The  opposition  of  the  authorities  of  the  English  Church,
under  the  impulse  of  the  queen,  to  the  modifications  de-


THOMAS   CARTWRIGHT.  1 9

sired  by  the  Puritans,  led  to  a  second  stage  in  Puritan
development,  and  one  much  more  radical  in  its  departure
from  the  polity  of  the  Establishment  than  that  just  con-
sidered. The  forcible  retention  of  vestments  and  cere-
monies which  the  growing  Protestantism  of  the  reform
party  increasingly  condemned  soon  led  to  questionings  as
to  whether  the  system  itself  which  permitted  their  reten-
tion was  that  divinely  intended  as  the  normal  polity  of  the
church ;  some  Puritans  no  longer  criticised  rites  and  gar-
ments, they  began  to  examine  the  constitution  of  the  English
Establishment  in  its  fundamental  principles.  Naturally,  the
test  by  which  they  judged  it  was  largely  borrowed  from
Geneva.  The  leader  in  this  second  stage  of  Puritanism
was  Thomas  Cartwright.  Born  in  1535,  he  was  identified
with  the  University  of  Cambridge  from  the  year  1547,  and
as  student,  fellow,  and  teacher  contributed  more  than  any
other  Englishman  toward  making  that  seminary  a  strong-
hold of  Calvinism.  His  greatest  prominence  came  in  1569,
when  he  became  Lady  Margaret  professor  of  divinity  in
his  university ;  but  this  post  of  influence  exposed  him  to
the  immediate  attack  of  the  Anglicans,  of  whom  the  most
prominent  was  John  Whitgift,  the  later  Archbishop  of  Can-
terbury. By  this  opposition  Cartwright  was  compelled  to
abandon  his  professorship  in  December,  1570,  and  in  Sep-
tember, 15 7 1,  he  was  driven  from  his  fellowship;  thence-
forward, till  his  death,  in  1603,  to  be  a  sufTerer  for  his
belief.
