The decade after 1619 is commonly seen as a decisive watershed in the doctrinal evolution of the Church of England. Just as the Synod of Dort, with which it began, is taken as confirmation and summit of the allegiance of that church to international Calvinism, so the Declaration prefixed to the Thirty-nine Articles, which marked its end, is regarded as the final step by which that same Calvinism was effectively outlawed. In the years between, the publication of the controversial works of Richard Montagu and the failure to condemn them at the York House Conference, coupled with the episcopal changes of 1626–8 and above all the appointment of Montagu himself to the see of Chichester are taken to be the major steps whereby a previously dominant Calvinist theology was replaced by Arminianism and its hierarchy swamped by adherents of the new doctrine. This was the decade, in short, which saw ‘the rise of English Arminianism’.

That picture, it will be argued, is conceptually flawed and at odds with much of the evidence, which demands a much more subtle colouring than any simplistic ‘Calvinist’ and ‘Arminian’ polarity is capable of accommodating. While it will not be denied that there was at one stage strong support for the Remonstrants, hitherto unused evidence will be adduced to show that it antedated rather than followed the appearance of the New Gagg. An attempt will be made to relate it to other developments, ecclesiastical and political, that were more or less coincident with it. The evolution of Richard Montagu's theology will thereafter be reviewed, and its orientation in its contemporary setting assessed; it will be suggested that the concerns of Durham House were substantially independent of support for the Remonstrants in the English Church.