This chapter examines the ways in which the Laudians mixed and matched the authorities of scripture, of natural law, of apostolic and ecclesiastical tradition and of the positive law of the church. Where, on the issue of church government, the Laudians pushed the claims of scripture and of apostolic precept and precedent to assert and exalt the iure divino status of episcopacy, on the Sabbath they played down the authority of scripture and of apostolic practice, while exalting the authority of the church. The result was a nuanced position which refuted the scripturalist sabbatarianism of the puritans, while allowing the Laudians to retain an account of Sunday worship exalted enough for their own purposes and perfectly compatible with their account of the power of the church to consecrate holy times as well as places.

Having dealt with Laudianism as an ideology, and sought to reconstruct it in all its coherences and inner tensions, this chapter introduces the notion, and explains the value, of viewing it as a coalition made up of persons and groups of different views, with different levels of commitment to the Laudian agenda; some fully signed up to the whole package, others committed to some parts of it but not to others, others still merely performing compliance and collaboration with varying degrees of intensity and conviction.