Puritanism

Puritanism was originally a movement within the Church of England which sought to take the English Reformation further than it had been taken by Queen Elizabeth I in what is sometimes referred to as the Elizabethan Religious Settlement. The Puritans, influenced by European reform movements such as Calvinism, sought to remove practices they regarded as unscriptural. Reaction against the Puritans by the Church hierarchy caused many to settle in the newly established American colonies.