During the reign of Queen Victoria, herself an ardent theatregoer as well as Supreme Governor of the Church of England, a remarkable rapprochement was effected between the Church and the stage. This 1997 book explores the implications for the theatre of the great religious movements of the period: Tractarianism, Christian Socialism and Latitudinarianism. This central relationship is seen in the context of other important themes in Victorian cultural history such as censorship, urbanization, transport, leisure, self-improvement and women's emancipation. The volume contains portraits of significant churchmen, dramatists, actors and actresses, including Newman and Keble, Bulwer Lytton and Shaw, Irving, Fanny Kemble and Ellen Terry. They were amongst the influential figures who participated in the search for a common culture which preoccupied the nineteenth century. To the Victorians the Church and the theatre were important parts of everyday life; in this study the two institutions are explored in relation not only to each other but also to the social, economic and intellectual movements of the period.

A comprehensive survey of the theatre practice and dramatic literature of the Victorian period.

In this, the second part of his history of the Industrial Revolution, Richard Brown examines the political and religious developments which took place in Britain between the 1780s and 1840s in terms of the aristocratic elite and through the expression of alternative radical ideologies. Opening with a discussion of the nature of history, and of Britain in 1700, it goes on to consider Britain's foreign policy, the emergence of the modern state and the mid-century 'crisis' of the 1840s. Unlike many previous works, it emphasises British not just English history. It is this diversity of experience and the focus on continuity as well as change, women as well as men, that makes this a distinctive text. Students will also find the theoretical foundations of historical narrative and analysis clearly explained.

This book, covering the period 1832 to 1868, describes how the so-called &"church rates&" controversy contributed to the rise of a secular liberal state in England and Wales. The church rate was an ancient tax required of all ratepayers, regardless of denomination, for the upkeep of parish churches of the Church of England. This meant that Dissenters and other non-Anglicans paid for the support of the established Church. In the 1830s, however, the Dissenters determined to tolerate the situation no longer. The resulting thirty-six-year struggle became the central church-state issue of the Victorian period. Ellens further argues that church rates played a pivotal role in the shaping of Victorian liberalism. Dissenters desired a society in which church and state would be separate and religious affairs voluntary. When Gladstone decided to champion the Dissenters' &"voluntaryist&" cause in the 1860s, he established the relationship that would give him the solid basis of electoral strength he needed to carry out the great liberal reforms of his governments after 1868. Elegantly written and argued, this book carefully details the process of disestablishment in England and Wales and uncovers an important and little-recognized dimension to the formation of the Liberal party.

This book, covering the period 1832 to 1868, describes how the so-called "church rates" controversy contributed to the rise of a secular liberal state in England and Wales. The church rate was an ancient tax required of all ratepayers, regardless of denomination, for the upkeep of parish churches of the Church of England. This meant that Dissenters and other non-Anglicans paid for the support of the established Church. In the 1830s, however, the Dissenters determined to tolerate the situation no longer. The resulting thirty-six-year struggle became the central church-state issue of the Victorian period. Ellens further argues that church rates played a pivotal role in the shaping of Victorian liberalism. Dissenters desired a society in which church and state would be separate and religious affairs voluntary. When Gladstone decided to champion the Dissenters' "voluntaryist" cause in the 1860s, he established the relationship that would give him the solid basis of electoral strength he needed to carry out the great liberal reforms of his governments after 1868. Elegantly written and argued, this book carefully details the process of disestablishment in England and Wales and uncovers an important and little-recognized dimension to the formation of the Liberal party.

Examines the entanglement of secularity and liberality in the foundation of the modern state in Britain. "Modern" Britain emerged from the outcome of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. The rather standard Whig account of the long nineteenth century is one of growing stability, progress and improvement. And yet nothing was preordained or inevitable about the period's stability. Ruling elites felt the constant anxieties of revolutionary terrorism. As Lubenow argues, it was a period of disorganization seeking organization. The great nineteenth-century reform acts against religious monopoly were aspects of this process of political organization. While religion did not disappear, these political actions gradually changed the constitutional position of religion. As a result, a political vacuum was created which was then filled by a secular "clerisy". These "fit and proper persons", educated in the reformed universities, qualified by success in competitive examinations, began to fill positions in the Civil Service and in the professions. The effect was to replace the eighteenth-century system of confessional loyalties with a liberal political culture based on merit. Lubenow's latest study examines the work of these intertwining nineteenth-century secular-liberal processes. Steeped deeply in archival research, this book considers biographical characteristics such as education, political connections and social associations, but it is equally conceptually guided by categories such as liberalism and secularism. It fills an important gap in the political history of nineteenth-century British liberalism by taking up the question of entanglement of secularity and liberality in the foundation of the modern state.

Concerned here broadly with the period 1829-59, Professor Chadwick writes of the church's precarious position at the start of the period, and the problems of dissent; the Whig reform of the Church by the ministries of Peel and Melbourne; the Oxford Movement, the influence of Newman and the development of ritual; the relations of church and government under Lord John Russell; the growth of the seven principal dissenting bodies; the theory and practice of Church and State at mid-century, and the troubles that arose over eucharistic worship; and finally the unsettlement of faith and the several attempts at restatement at the close of the period. The history is completed in The Victorian Church, Part II 1860-1901.