Muldrew traces the integration of Aristotelian into Christian thinking about happiness, by Thomas Aquinas and during the Renaissance but more particularly in the thinking of late seventeenth-century ‘Latitudinarian’ divines. He argues that they were seeking an alternative way to achieve peace and tranquillity to that offered by Hobbes, who had stressed the need for strong authority. Their alternative drew on a variety of classical ideas about self-cultivation and self-discipline, but built upon and further developed relatively hedonistic versions of these. The pursuit of moderate sensual gratification was legitimized as an appropriate use of human faculties implanted by God. Although this was an erudite tradition, it was presented to a less erudite audience in sermons: these writers often transposed ideas from a classical to an English-language setting. In that context, the word ‘happiness’ came to loom large, appearing frequently and functioning as a key motif in latitudinarian thought.