In the context of continuing historical and theoretical controversies, this book undertakes a systematic comparative-historical analysis of religion and politics in three carefully selected cases. In England, Wiirttemberg, and Prussia, at the times when the rulers were attempting to introduce the apparatus of absolutist rule, there were very similar religious movements for the further reform of the Protestant state churches: the Puritan and Pietist movements. Yet, while sharing similar religious aims and ethos, Puritans and Pietists developed very different attitudes and activities in relation to would-be absolutist rule in each case. These ranged from the activism and anti-absolutism of English Puritans, through the passive anti-absolutism of Pietists in Wurttemberg, to the activism and support of absolutism of the Prussian Pietists. Such surprisingly different patterns of political contribution to the success or failure of absolutism - with its fundamental historical consequences - represent promising terrain for the generation and testing of a coherent explanation.