This chapter traces the consequences of the Laudians’ view of the church as the house of God for the internal arrangements and beautification of the church and its fabric. It draws out the full practical and theological significance of the Laudian ideal of the beauty of holiness. Their claims that their policies and practices were based in part on the Jewish temple and in part on the cathedrals and the Chapel Royal are outlined and assessed.

This chapter outlines the Laudian view of the church as a physical space and architectural structure and as the house of God and thus as a repository of the divine presence. It follows their sense of that presence throughout the building and finds it centred on the altar. The Laudians traced that vision through salvation history from Abraham’s altar at Bethel, through the Tabernacle and the Temple of the Old Law, and then through the succession of Christian churches since the apostles. Laudian practice was thus based on the successive and overlapping dictates of the natural law, the Mosaic law, the gospel and the practices of the apostles and of church tradition.