Decline of Puritinism
The seventeenth century in American history witnessed the arrival of a devout religious group known as the Puritans to the New England area. Whether unsatisfied with the seemingly slow progress of the Protestant Reformation in their home country of England, or fearing for their lives because of anti-Puritan persecutions, they eventually made their way to the New World with the goal of living and worshipping freely for God. Though the Puritan settlement at Massachusetts Bay in 1630 was started off at a larger scale than any others in colonial America, the faith managed to fully lose its dominant cultural impact in these settlements in the nineteenth century. Essentially, this demise was the result of Puritanism's own strict social, political, and religious doctrines.Though the Puritans were essentially supporters of liberty, they were restrained in social conduct to a degree incomparable to any contemporary standards. The idea of religion and government as one functioning system, or paternalism, was at the heart of their colonial settlements. It was mutually agreed upon by the Puritans that the purpose of government was to enforce the will of God. Therefore, social aspects like dress and family were considered within the ju
As compared to the more democratic of the colonies, the Puritan settlements contrasted well in political regard. In these colonies, only freemen, or adult churchgoers, were permitted to vote in provincial elections, which left over half the population without the privilege. Anyone who exempted themselves from church services was fined, imprisoned, or whipped, and a citizen who denied the divine origin of any book of the Bible received a harsher sentence. In addition to the social and politic rigidity of the Puritan order, stern religious limitations may have played a role in the faith's decline. One man was forced to spend hours in the stocks for kissing his in front of his home after returning from three years at sea. For women, lace was not considered an acceptable article of clothing in Puritan society, and their attire had to have acceptable sleeve measurements. risdiction of the system, and an extensive and outrageous list of laws, called the sumptuary laws, was created concerning communal behavior. At the same time, a man was subject to prosecution if he wore long hair, and men were not even allowed to kiss their wives in public situations. . The political outlook of the Puritan faith was very similar to the social mindset; the people loved freedom, but their religion's standards were at best limitedly democratic in many regards. More or less, the religious policies of raw New England Puritanism were replaced with more liberal denominations throughout the eighteenth century. As a result of these policies, most immigrants of the early 1700s settled in the middle colonies, where ethnic diversity and greater religious tolerance were the norm. Puritanism, founded on the strictest form Calvinism, really served legalistic purposes rather than spiritual ones. Dress, voting privileges, taxes, and even spiritual beliefs were all dictated, and as such, freedom of choice was hard to come by. In all actuality, such harsh social policies could have done nothing more effectively than bread dissenters over time.
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