The common view of the period in western history known as the "Enlightenment" --- spanning roughly two centuries, 1650-1815 --- is of a revolution in attitude, moving from a medieval mentality based on social precedent and revealed religion toward a world view governed by skepticism, rationality, scientific investigation, pragmatism and democratic principles. The great thinkers of the Enlightenment, exemplified by Diderot, Hume and Voltaire, abandoned preoccupation with the World to Come for the pursuit of the Here and Now.
Yet a tenacious spiritual hunger persisted despite, or perhaps because of, popular revulsion against institutional religion after two centuries of internecine religious conflict had devastated Europe. The Enlightenment also fostered a fascination with the occult, such as miracles, magic, cabala and alchemy, encouraged by the same thinkers and movements (Roscrucianism and Freemasonry) that spread Enlightenment ideas. Fleming spends a chapter each on the career of Valentine Greatrakes, the Anglo-Irish "Stroker," and the cult of Deacon Francois de Paris at the Church of St. Medard in Paris. Other chapters describe the lives of two eighteenth century "celebrities" who encapsulate the murkier aspects of the Enlightenment. “Count” Alessandro Cagliostro (con man extraordinaire), is remembered still for his alleged connection with the Affair of the Diamond Necklace, one of the many scandals that fanned public fury with the monarchy and led to the French Revolution. Julie de Krüdener (best-selling sentimental novelist and ecstatic Piestist preacher) although virtually forgotten today, was an intimate of Madame de Stael and spiritual advisor to Tsar Alexander I of Russia. In a time of increasing connectedness, she was as well connected as they come.
Author John V. Fleming is an American literary critic and the Louis W. Fairchild Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature, Princeton University. After studying at Jesus College, Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, Fleming earned his Ph.D. from Princeton in 1963. After two years at the University of Wisconsin–Madison he returned to Princeton as an assistant professor of English in 1965. Beginning in 1978 he took up a joint appointment in the Department of Comparative Literature. His fields of expertise included medieval English, French, and Latin literatures, and the history and culture of the Franciscan Order in the Middle Ages. He is perhaps best known in Princeton for his popular and erudite lecture course on Geoffrey Chaucer. In 2008 he was inducted as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In retirement Fleming has set his sights on topics in the history of ideas for inquiring general readers. Check out his web site at www.johnvfleming.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment