Renaissance ideas about the individual gave people faith in their own powers. They were eager to search for new continents, they wanted to learn the secrets of nature they questioned Church authority and showed their love of life. Rarely has the world seen so many people with so many talents: Leonardo da Vinci who was one of the greatest painters of all times was among them. He also studied geology, chemistry, anatomy, building and canals design. Humanism owed much to the Italian writer Francesco Petrarca, inspired by his love for a woman named Laura, wrote a number of sonnets that made him one of the greatest lyric poets.
The writings of Italian humanists influenced two great European scholars, Erasmus and Sir Thomas More. Erasmus, a Dutch scholar bom about 1466 is often thought to be the greatest humanist. His satire “The Praise of Folly”, published in 1511, lashed out at the evils of the time. All his life Erasmus fought against ignorance, stupidity; he kept up a huge correspondence with people around the world helping to spread humanistic ideals. One of his students was English corresponder Sir Thomas More, whose best-known book “Utopia” described a perfect society that was not real.
In England the Renaissance literature reached its height in Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare. The English poet Geoffrey Chaucer (l340 -1400) is sometimes described as the father of English literature. He laid a base for English writers to build a literature equal to any nation’s written art. One of the greatest writers in the world literature was William Shakespeare (1564 -1616). He had a deep understanding of human beings, and he expressed the whole range of human emotions in his plays.
An important author of the period was the Spaniard Miguel de Cervantes who wrote a novel ’’Don Quixote”. The main hero was a poor but proud Spanish gentleman who loved to read romances about knighthood. At fifty, he made a suit of armor, then took his old horse and together with his servant Sancho Panza went to seek adventures. The deeds of the hero are absurd but Cervantes admired his hero’s humanism which no longer respected in the world as he know it.
Lesson 32-33.
Thomas More, was an English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist. He was an important councilor to Henry VIII of England and, for three years toward the end of his life, Lord Chancellor. He is recognized as a saint within the Catholic Church and is commemorated by the Church of England as a "Reformation martyr".He was an opponent of the Protestant Reformation and in particular of Martin Luther and William Tyndale.
More coined the word "utopia" - a name he gave to the ideal and imaginary island nation, the political system of which he described in Utopia published in 1516. He opposed the king's separation from the Catholic Church and refused to accept the king as Supreme Head of theChurch of England, a status the king had been given by a compliant parliament through the Act of Supremacy of 1534. He was imprisoned in 1534 for his refusal to take the oath required by theFirst Succession Act because the act disparaged the power of the Pope and Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon. In 1535, he was tried for treason, convicted on perjured testimony and beheaded.
Intellectuals and statesmen across Europe were stunned by More's execution. Erasmus saluted him as one "whose soul was more pure than any snow". Two centuries later Jonathan Swift said he was "the person of the greatest virtue this kingdom ever produced", a sentiment with which Samuel Johnson agreed. Historian Hugh Trevor-Roper said in 1977 that More was "the first great Englishman whom we feel that we
know, the most saintly of humanists, the most human of saints, the universal man of our cool northern renaissance." The Catholic Church proclaimed him a saint in 1935. The Franciscan order has the tradition that he was a member of the Third Order of St. Francis and venerates his memory as a member of the order.
Early life
Boкт in Milk Street in London on 7 February 1478, Thomas More was the son of Sir John More, a successful lawyer, and his wife Agnes). More was educated at St Anthony's School, considered one of the finest schools in London at that time. He later spent the years 1490 to 1492 as a page in the household service of John Morton, the Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Chancellor of England. Morton enthusiastically supported the "New Learning" of the Renaissance, and thought highly of the young More. Believing that More showed great potential, Morton nominated him for a place at Oxford University (either in St. Mary's Hall (Oriel) or Canterbury College), where More began his studies in 1492. More may have lived and studied at nearby St. Mary’s Hall.
