Church of England by 1603 (AQA A-Level History): Revision Notes
Church of England by 1603
Introduction
By 1603, the Anglican Church had endured its first half-century of existence. The newly established Church faced sustained challenges from both Protestant reformers who demanded further changes and Catholics who rejected the break from Rome entirely. Despite these attacks from opposite directions, the religious settlement of 1559 remained largely intact at Elizabeth's death. This survival was not accidental but resulted from a combination of political determination, institutional mechanisms, popular acceptance, and external circumstances.
The Church of England's survival is remarkable considering it faced opposition from two opposing directions: Catholics who wanted a return to Rome, and Puritans who wanted more radical Protestant reforms. Understanding the mechanisms that enabled its survival helps explain the development of English religious identity.
Why the Church of England survived
Elizabeth's commitment to the settlement
Elizabeth viewed the 1559 settlement as the most effective means of achieving both religious and political stability in her realm. Her determined opposition to Puritan demands meant that they struggled to use Parliament as a vehicle for altering the settlement's fundamental elements. The Queen's personal conviction that this middle path served England best gave the Church crucial protection from those seeking more radical Protestant reforms.
Support from Archbishop Whitgift
After 1583, Elizabeth gained a powerful ally in John Whitgift, who became Archbishop of Canterbury that year. Whitgift offered uncompromising support for Anglicanism, providing the Queen with an ecclesiastical champion against those advocating more extreme positions within the Church of England. His appointment strengthened the conservative wing of the Church hierarchy and made it substantially harder for reformers to push their agenda through official channels.
The Court of High Commission
The Court of High Commission provided legal machinery for prosecuting religious dissenters. This institution gave authorities practical methods to pursue those who challenged Anglican doctrine and practice. Laws such as the Treason Act served as deterrents, discouraging open resistance to the established Church. The existence of these enforcement mechanisms meant that opposition to Anglicanism carried real risks.
The Court of High Commission was crucial to the Church's survival because it provided institutional power to prosecute religious radicals. Without legal mechanisms to enforce conformity, the settlement would have been far more vulnerable to challenges from both Catholics and Puritans.
Popular acceptance of the middle way
Radicals represented, by definition, those who advocated extreme positions. Most English people found the Church of England's moderate approach appealing. The Church retained traditional Catholic ceremonial and appearance whilst incorporating doctrines that emphasised personal faith over elaborate ritual. This combination satisfied many who disliked the 'innovations' promoted by Puritans. Radicalism consequently remained less widespread than the turbulent events of the period might suggest.
The "middle way" appealed to ordinary English people because it preserved familiar ceremonies and church practices whilst embracing Protestant theology. This combination meant that religious change didn't feel as radical or disruptive as it might have been under a purely Puritan approach.
Compulsory attendance and social pressure
Attendance at Anglican services became mandatory from 1559, with fines enforcing this requirement. In small communities, absence from church services attracted gossip and could result in social isolation. This peer pressure proved effective in maintaining conformity. Non-attendance marked individuals as different, potentially unreliable, or even disloyal.
Discrediting of Catholicism
Catholicism in England suffered from its association with rebellion against the legitimate monarch. Catholics also faced accusations of supporting foreign (Spanish and papal) interference in English affairs. These connections damaged Catholic credibility and made their alternative to Anglicanism appear treasonous rather than merely theological.
European context
Events across Europe during Elizabeth's reign provided cautionary examples. Bitter divisions between Puritan minorities and their Catholic rulers in France and the Netherlands resulted in devastating civil wars. These conflicts reminded English observers of the dangers inherent in allowing religious disagreements to escalate. The spectacle of religious warfare abroad strengthened arguments for maintaining England's own settlement.
The European context was crucial to the settlement's survival. English people could see the consequences of religious conflict in France (the Wars of Religion) and the Netherlands (the Dutch Revolt). These brutal conflicts made the Anglican compromise seem preferable to religious extremism.
Generational influence
By 1603, the Anglican Church had shaped the attitudes of two generations of English people. Religious authorities had spent these decades discussing and defining the Church's essential beliefs. They also developed a licensing system to monitor the quality of the clergy. This institutional maturity made the Church's position more secure, as it had become embedded in English life and identity.
Richard Hooker and The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity
Hooker's intellectual defense
Anglicanism survived partly because it gained powerful support and partly because it offered an acceptable compromise between Roman Catholicism and extreme Protestantism. Its supporters gradually developed theological justifications for this position. The most effective intellectual case for the Anglican Church came from Richard Hooker in The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, published in 1593.
Hooker accepted that the Church of England represented a compromise between Catholic tradition and continental Protestant ideas. However, he argued forcefully that this was far from being merely a convenient political arrangement. Instead, the Anglican 'middle way' represented true Christian faith, built upon medieval traditions whilst incorporating continuity from the early Church.
Hooker's The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1593) provided the first comprehensive theological and philosophical defense of Anglicanism. Before Hooker, the Church had political and institutional support, but lacked a sophisticated intellectual justification. His work transformed Anglicanism from a political compromise into a defendable theological position.
The "middle way" concept
Hooker contended that the unnecessary and superstitious additions made by the medieval papacy had been removed, revealing the essentials of early Christianity. These essentials were relatively straightforward: faith in Christ based upon reading the Bible and commemoration of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. Other matters, such as the precise nature and conduct of ceremonies and the extent and role of decoration, were "matters indifferent". These could safely be left to the discretion of the monarch and bishops.
