Puritanism

Puritanism
Puritanism was a religion in the 16th Century made by Christian fanatics. During Charles II's reign (1630-1685) a new version of the bible was published allowing Christians to get their own ideas. Hence the religion Puritanism was born.

Early Days
The vast majority of Puritans where once Protestant; but when they read the bible and heard about this new religion they had other ideas. They took the bible literally, they didn't want anything fancy in life. Bland clothing; boring celebrations and no beautiful churches.

Charles disliked this religion quite a lot to say the least, in fact he was seen as the exact opposite of a Puritan. Puritans thought he believed in Catholicism, and one character of a Catholic monarch is that they loved things to be glorious. Obviously this was seen as quite a big problem for Puritans and for Charles; but Puritans had one thing Charles didn't have, a crazy love for their religion. They had ears cut off, were imprisoned and overall tortured by the vast Protestant community.

The Rise
It was obvious that at these times an argument would never end with out some sort of war. So began the English Civil War in 1642. At this point in the 17th Century, Puritans had taken over Parliament. Although this wasn't enough to budge a monarch believing in the Divine Right of the King.

Charles II dominated the early stages of the war, the star of the show being his cavalry. But a weakness was found in the King's army, the man who found it was called Oliver Cromwell. This was something Charles could not simply fix, it required training and he just did not have time to loose.

Discipline was the one thing Charles didn't have in his army. Soldiers would often ride off on their trusty steed and loot enemy camps. Although this sounds like it might benefit the King, it left soldiers on foot like sitting ducks. Many battles were lost because of this lack of discipline, and Cromwell's army, The Ironsides definitely had discipline.

The Deterioration of Puritans
Puritans silently cheered in their god loving minds when they won the English Civil War in 1648 and a short lived quarrel after that. But Parliament were still the same, they wanted power. A lot of power. Cromwell had to shut Parliament down, people were too power hungry and he did it for the better of England, Protestantism came back later on in the Stuart days, almost wiping out all Puritans left. A short lived victory for the Puritans, but worth the while.