Tudor Protestant Political Thought 1547-1603

The Reformation of the sixteenth-century is commonly seen as the transitional period between the medieval and the modern worlds. This study examines the political thought of England during its period of religious reform from the reign of Edward VI to the death of Elizabeth I. The political thought of Tudor ecclesiastics was heavily informed by the institutional and intellectual upheavals in England and on the continent, producing tensions between traditional ways of conceptualising politics and new religious and political realities. This book offers a study of natural law, providentialism, cosmic order, political authority, and government by consent in Protestant political thought during a transitional period in English history. It shows how the Reformation was central to the birth of modern political thought.