Excerpt from A History of the English Church, Vol. 1 of 2: During the Civil Wars and Under the Commonwealth; 1640-1660 The scope of this work is intentionally restricted. It is not a history of religion in England during the years 1640-60. It is therefore not concerned either with the history of Dogma or with that of the Sects or of the three Denominations. The history of the Congregationalists as such, or of the Baptists as such, or of the Presbyterians as such, or of the Quakers as such, or of any of the Sects as such, must be sought in the separate histories of those bodies. The bearing of the present work is quite different. The years 1640-60 witnessed the most complete and drastic revolution which the Church of England has ever undergone. Its whole structure was ruthlessly demolished - Episcopacy, the Spiritual Courts, Deans and Chapters, Convocation, the Book of Common Prayer, the Thirty-nine Articles, and the Psalter; the lands of the Bishops and of the Deans and Chapters were sold, and the Cathedrals were purified or defiled. On the clean-swept ground an entirely novel Church system was erected. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.