Delivering his last provincial account in 1632, Archbishop Abbot informed the King that ‘there is not in the Church of England left any inconformable minister which appeareth’, although the bishops of London and Lincoln had been forced to deprive two or three divines, ‘whom no time can tame, nor instruction conquer’. Six years later, William Juxon, the Bishop of London, made his annual report to Abbot's successor, William Laud, and, after taking note of a brief squabble in the city occasioned by ‘some over-nice curiousities’ expressed in the pulpit, claimed ‘there is but one noted refractory person that stands out in that diocese, and he is now under suspension’. These accounts present, from either end of the decade, a diocese essentially at peace, with the occasional disciplinary duty and an infrequent need for peacemaking falling under the pastoral eye of the bishop. The task of this section is to scratch beneath the surface of this picture to test its validity, to see if this was a decade of tranquillity and to measure the perception of the ecclesiastical establishment against that of the godly ministers. In the course of the discussion a number of themes emerge: firstly, I will examine in a little detail the experience of Thomas Hooker between 1628 and 1633 to see how debates among the godly, particularly regarding the Prayer Book ceremonies, underwent a crucial transition during these years. The issues which animate these ministers lead us to variations in response to changing perceptions: it becomes possible to discuss different trajectories of experience and gain an insight into their doubts and resolutions.