Both Canterbury College and St Mary’s Hall have since disappeared; part of Christ Church College is on the site of Canterbury, and part of Oriel College is on the site of St Mary’s. More received a classical education at Oxford and was a pupil pfThomas Linacre and William Grocyn, becoming proficient in both Greek and Latin. He left Oxford in 1494 - after only two years - at the insistence of his father, to begin his legal training in London at New Inn, one of the Inns of Chancery. In 1496, he became a student at Lincoln’s Inn, one of the Inns of Court, where he remained until 1502, when he was called to the bar.
Earдy political career
In 1504 he was elected to Parliament to represent Great Yarmouth and in 1510 to represent London. From 1510, More served as one of the two undersheriffs of the City of London, a position of considerable responsibility in which he earned a reputation as an honest and effective public servant. More became Master of Requests in 1514, the same year in which he was appointed as a Privy Councillor, a member of His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council. After undertaking a diplomatic mission to the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, More was knighted and made under- treasurer of the Exchequer i n 1521.
Henry VIII, More became increasingly influential in the government, welcoming foreign diplomats, drafting official documents, and serving as a liaison between the king and his Lord Chancellor: Thomas Wolsey, the Cardinal Archbishop of York.
In 1523 he was elected as knight of the shire (MP) for Middlesex and, recommended by Wolsey, was elected the Speaker of the House of Commons.
He later served as High Steward for the universities of Oxford and Cambridge. In 1525 he became chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, a position that entailed administrative and judicial control of much of northern England.
Between 1512 and 1519, Thomas More worked on a History of King Richard III, which was never finished, but which greatly influenced William Shakespeare's play Richard III. Both More's and Shakespeare's works are controversial to contemporary historians for their unflattering portrait of King Richard III, a bias partly due to both authors' allegiance to the reigning Tudor dynasty that wrested the throne from Richard III in the Wars of the Roses. More's work, however, little mentionsKing Henry VII, the first Tudor king, perhaps for having persecuted his father, Sir John More. Some historians see an attack on royal tyranny, rather than on Richard III himself or on the House of York.
The History of King Richard III is a Renaissance history, remarkable more for its literary skill and adherence to classical precepts than for its historical accuracy. More's work, and that of contemporary historian Polydore Vergil, reflects a move from mundane medieval chronicles to a dramatic writing style; for example, the shadowy King Richard is an outstanding, archetypal tyrant drawn from the pages of Sallust, and
should be read as a meditation on power and corruption as well as a history of the reign of Richard III. The 'History of King Richard III was written and published in both English and Latin, each written separately, and with information deleted from the Latin edition to suit a European readership.
Utopia
More sketched out his best known and most controversial work, Utopia (completed and published in 1516), a novel in Latin. In it a traveller, Raphael Hythlodeaus (in Greek,
his name and surname allude to archangel Raphael, purveyor of truth, and mean "speaker of nonsense"), describes the political
arrangements of the imaginary island country of Utopia (Greek pun on ou-topos [no place], eu- topos [good place]) to himself and to Pieter Gillis.
This novel describes the city of Amaurote by saying, "Of them all this is the worthiest and of most dignity".
Utopia contrasts the contentious social life of European states with the perfectly orderly, reasonable social arrangements of Utopia and its environs (Tallstoria, Nolandia, and Aircastle). In Utopia, with communal ownership of land, private property does not exist, men and women are educated alike, and there is almost complete religious toleration. Some take the novel's principal message to be the social need for order and discipline rather than liberty. The country of Utopia tolerates different religious practices but does not tolerate atheists. Hythlodeaus theorises that if a man did not believe in a god or in an afterlife he could never be trusted, because he would not acknowledge any authority or principle outside himself.
More used the novel describing an imaginary nation as a means of freely discussing contemporary controversial matters; speculatively, he based Utopia on monastic communalism, based upon the Biblical communalism in the Acts of the Apostles.
Utopia is a forerunner of the utopian literary genre, wherein ideal societies and perfect cities are detailed. Although Utopianism is typically a Renaissance movement, combining the classical concepts of perfect societies of Plato and Aristotle with Roman rhetorical finesse (cf.Cicero, Quintilian, epideictic oratory), it continued into the Enlightenment. Utopia's original edition included the symmetrical "Utopian alphabet" that was omitted from later editions; it is a notable, early attempt at cryptography that might have influenced the development of shorthand.
