The English Reformation had broken with Rome, but to many it had not gone far enough. Puritans — the name began as an insult — wanted the Church of England purified of what they saw as unbiblical ceremony and governance, and shaped instead by Scripture alone.
More than a program of church reform, Puritanism was a way of life. It pressed for a disciplined conscience, sober family worship, diligent work as a calling, and a sermon-centered Sunday. It produced a vast literature of devotion and pastoral care, and theologians whose work shaped the Reformed tradition.
When reform within England stalled and pressure mounted, many Puritans emigrated — to the Netherlands, and famously to New England, where they sought to build a society ordered by their convictions. Puritanism's mark on the English-speaking world, for good and ill, ran deep and long.