Infinity, Faith and Time: Christian Humanism and Renaissance Literature

215 Pages·1997·12.312 MB·English

by  John Spencer Hill

Infinity, Faith, and Time
Christian Humanism and Renaissance Literature
Infinity, Faith, and Time is an exploration of Renaissance literature
and the importance of a powerful tradition of Christian-Platonist
rational spirituality derived from St Augustine and Nicholas of
Cusa. John Spencer Hill argues that this tradition had a formative
role in the thought of Renaissance writers by enabling them to
assimilate into their worldview two central discoveries of the
Renaissance - that the universe is possibly infinite and that human
existence is bound and regulated by the passage of time.
In Part i Hill examines the effect of the idea of spatial infinity
on seventeenth-century literature, arguing that the metaphysical
cosmology of Nicholas of Cusa provided Renaissance writers, such
as Pascal, Traherne, and Milton, with a way to construe the vast-
ness of space as the symbol of human spiritual potential. Focusing
on time in Part 2, Hill reveals that, faced with the inexorability of
time, Christian humanists turned to St Augustine to develop a
philosophy that interpreted temporal passage as the necessary
condition of experience without making it the essence or ultimate
measure of human purpose. Hill's analysis centres on Shakespeare,
whose experiments with the shapes of time comprise a gallery of
heuristic time-centred fictions that attempt to explain the conse-
quences of human existence in time.
Infinity, Faith, and Time reveals that the sixteenth and seven-
teenth centuries were a period during which individuals were
able, with more success than in later times, to make room for
new ideas without rejecting old beliefs.
JOHN SPENCER HILL is professor of English, University of Ottawa.
McGill-Queen's Studies in the History of Religion
Volumes in the McGill-Queen's Studies in the History of Religion have
been supported by the Jackman Foundation of Toronto.
SERIES ONE
G.A. Rawlyk, Editor
1 Small Differences
Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants, 1815-1922
An International Perspective
Donald Harman Akenson
2 Two Worlds
The Protestant Culture of Nineteenth-Century Ontario
William Westfall
3 An Evangelical Mind
Nathanael Burwash and the Methodist Tradition in Canada, 1839-1918
Marguerite Van Die
4 The Devotes
Women and Church in Seventeenth-Century France
Elizabeth Rapley
5 The Evangelical Century
College and Creed in English Canada from the Great Revival to the Great Depression
Michael Gauvreau
6 The German Peasants' War and Anabaptist Community of Goods
James M. Stayer
7 A World Mission
Canadian Protestantism and the Quest for a New International Order, 1918-1939
Robert Wright
8 Serving the Present Age
Revivalism, Progressivism, and the Methodist Tradition in Canada
Phyllis D. Airhart
9 A Sensitive Independence
Canadian Methodist Women Missionaries in Canada and the Orient, 1881-1925
Rosemary R. Gagan
10 God's Peoples
Covenant and Land in South Africa, Israel, and Ulster
Donald Harman Akenson
11 Creed and Culture
The Place of English-Speaking Catholics in Canadian Society, 1750-1930
Terrence Murphy and Gerald Stortz, editors
12 Piety and Nationalism
Lay Voluntary Associations and the Creation of an Irish-Catholic Community in
Toronto, 1850-1895
Brian P. Clarke
13 Amazing Grace
Studies in Evangelicalism in Australia, Britain, Canada, and the United States
George Rawlyk and Mark A. Noll, editors
14 Children of Peace
W. John Mclntyre
15 A Solitary Pillar
Montreal's Anglican Church and the Quiet Revolution
Joan Marshall
16 Padres in No Man's Land
Canadian Chaplains and the Great War
Duff Crerar
17 Christian Ethics and Political Economy in North America
A Critical Analysis of U.S. and Canadian Approaches
P. Travis Kroeker
18 Pilgrims in Lotus Land
Conservative Protestantism in British Columbia, 1917-1981
Robert K. Burkinshaw
19 Through Sunshine and Shadow
The Woman's Christian Temperance Union, Evangelicalism, and Reform in Ontario,
1874-1930
Sharon Cook
20 Church, College, and Clergy
A History of Theological Education at Knox College, Toronto, 1844-1994
Brian J. Fraser
21 The Lord's Dominion
The History of Canadian Methodism
Neil Semple
22 A Full-Orbed Christianity
The Protestant Churches and Social Welfare in Canada, 1900-1940
Nancy Christie and Michael Gauvreau
23 Evangelism and Apostasy
The Evolution and Impact of Evangelicals in Modern Mexico
Kurt Bowen
24 The Chignecto Covenanters
A Regional History of Reformed Presbyterianism in New Brunswick and Nova
Scotia, 1827 to 1905
Eldon Hay
25 Methodists and Women's Education in Ontario, 1836-1925
Johanna M. Selles
26 Puritanism and Historical Controversy
William Lamont
SERIES TWO In memory of George Rawlyk
Donald Harman Akenson, Editor
Marguerite Bourgeoys and Montreal, 1640-1665
Patricia Simpson
Aspects of the Canadian Evangelical Experience
Edited by G.A. Rawlyk
Infinity, Faith, and Time
Christian Humanism and Renaissance Literature
John Spencer Hill
The Contribution of Presbyterianism to the Maritime Provinces of Canada
Charles H.H. Scobie and G.A. Rawlyk, editors
Infinity, Faith, and Time
Christian Humanism and
Renaissance Literature
JOHN SPENCER HILL
McGill-Queen's University Press
Montreal & Kingston • London • Buffalo
© McGill-Queen's University Press 1997
ISBN 0-7735-1661-1
Legal deposit fourth quarter 1997
Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
This book has been published with the help of a grant
from the Humanities and Social Sciences Federation of
Canada, using funds provided by the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Funding
has also been received from the Faculty of Arts,
University of Ottawa.
McGill-Queen's University Press acknowledges the
support received for its publishing program from the
Canada Council's Block Grants program.
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Hill, John Spencer, 1943-
Infinity, faith and time : Christian humanism and
Renaissance literature
(McGill-Queen's studies in the history of religion)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-7735-1661-1
i. European literature - Renaissance, 1450-1600 -
History and criticism. 2. Humanism in literature.
3. Infinite in literature. 4. Time in literature, i. Title.
ii. Series.
PN721.H54 1997 8o9.8'94'o903 097-900674-0
Typeset in Palatino 10/12
by Caractera inc., Quebec City
in patris matrisque memoriam
Harry Simon Hill (1908-1961)
Marion Isobel Hill (1910-1991)
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Contents
Preface xi
PART ONE THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE
1 Fides Quaerens Intellectum 3
2 The Aristotelian Cosmos 13
3 Nicholas of Cusa and the New Astronomy 17
4 Rational Spirituality and Empirical Rationalism 28
5 Chorismos and Methexis: Pascal, Traherne, Milton 40
PART TWO TIME
6 Chronos and Kairos 69
7 Inner Time: Augustine and Bergson 78
8 Time, Literature, and Literary Criticism 88
9 Time in Shakespeare 104
10 Heilsgeschischte: Typology and the Helix of History 127
Appendix One: Notes Toward a Protestant Poetic 137
Appendix Two: Translations from Pascal's Pensees 154