There are several possibilities. I think you might want to use a brief lecture as a bridge and talk about the Puritans, the Restoration, and the move toward tolerance after the traumas of the religious wars of the intervening period.
A few works might help with this. A Letter Concerning Toleration by John Locke might be a good example of the shift in values towards reason and restraint. On a more literary level, one might use Pope's "Essay on Criticism" as a way of showing how literary tastes changed. His "Essay on Man" contrasts well with Milton, but is less important if you skipped over Milton.
Some of how you handle the transition depends on what you are doing in your class. If you are focusing on poetry, this was a great age for satire, and Pope would be a good focus. If you are thinking about the rise of the novel, Watts is a bit dated but a good starting point for the conversation. Essays by Addison or Steele might also be a good way of establishing the new ideals of taste.
To answer this more fully, I'd need a sense of the pedagogical context. The strategies that might work for a seminar in drama wouldn't fit an introductory lecture course.
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