The English Civil War

Although a reader of his poetry may not suspect it, the world in which Herrick lived and wrote was one marked, in great part, by the chaos of war. In 1637, King Charles I attempted to legally force the Scots to adopt the Anglican liturgy in place of their favored Presbyterian one. The Scots, understandably outraged, protested and eventually gathered an army that, by 1640, was bordering the northern counties of England. Refusing to back down, Charles I summoned the Long Parliament and petitioned them for money with which he could finance a war against the Scots; the Long Parliament agreed but insisted on a number of reforms in what the Puritans among them saw as a corrupted monarchy. After two years of bitter disagreements, both Charles and the Long Parliament raised armies and began the English Civil War in 1642, generally fought between the "cavaliers" (Royalists...