This volume collects and reprints some of the most important essays written by Blair Worden over the past thirty years or so, all of them exploring facets of what, in his pithy introduction, he refers to as ‘the broken landscape of the 1650s’. Some are little changed from the original, particularly the opening trio on aspects of Oliver Cromwell's own faith and on religious outlooks and policies during the Cromwellian Protectorate, together exploring how ‘Puritanism’ worked and impacted upon the political and governmental worlds, how Cromwell and his milieu interpreted God's signs and messages and how they sought to follow what they took to be the Lord's will, directions and goals in terms of their own lives and of public policy. Since they first appeared, they have been widely admired and accepted as a key starting-point for understanding Cromwell's faith and religious policies and remain hugely impressive works of scholarship. Other pieces here have been more significantly rewritten, embellished and extended, so that some are now well beyond the normal length of a journal article or a chapter in an edited volume, most notably the fourth, meticulously researched piece, on Cromwellian Oxford and on the pursuit of godly reformation at that university – though to some extent also seen as a microcosm of the wider pursuit of reformation in Cromwellian England – which here runs to over a hundred pages. The next two pieces, both of them significantly extended compared to their original published forms, focus on aspects of government during the Cromwellian Protectorate, giving less space to its religious basis and outlook, and exploring more secular and practical elements of Protectoral rule. Here and elsewhere, Worden seems to be moving away from the portrayal of Lord Protector Cromwell as a constitutional head of state and of Protectoral central government as comprising several powerful and balanced bodies, and towards that of most central power resting with Lord General Cromwell, his fellow military commanders and the army, that is towards military rather than civilian and constitutional rule. This reviewer, for one, remains far from convinced by this, believing that it underplays the significant role and power of bodies such as the Protectoral Council and presents an image of the Protectorate which, in secular governmental terms, is unduly limited and negative. Picking up on some earlier themes, a brace of chapters explores wider issues current during the 1650s as a whole, namely the role and possible restoration of a single ruler at the head of government and state and the pursuit and varying interpretations of liberty. The closing two chapters, while rich and fascinating assessments, are rather different, as they examine the outlooks and ideas of two figures who had little or no power in English government during the 1650s, John Milton and the exiled Edward Hyde, earl of Clarendon. Taken together, this collection allows the reader to revisit many old pieces which have stood the test of time, as well as to appreciate new, revised or expanded arguments. Given its origins and nature, it is inevitable that a volume of this sort will contain a few gaps, overlaps and tangents, but in the main this is a vibrant and compelling examination of the (religiously informed and shaped) government and politics of the English republic and of its charismatic leading figure, Oliver Cromwell.