In the 1630s, Falkland and his friends began to use Socinian ideas to re-interpret Christianity and to defend their Church against its Catholic and Puritan detractors. The scholars of Great Tew had found time and leisure to contemplate religious questions during the ‘calm and tranquillity’ that had prevailed in England for much of that decade. With the outbreak of rebellion in Scotland in the late 1630s and then in England in 1642, however, the calm was shattered and scholarly retreat was no longer possible. Instead, Falkland's friends began to turn their attention to more political issues, and almost all placed themselves and their pens at the service of their king. The support Charles received from the Royalist writers associated with the Great Tew Circle was particularly strong; several denounced Parliamentarian resistance in uncompromising terms. Their arguments were striking and, in an English context, quite novel, but this chapter will show that these Royalists make most sense when placed within a broader European discussion about natural law, Christianity, and civil society. This was, of course, a discussion in which Socinianism loomed large. Indeed, some of the Royalists built their critique of Parliament's actions upon intellectual foundations which they shared with the Socinians. The pamphlets which they produced, and the reactions which these pamphlets provoked, helped to alter the constitutional debate on both the Royalist and the Parliamentarian side.

The distinction suggested by the Socinians between nature and the law of Christ was put to important use during the English Civil War.