The renaissance

THE RENAISSANCE

During the Tudor period we have the passage from the Middle Ages to the Modern Age, this passage was colled 'Renaissance' all over Europe because it was a ribirth from a period of obscurity and superstition, as the Middle Ages were considered.

At the social level the Renaissance witnessed the raise of a new class, the merchants (Henry VII), which were middle-class people interested in commerce and trade and were not nobles. They represent the future bourgeosie which will become the heading class in the 18th century but their social ascent started in this period. It was a very modern class, interested in the economic development of England and in colonial expansion, and very active at the economi level; it contribued to the economic development of England a lot. This class became richer and richer not only thanks to colonial expansion, which opened new markets for their trades outside England, but also thanks to the Protestant Reformation. In fact with the reformation of Henry VIII lots Catholic monasteries were dissolved and their lauds were confiscated and sold to this new, very rich class which became even rich because now it had money and lauds.

At the geographical level this was an age of important geographical discoveries (America 1492) which changed the old conception of the world and showed how the earth really was. They also gave new possibilities of commerce with new countires whose existence was before unknown, countries which sometimes proved to be very rich in precious metals or exotic products. This, too, contributed to the economic progress of England.

At the scientific level there were new discoveries which caused a real revolution in the common vision of the Universe. The most important of them was Copernicus' one. In his book 'On the revolution of the Sphares' (1543), Copernicus showed that it was not true that the Earth was at the centre of the Universe and the sun and other planets went aroun it, like Ptolemeus had said, but the Sun was at centre of the Universe and the Earth and other planets went around it. This discovery, confirmed later by Galileo and Kepler, was one of the most important ones in the history of the man and it caused a lot of great changes in the visionof the Universe and in the way of thinking of the people.

Actually man started to realize that he was a very intelligent being who, through scince, could not only know the organization of the world and of the Universe, but he could also change it and improve it. This was a very new and modern conception which replaced the medieval one. In the Middle Ages people believed that the Universe was a perfect machine created by God and ruled by divine laws, in which man was only a little part of it (the other parts were animals, plants, inanimate objects, stars, planets, ecc.); as this machine was already perfect because it was a divine creation, it could not be modifield by man; each attempt to modify it would be an act of blasphemy, an offence to God, because it would mean that man believed he was able to modify something created by God and therefore he was more intelligent than God. On the contrary in the Renaissancethe new scentific discoveries showed that although the Universe was a perfect machine probably created by God, it was governed by scientific laws and therefore it could be still improved, it could become even better, more perfect, and now, who was the most intelligent of the creatures living in the Universe, could improve it through science and scientific discoveries. Therefore a new faith in man and in his capabilities replaced the old, medieval faith in God and literature became more individualistic, that is, more interested in the individual, in man and in his capability of contributing to the progress of the Universe.

This new faith in man was called Humanism or New Learning, from 'humanae litterae' (the study of grammar, rhetoric, poetry, Greek and Latin) as opposed to 'litterae divinae' (the study of theology, of God). Humanism was the interest in the study of those fields of knowledge which concerned man and his development as opposed to the old, medieval interest in the study of God. At the literary level Humanism caused the rediscovery of classical culture, thanks to the Greek refuges to Italy after the fall of Costantinopoli to the Turks (1453), and the birth of a new type of literature which was influenced and based on the classical one. This new literature developed in Italy and from there it spread all over Europe and to England, too. But in England this literature was a little different because it was influences by Protestantism.

At the first the Reformation was the result of Anticlericalism rather than the result of an interest in Protestantism. English people had supported the separation of the English Church from the Church of Rome because they were tired of the privileges, wealth and corruption of the Catholic clergy; for them the Reformation meant the abolition of all the privileges, abuses and power of the Catholic clergy. Only in a second moment the Reformation meant some important changes at the doctrinal level, but these changes were not immediate, they lasted many years and for many years the old, Catholic valves and beliefs coesistent in England with the new Protestant ones.

The new Protestant valves and beliefs were of Calvinistic inspiration. They were based on a more direct relationship between man and God, through the reading of the Bible, without the interference of the Church and of the priest. According to the Catholic religion the relationship betweenman and God is mediated by priest who is a sort of link between the human world and the divine world. Besides man is not directly responsible of his actions before God, because through the confession he has the possibility of repenting of his sins and of being saved; the priest, giving the absolution, acts as an intermediator between man and God in this process of repentance and salvation. On the contrary, according ton the Calvinistic conception and therefore to Protestantism, man is the only responsible of his actions before God and he himself only can contribute to his eternal salvation and can conquer it through a correct and honest way of living.

This deep sense of responsability influenced the English literary production, too. In fact, while in Italy and in other European countries, the Renaissant literature was very pagan, interested in man and in science, rather than in God, in England it was characterized by this deep conflict between man and God, by the conflict between man's desire to improve his knowledge through science and to increase his influence on the Universe and the necessity to submit to God and his will and to justify his actions before God. It was as if man entrapped bu his fear of God's judgmant and this vision was still very near to the old medieval one.