We must not imagine that the people took no interest in the course of affairs.

On the contrary the burning issues of the day were discussed in public house and marketplace with the same vivacity with which politics are now debated in the New England country store.

"The Word of God was disputed, rhymed, sung and jangled in every alehouse and {308} tavern," says a contemporary state paper.

In private, graver men argued with the high spirit reflected in More's dialogues.
Four parties may be plainly discerned.

First and most numerous were the strict Anglicans, orthodox and royalist, comprising the greater part of the crown-loving, priest-hating and yet, in intellectual matters, conservative common people.