While the Cromwellian ecclesiastical establishment has often been portrayed in negative terms as the absence of a national church, Chapter 10 supports the case for seeing this establishment in many practical respects (and in the eyes of many serving ministers) as a continuation of the pre-war national church. The chapter discusses how many aspects of the Church settlement were conceptualized and organized at a national level, and the sustained pressure for religious uniformity. A further section discusses the ‘half-life’ of the reforms of the 1640s – an existing Reformation that lurked constantly in the background in this decade, its formularies reprinted and in some cases still deployed. The chapter also seeks to capture something of the Cromwellian church on the ground, where gathered and parochial church forms existed rather awkwardly side by side, where local practice was marked by creativity and improvisation, and where the ritual life of parishes was not as attenuated and token as is sometimes suggested. A final section explores how far the reformers of the 1650s -- and even its most radical spirits -- still situated their positions with reference to the past history of the Church of England and some of its famous figures.

Chapter 7 traces the emergence of the Reformation implemented by the parliamentarian side in the Civil War. After noting the ambiguous status of the Westminster Assembly, the chapter analyses the drawing up of the Westminster Confession, the Directory for Public Worship, the Catechisms and the form of Presbyterian church government. In each case, it is argued that these represented more sweeping changes than the limited reforms originally contemplated by Parliament. But in each case, it is also demonstrated that the new formularies reflected many pre-war ideas and forms, while the orthodoxy of the Thirty-nine Articles and the Book of Common Prayer was still partly maintained. The reform of church government reflected the continuing determination of Parliament to retain ecclesiastical control. The second half of the chapter describes how these reforms were presented and understood, noting how shared discourses of anti-Laudianism, the covenant, fellowship with the foreign Reformed churches, providentialism, and biblicism both justified the changes but also created a language that could be turned against fellow parliamentarians. It is concluded that, for all the radical changes being contemplated and (partly) implemented, the Westminster Reformation encompassed a mixture of change and continuity with the pre-war church.