It has been argued[by whom?

] that the suppression of the English monasteries and nunneries contributed

as well to the spreading decline of that contemplative spirituality which once thrived in Europe, with
the occasional exception found only in groups such as the Society of Friends ("Quakers"). This may
be set against the continuation in the retained and newly established cathedrals of the daily singing
of the Divine Office by choristers and vicars choral, now undertaken as public worship, which had
not been the case before the dissolution. The deans and prebends of the six new cathedrals were
overwhelmingly former heads of religious houses. The secularised former monks and friars
commonly looked for re-employment as parish clergy; and consequently numbers of new ordinations
dropped drastically in the ten years after the dissolution, and ceased almost entirely in the reign of
Edward VI. It was only in 1549, after Edward came to the throne, that former monks and nuns were
permitted to marry; but within a year of permission being granted around a quarter had done so, only
to find themselves forcibly separated (and denied their pensions) in the reign of Mary. On the
succession of Elizabeth, these former monks and friars (happily reunited both with their wives and
their pensions) formed a major part of the backbone of the new Anglican church, and may properly
claim much credit for maintaining the religious life of the country until a new generation of ordinands
became available in the 1560s and 1570s