"The King's good servant, but God's first."
Thomas More was born in Milk Street, London on February 7,1478, son of Sir John More, a prominent judge. He was educated at St Anthony's School in London. As a youth he served as a page in the household of Archbishop Morton, who anticipated More would become a "marvellous man."l More went on to study at Oxford under Thomas Linacre and William Grocyn. During this time, he wrote comedies and studied Greek and Latin literature. One of his first works was an English translation of a Latin biography of the Italian humanist Pico della Mirandola. It was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1510.
Around 1494 More returned to London to study law, was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in 1496, and became a barrister in 1501. Yet More did not automatically follow in his father's footsteps. He was torn between a monastic calling and a life of civil service. While at Lincoln's Inn, he determined to become a monk and subjected himself to the discipline of the Carthusians, living at a nearby monastery and taking part of the monastic life. The prayer, fasting, and penance habits stayed with him for the rest of his life. More's desire for monasticism was finally overcome by his sense of duty to serve his country in the field of politics. He entered Parliament in 1504, and married for the first time in 1504 or 1505.
More became a close friend with Desiderius Erasmus during the latter's first visit to England in 1499. It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship and correspondence. They produced Latin translations of Lucian's works, printed at Paris in 1506, during Erasmus' second visit. On Erasmus' third visit, in 1509, he wrote Encomium Moriae, or Praise of Folly, (1509), dedicating it to More.
One of More's first acts in Parliament had been to urge a decrease in a proposed appropriation for King Henry VII. In revenge, the King had imprisoned More's father and not released him until a fine was paid and More himself had withdrawn from public life. After the death of the King in 1509, More became active once more. In 1510, he was appointed one of the two undersheriffs of London. In this capacity, he gained a reputation for being impartial, and a patron to the poor. In 1511, More's first wife died in childbirth. More was soon married again, to Dame Alice.
During the next decade, More attracted the attention of King Henry VIII. In 1515 he accompanied a delegation to Flanders to help clear disputes about the wool trade. Utopia opens with a reference to this very delegation. More was also instrumental in quelling a 1517 London uprising against foreigners, portrayed in the play Sir Thomas More, possibly by Shakespeare. More accompanied the King and court to the Field of the Cloth of Gold. In 1518 he became a member of the Privy Council, and was knighted in 1521.
More helped Henry VIII in writing his Defence of the Seven Sacraments, a repudiation of Luther, and wrote an answer to Luther's reply under a pseudonym.
More had garnered Henry's favor, and was made Speaker of the House of Commons in 1523 and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in 1525. As Speaker, More helped establish the parliamentary privilege of free speech. He refused to endorse King Henry VIH's plan to divorce Katherine of Arag6n (1527). Nevertheless, after the fall of Thomas Wolsey in 1529, More became Lord Chancellor, the first layman yet to hold the post.
While his work in the law courts was exemplary, his fall came quickly. He resigned in 1532, citing ill health, but the reason was probably his disapproval of Henry's stance toward the church. He refused to attend the coronation of Anne Bofeyn in June 1533, a matter which did not escape the King's notice. In 1534 he was one of the people accused of complicity with Elizabeth Barton, the nun of Kent who opposed Henry's break with Rome, but was not attainted due to protection from the Lords who refused to pass the bill until More's name was off the list of names.l In April, 1534, More refused to swear to the Act of Succession and the Oath of Supremacy, and was committed to the Tower of London on April 17. More was found guilty of treason and was beheaded alongside Bishop Fisher on July 6,1535. More's final words on the scaffold were: "The King's good servant, but God's First." More was beatified in 1886 and canonized by the Catholic Church as a saint by Pope Pius XI in 1935.
Thomas More (1478-535)
Thomas More, the Is' English humanist of the Renaissance, was born in London. Educated at Oxford, he could write a most beautiful Latin. It was not the Latin of the Church but the original classical Latin
Thomas More began his life as a lawyer. During the reign of Henry 7lh he became a member of Parliament. He was an active-minded man and kept a keen eye on the events of his time. He was the first great writer on social and political subjects in England.
