This book explores the preaching and printing of sermons by royalists during the English Revolution. While scholars have long recognised the central role played by preachers in driving forward the parliamentarian war-effort, the use of the pulpit by the king’s supporters has rarely been considered. The Lord’s battle, however, argues that the pulpit offered an especially vital platform for clergymen who opposed the dramatic changes in Church and state that England experienced in the mid-seventeenth century. It shows that royalists after 1640 were moved to rethink earlier attitudes to preaching and print, as the unique potential for sermons to influence both popular and elite audiences became clear. As well as contributing to our understanding of preaching during the Civil Wars therefore, this book engages with recent debates about the nature of royalism in seventeenth-century England.

'White's book offers an important addition to the recent literature devoted to drawing out the complexities and internal fissures of royalism by using sermons to show that episcopalian royalism was an option that needed to be argued for and defended instead of being the default position.'
Journal of British Studies

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William White is a Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellow at the University of York