The Puritans had overthrown the political tyranny of Charles, but in attempting to build up by force a kingdom of the saints on earth, they had established a spiritual tyranny, quite as irksome and quite as perishable, of their own.  Meanwhile they had failed to preserve the reputation for sanctity which formed the chief basis of their authority.  As soon as they had attained power, they were joined by men who professed their principles merely for selfish purposes; who vied with each other in presenting to the world the outward signs of Puritanism, and remained notoriously profligate in life and character.  The kingdom of the saints, objectionable as a tyranny, and finally identified in the popular mind with a hated hypocrisy, came to its inevitable end in the reaction of the Restoration.  But when the first fury of this reaction had passed away, it was evident that Puritanism survived it:  no longer a political power, but a moral influence which controlled the great body of the people, and gave to English habits and literature their distinctive tone of serious morality.

But for the time, all sight of this was lost.  The entry of Charles II into Whitehall was the sign for unlimited indulgence in all that had lately been forbidden.  “Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop."[84] The Puritans had pent up for so long the natural cravings for pleasure and gaiety, that, when the barriers were withdrawn, license and debauchery were necessary to satisfy appetites which a long-enforced abstinence had made abnormal.  In Vanburgh’s “Provoked Wife,” a comedy, like so many others of the time, at once very immoral and very entertaining, Sir John Brute thus excuses the virtues of his early life:  “I was afraid of being damned in those days; for I kept sneaking, cowardly company, fellows that went to church, said grace to their meat, and had not the least tincture of quality about them.” Heartfree:  “But I think you have got into a better gang now.” Sir John:  “Zoons, sir, my Lord Rake and I are hand in glove."[85] In the country, people were generally satisfied with getting back their May-poles and Sunday games.  But in London, where the rule of Puritanism had been the strictest, and above all among the courtiers, the new liberty resulted in a license and shamelessness unequalled in English history.

In the general proscription of Puritan ideas, the good were involved in the same destruction as the bad.  Religion was mocked at as a cloak for hypocrisy, self-restraint was thrown aside as an obstacle to enjoyment.  It was thought that emancipation from Puritan tyranny could not be attained more effectually than by a life of open licentiousness; by gambling and drunkenness.  Such, under the Restoration, were the occupations most attractive to the gentlemen of fashion.  Buckingham, Rochester, and the troop of courtiers who looked to them for an example, spent their lives in sinking into an ever deeper depravity.  Their thoughts