Fourteen years after Henry 8th come to the throne, More was made Speaker of the House of Commons.
Thomas More was an earnest Catholic, but he wasn’t liked by priests and the Pope on account of his writings and the ideas he taught. After Henry 8th quarreled with the Pope he gathered around himself all the enemies-of the Pope, and so in 1529 More was made Lord Chancellor (highest judge to the House of Lords). He hadn’t wanted to post because he was as much against the king’s absolute power in England as he was against the Pope. More soon fell a victim to the king’s anger. He refused to swear that he would obey Henry as the head of the English Church, and was thrown into the Tower. Parliament, to please the king, declared More guilty of treason and he was beheaded in the Tower in 1535.
The works of Thomas More:
Thomas More wrote in English and in Latin. The humanists of all European countries communicated in the Latin language, and their best works were written in Latin.
The English writings of Thomas More include:
Discussion on political subjects.
Biographies.
Poetry.
His style is simple, colloquial and has an unaffected ease.
The work by which he is best remembered today is ’’Utopia” which was written in Latin ini516. It has now been translated into all European languages.
“Utopia”(which in Greek means “nowhere”) is a name of a non-existent island. This work is divided into two books.
In the 1st, the author gives a profound and truthful picture of the people’s sufferings and points out the social evils existing in England at the time.
In the 2nd book More presents his ideal of what the future society should be like.
“Utopia” describes a perfect social system built on communist principles.
“Utopia”
First book
While on business in Flanders, the author makes the acquaintance of a certain Raphael Hythloday and Amerigo Vespucci. He was much to tell about his voyages. Thomas More, Raphael Hythloday and Amerigo Vespucci meet together in a garden and discuss many problems. Raphael has been to England too and expresses his surprise at the cruelty of English laws and at the poverty of the population. Then they talk about crime in general and Raphael says:
“There is another cause of stealing which I suppose is proper and peculiar to you Englishmen along.”
'‘What is that?” - asked the Cardinal.
“Oh, my lord.” - said Raphael, “your sheep that used to be so meek and tame and so small eaters, have now become so great devourers and so wild that they eat up and swallow down the veiy men themselves. The peasants are driven out of their land. Away they go finding no place to rest in. And when all is spent, what can they do but steal and then be hanged?”
Second book
The disastrous state of things in England puts Raphael Hythloday in mind of commonwealth (a republic) he has seen on an unknown island in an unknown sea. A description of “Utopia” follows, and Raphael speaks “of all the good laws and orders of this same island.”
First, the community which inhabited the island of Utopia was not divided into separate social classes. All the people enjoyed equal rank and rights. There was no private property because Utopians believed that private led to envy, hate, selfish ambitions and strife. Everybody wore the same type of clothing, and no one was allowed to wear jewelry or any other form of finery (пышный наряд) that would proclaim the superiority of one person over another.
There were no leisured or idle classes. Everyone had to work, though not excessively, for seven hours a day was considered sufficient. Nobody was allowed to force his opinions or religious beliefs on anyone else, except by fair argument and discussion. Anyone who tried to change people’s views by compulsion (принуждение) was banished (to drive away) from the island. People were free to marry the partners of their choice. They were also free to end their own marriage if they found it was not successful. If someone was suffering from a painful incurable illness, he could demand to be put to death.
In Utopia the cleverest young people were excused from work which involved physical or unskilled labour. Instead they were trained to be the wise men or philosophers of the community. But they were still treated as only ordinary members of the community, so that they would not become a privileged superior class. Members of the government, even the king himself were chosen from the philosophers; but the king could be removed from the throne if he showed any tendency to turn into a tyrant/’taiərənt/.
