Says Siebert (p. 25): “The Tudor policy of strict control 
over the press in the interest of the safety of the state was 
maintained throughout the sixteenth century.” It was inevitable 
that with printing the sixteenth century should also witness “a 
large increase in the powers—executive, legislative, and 
judicial—of the Council (or Privy Council) at the expense of both 
Parliament and the older courts, but to the distinct advantage 
of the crown.” But as the book market enlarged and the habit 
of much reading spread widely toward the end of the century, 
the consumer revolt against central controls got ever stronger. 
L. B. Wright’s splendid account of Middle-Class Culture in  
Elizabethan England  provides an image of the complex uses of 
print to foster many varieties of self-education and self-help. It 
becomes obvious how the first age of readers was not merely 
seeking diversion but instruction in methods of applied 
knowledge.