Why did the Puritan experiment finally collapse?
The Puritans’ charter was revoked in 1689, so the Puritans could no longer compel assent. They had to tolerate Quakers and Anglicans. This created a real crisis of meaning: How do we survive in a pluralistic world? Today, we take religious toleration for granted. What would terrify us would be the exact opposite a theocracy, such as we see in the Middle East. How much have the Puritans shaped American culture? Though some scholars disagree, I believe Puritanism shaped American society to an extraordinary degree. Recently, historians have pointed out rightly, I think that we cannot forget the contribution of Quakers, Presbyterians, native Americans, African-American slaves, and so on. But the Puritans were more than merely one group among many. They exerted an influence in American culture disproportionate to their numbers. For instance, they gave us a world-regenerative creed, a vision that America is “a city set upon a hill.” That vision infuses American literature, foreign policy our
