ABSTRACT
This chapter examines some of the achievements of social historians writing in the 1970s and 1980s. It would be foolish to suggest that the development of many different religious views in post-Reformation England, did not produce strains and stresses that threatened the stability of early Stuart England. Historians who approached the history of society in the ways were rightly excited at the prospect of revealing aspects of the lives of people in the past. Instead, individuals 'disappeared' from the registers, a symptom of large-scale internal migration, conclusive evidence for which has been provided by historians working on many sources. The concept of 'the scientific revolution' to describe changes in the intellectual climate of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is more acceptable than the idea of 'an educational revolution'. Numerous contemporary treatises reflect the high value placed by many on education to produce an educated magistracy and to promote Protestantism by increasing the ability to read and interpret the Bible.