Hooker viewed bishops as convenient and effective organisational tools rather than essential to the Church itself. He accepted them as practical means of maintaining order and Christian unity. For the sake of order and unity, the existing ceremonies should be accepted and valued for the decency and order they provided.
The concept of "matters indifferent" (also called adiaphora) was central to Hooker's argument. This meant that issues like ceremonial practices, church decoration, and vestments were not essential to salvation. They could therefore be determined by the monarch and bishops without compromising true Christian faith. This gave the Anglican settlement flexibility and theological legitimacy.
Political context of the settlement
The 1559 settlement had been shaped by immediate political concerns. However, by the 1590s, time, practice and the authority of tradition had enabled it to establish a genuinely Anglican identity that many wished to defend. Catholicism had declined in influence, and the attachment many people felt to its practices had transferred to the Anglican Church. Puritans had demanded changes too aggressively and too rapidly, leading to their defeat. Even so, the divisions that Elizabeth had inherited had not healed entirely, and these divisions would widen in the following century.
Political success of Anglicanism
In political terms, establishing Anglicanism proved successful. England avoided the destructive civil wars over religious identity and choice that ravaged France and the Netherlands. Elizabeth emerged as a strong and independent monarch, partly because she was not bound to papal wishes and partly because control of the Church gave her substantial powers of patronage and a new source of authority over her subjects.
The political success of Anglicanism should not be underestimated. By avoiding religious civil war, England was able to focus on economic development, overseas expansion, and cultural achievements (the Elizabethan Renaissance). The Church of England also gave the monarch unprecedented control over both spiritual and temporal matters, strengthening royal authority.
Shortcomings of the Church of England
Quality of the clergy
In religious terms, the change to Anglicanism produced more mixed outcomes. The Church did not necessarily address the criticisms of the clergy that had fuelled demands for reformation in the 1520s. When measured against the high standards that Puritans demanded of their ministers, the Anglican Church appeared to retain the same moral failings that had tainted Catholicism.
Evidence from Puritan surveys
A Puritan survey of ministers conducted in Essex in 1586 revealed numerous examples of unsuitable clergy:
Evidence from the Essex Survey (1586)
The following examples illustrate Puritan concerns about clergy quality:
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Mr Ocklei, parson of Much Tey: identified as a gamester
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Mr Durdent, vicar of Stebbing: described as a drunkard, gamester and gross abuser of the Scriptures, with witnesses including Mr Denham and Mr Rogers
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Mr Durden, parson of Mashbury: characterised as a careless man, gamester, ale-house haunter and company keeper who sometimes appeared drunk, with witnesses including Richard Reynolds and John Argent
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Mr Cuckson, vicar of Linsell: noted as unable to preach, having been a pilferer
A report to the Royal Council concerning the state of religion in Lancashire and Cheshire in the early 1590s painted a similarly concerning picture. The report noted that small reformation had occurred in these counties, as evidenced by the emptiness of churches on Sundays and holidays. The people swarmed the streets and alehouses during service time, leaving many churches with only the curate and his clerk present. The people lacked instruction, preachers were few, most parsons were unlearned, and no examination was made of schools and schoolmasters. The proclamation for apprehending Jesuits, seminaries and mass priests was not executed.
Cautions about source reliability
These sources require careful handling. As reliable evidence of the actual state of the Church and clergy during Elizabeth's reign, they present problems. Both sources originated from Puritans who had clear motives to exaggerate clerical failings in order to strengthen their case for further reform. Their accounts may therefore present a distorted picture designed to support their arguments rather than provide balanced assessments.
When evaluating evidence about the quality of the clergy, remember that sources must be assessed for bias and purpose. The Puritan surveys were produced by critics of the Church who wanted to demonstrate the need for further reform. While they may contain accurate information, they likely emphasised failures and ignored successes. This doesn't mean they're worthless as evidence, but they must be balanced against other sources and evaluated critically.
Historical perspectives
Protestant historians have tended to view the Elizabethan Church settlement positively, though Catholic writers have been more critical. More recent historians have questioned the wisdom of the entire settlement given the divisions it caused. They have also adopted a more nuanced view of Elizabeth's policies concerning religion. The explosiveness of Puritanism in the seventeenth century damaged the Church, but it recovered after the Civil Wars with a structure and set of beliefs that remained virtually unchanged from 1559. This continuity has persisted, with some adaptation, into the twenty-first century.
Key Points to Remember:
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Elizabeth's determination to preserve the 1559 settlement, combined with Archbishop Whitgift's support after 1583, provided the Church of England with strong leadership against both Catholic and Puritan challenges.
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Richard Hooker's The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1593) offered an intellectual justification for Anglicanism as a "middle way" between Catholic tradition and Protestant reform, arguing that many ceremonial matters were "indifferent" and could be left to episcopal discretion.
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The Church survived through multiple mechanisms: the Court of High Commission prosecuted dissenters, compulsory attendance created social pressure for conformity, and Catholicism was discredited through its association with foreign interference and rebellion.
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By 1603, two generations of English people had been influenced by Anglican teaching, giving the Church institutional maturity and embedding it in English identity, despite ongoing problems with clergy quality that Puritan critics highlighted.
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Politically, Anglicanism succeeded in avoiding the religious civil wars that devastated France and the Netherlands, whilst strengthening Elizabeth's independent authority through Church patronage, even though religious divisions persisted into the next century.