Politics, Religion and Society in England, 1679-1742
Geoffrey Holmes FBA

Geoffrey Holmes's work on English history between the Exclusion Crisis and the fall of Walpole is fundamental to the understanding of the period. British Politics in the Age of Anne by its magisterial sweep and effortless grasp of detail established a reputation that has been confirmed by his other books, The Trial of Doctor Sacheverell and Augustan England: Professions, State and Society, 1680-1730. His essays complement rather than repeat his other work and make a well-rounded and characteristically stylish collection.

Between 1679 and 1742 English politics experienced the birth, vigorous life and demise of 'the first age of party'. Professor Holmes begins by explaining how the electorate, large and more responsive to the national will down to 1722 than is often thought, but thereafter subdued, held the key to much of the saga. In the remainder of Part I he studies forces and individuals which ran across the party grain: the 'Country' tradition which led to a persistent campaign in the early eighteenth century to restrict government influences of the House of Commons, and the two shrewdest political operators of the period, Harley and Walpole.

In the first five essays in Part II of the collection the author takes two main themes: the politically disruptive power of religion in late Stuart England; and the capacity of English society, through its fundamental stability - however much it was buffeted by ideological forces and 'the rage of party'. In the end, Holmes argues, such developments as the expansion of the professions and rising national wealth and living standards, made an important long-term contribution to the restoration of political stability also. Even the frightening 'Church in danger riots in London in 1710 were the work of a 'mob' which, socially was astonishingly respectable and quite unrevolutionary.