1. Poets and…have always created ideal societies in religious and scientific works.
a) Rulers b) politicians c) artists d) thinkers
2. The word “utopia” means
a) equal b) perfect c) of great possibilities d) of everybody’s dream
3. Thomas More’s “Utopia” is written in a form of …
a) Letters b) a diary c) a dialogue d) a monologue
4. The people in Utopia were …
a) Well-read b) well-fed c) well-bred d) well-trained
5. Hythlodaye’s comparison between Utopia and England showed …
a) Utopia’s advantage over England
b) That England’s living conditions were not ideal
c) Many problems in England were not noticed
d) Characteristic features of English life
6. Utopia’s community was a community with …
a) Class discrimination b) rank distinction c) class supremacy d) equal private property
7. People in Utopia were free to …
a) Refuse to work b) do what they wanted c) impose own views on others d) live according to the rules of the country
Discussion:
1. Why was “Utopia” published in Latin?
2. Why can you call Sir Thomas More a man of principle?
3. What has the word ‘utopia’ come to mean?
4. What social evils were exposed in the book?
5. Which features of the utopian society do you like? Which of them would you call unrealistic? Wrong? Strange?
What do you think the word ‘anti-utopia’ means? Have you ever read books or watched films where anti-utopian societies were described?
Leson 34 TEST.
I. What must we remember about Chaucer?
II. Retell one of the ballads about Robin Hood.
III. What is known about Thomas More and why is he called the first English humanist?
IV. Choose the correct answer concerning “Utopia”
1. Poets and … have always created ideal societies in religious and scientific works
a. rulers b. politicians c. artists d. thinkers
2. The word “Utopia” means
a. equal b. perfect c. of great possibilities
d. of everybody’s dram
3. Thomas More’s “Utopia” is written in a form of …
a. a letter b. a dialogue c. a diary d. a monologue
4. The people in Utopia were …
a. well-read b. well-fed c. well-bred d. well-trained
Lesson 35
The period between the 16th and 18th centuries is commonly described as mercantilism This period was associated with geographic discoveries by merchant overseas traders, especially from England and the Low Countries; the European colonization of the Americas; and the rapid growth in overseas trade. Mercantilism was a system of trade for profit, although commodities were still largely produced by non-capitalist production methods. While some scholars see mercantilism as the earliest stage of modem capitalism, others argue that modem capitalism did not emerge until later. For example, noting the pre-capitalist features of mercantilism, Karl Polanyi argued that capitalism did not emerge until the establishment of free trade in Britain in the 1830s.
The earliest forms of mercantilism date back to the Roman Empire. When the Roman Empire expanded, the mercantilist economy expanded throughout Europe. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, most of the European economy became controlled by local feudal powers, and mercantilism collapsed there. However, mercantilism persisted in Arabia. Due to its proximity to neighboring countries, the Arabs established trade routes to Egypt, Persia, and Byzantium. As Islam spread in the 7th century, mercantilism spread rapidly to Spain. Portugal, Northern Africa, and Asia. Mercantilism finally revived in Europe in the 14th century, as mercantilism spread from Spain and Portugal.
Feudalism began to lay some of the foundations necessary for the development of mercantilism, a precursor to capitalism. Feudalism took place mostly in Europe and lasted from the medieval period up through the 16th century. Feudal manors were almost entirely self sufficient, and therefore limited the role of the market. This stifled the growth of capitalism. However, the relatively sudden emergence of new technologies and discoveries, particularly in the industries of agriculture and exploration, revitalized the growth of capitalism. The most important development at the end of Feudalism was the emergence of “the dichotomy between wage earners and capitalist merchants”.
The Elizabethan Period
The earlier half of Elizabeth's reign, also, though not lacking in literary effort, produced no work of permanent importance. After the religious convulsions of half a century time was required for the development of the internal quiet and confidence from which a great literature could spring. At length, however, the hour grew ripe and there came the greatest outburst of creative energy in the whole history of English literature. Under Elizabeth's wise guidance the prosperity and enthusiasm of the nation had risen to the highest pitch, and London in particular was overflowing with vigorous life. A special stimulus of the most intense kind came from the struggle with Spain. After a generation of half-piratical depredations by the English seadogs against the Spanish treasure fleets and the Spanish settlements in America, King Philip, exasperated beyond all patience and urged on by a bigot's zeal for the Catholic Church, began deliberately to prepare the Great Armada, which was to crush at one blow the insolence, the independence, and the religion of England. There followed several long years of breathless suspense; then in 1588 the Armada sailed and was utterly overwhelmed in one of the most complete disasters of the world's history. Thereupon the released energy of England broke out exultantly into still more impetuous achievement in almost every line of activity. The great literary period is taken by common consent to begin with the publication of Spenser's 'Shepherd's Calendar' in 1579, and to end in some sense at the death of Elizabeth in 1603, though in the drama, at least, it really continues many years longer.
Several general characteristics of Elizabethan literature and writers should be indicated at the outset.
1. The period has the great variety of almost unlimited creative force; it includes works of many kinds in both verse and prose, and ranges in spirit from the loftiest Platonic idealism or the most delightful romance to the level of very repulsive realism.
2. It was mainly dominated, however, by the spirit of romance.
3. It was full also of the spirit of dramatic action, as befitted an age whose restless enterprise was eagerly extending itself to every quarter of the globe.
4. In style it often exhibits romantic luxuriance, which sometimes takes the form of elaborate affectations of which the favorite 'conceit' is only the most apparent.
5. It was in part a period of experimentation, when the proper material and limits of literary forms were being determined, oftentimes by means of false starts and grandiose failures. In particular, many efforts were made to give prolonged poetical treatment to many subjects essentially prosaic, for example to systems of theological or scientific thought, or to the geography of all England.
6. It continued to be largely influenced by the literature of Italy, and to a less degree by those of France and Spain.
7. The literary spirit was all-pervasive, and the authors were men (not yet women) of almost every class, from distinguished courtiers, like Ralegh and Sidney, to the company of hack writers, who starved in garrets and hung about the outskirts of the bustling taverns.
Prose fiction
The period saw the beginning, among other things, of English prose fiction of something like the later modern type. First appeared a series of collections of short tales chiefly translated from Italian authors, to which tales the Italian name 'novella' (novel) was applied. Most of the separate tales are crude or amateurish and have only historical interest, though as a class they furnished the plots for many Elizabethan dramas, including several of Shakespeare's. The most important collection was Painter's 'Palace of Pleasure,' in 1566. The earliest original, or partly original, English prose fictions to appear were handbooks of morals and manners in story form, and here the beginning was made by John Lyly, who is also of some importance in the history of the Elizabethan drama. In 1578 Lyly, at the age of twenty-five, came from Oxford to London, full of the enthusiasm of Renaissance learning, and evidently determined to fix himself as a new and dazzling star in the literary sky. In this ambition he achieved a remarkable and immediate success, by the publication of a little book entitled 'Euphues and His Anatomie of Wit.' 'Euphues' means 'the well-bred man,' and though there is a slight action, the work is mainly a series of moralizing disquisitions (mostly rearranged from Sir Thomas North's translation of 'The Dial of Princes' of the Spaniard Guevara) on love, religion, and conduct. Most influential, however, for the time-being, was Lyly's style, which is the most conspicuous English example of the later Renaissance craze, then rampant throughout Western Europe, for refining and beautifying the art of prose expression in a mincingly affected fashion. Witty, clever, and sparkling at all costs, Lyly takes especial pains to balance his sentences and clauses antithetically, phrase against phrase and often word against word, sometimes emphasizing the balance also by an exaggerated use of alliteration and assonance. A representative sentence is this: 'Although there be none so ignorant that doth not know, neither any so impudent that will not confesse, friendship to be the jewell of humaine joye; yet whosoever shall see this amitie grounded upon a little affection, will soone conjecture that it shall be dissolved upon a light occasion.' Others of Lyly's affectations are rhetorical questions, hosts of allusions to classical history, and literature, and an unfailing succession of similes from all the recondite knowledge that he can command, especially from the fantastic collection of fables which, coming down through the Middle Ages from the Roman writer Pliny, went at that time by the name of natural history and which we have already encountered in the medieval Bestiaries. Preposterous by any reasonable standard, Lyly's style, 'Euphuism,' precisely hit the Court taste of his age and became for a decade its most approved conversational dialect.
