The Northern Renaissance, flourishing in the early sixteenth century in France, England, and Germany, presented a distinct character compared to its Italian counterpart. Unlike the often amoral and anarchic Italian movement, the Northern Renaissance was deeply intertwined with piety and public virtue, focusing on ecclesiastical reform from within and a rigorous application of scholarship to the Bible. This period, exemplified by the close friendship and shared ideals of Erasmus and Sir Thomas More, represented a pre-revolutionary age, where there was a widespread demand for moderate reform before the world became too violent for such nuanced thinkers.
Erasmus (1466-1536), a brilliant Dutch scholar, was a highly accomplished Latinist and later a Greek scholar, driven by a desire to produce more accurate texts of the Bible. His most famous work, The Praise of Folly, written at the house of Sir Thomas More, is a biting satire delivered by Folly herself, who praises human foolishness as essential to life and happiness. However, the satire quickly turns to a fierce critique of ecclesiastical abuses: the sale of pardons and indulgences, the superstitious worship of saints, the theological disputes of scholastics, and the worldly corruption of popes, cardinals, and monastic orders. Erasmus’s sharp wit exposed the hypocrisy and moral decay within the Church, advocating for a return to Christian simplicity and a more inward, heartfelt religion, a view that foreshadowed Rousseau’s later emphasis on sensibility over abstract reason.
Utopian Visions: Justice, Communism, and Tolerance
Sir Thomas More (1478-1535), an English humanist and deeply pious man, is remembered almost solely for his seminal work, Utopia (1518). This fictional island commonwealth in the southern hemisphere is depicted as a society where all things are held in common for the public good, reflecting a radical form of communism. More argued that true equality and public welfare could not flourish where private property existed. In Utopia, citizens work only six hours a day, with no idlers or useless labor, ensuring abundance for all. The society is characterized by uniform dress, communal meals, and a patriarchal family structure, with strict moral codes regarding marriage and sexual conduct.
More’s Utopia was astonishingly liberal in many respects, particularly in its views on war, religion, and criminal law. The Utopians, while learning to fight, despise martial glory and only resort to war for defense, to aid allies, or to free oppressed nations from tyranny, often employing mercenaries to minimize their own losses. They teach contempt for gold by using it for chamber pots and the chains of bondmen, and tolerate a diversity of religions, with only a few non-believers excluded from political life. More’s advocacy for a mild criminal law, including arguments against the death penalty for theft, showcased his progressive ideals. While life in Utopia might appear dull due to its lack of diversity, it represents a profound critique of existing social injustices and a visionary attempt to imagine a society built on principles of justice, equality, and communal welfare, even if its practical implementation remained a distant ideal.
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Russell, Bertrand. A History of Western Philosophy. Simon and Schuster, 1945.
More Topics
- The Utilitarians: Can Happiness Be Quantified and Legislated?
- Karl Marx: The Philosopher of History, Class, and Revolution
- Bergson: The Philosopher of Life, Intuition, and Creative Evolution
- William James: Radical Empiricism and the ‘Will to Believe’
- John Dewey: Instrumentalism and the Evolution of Truth
- Locke’s Theory of Knowledge: How Did Empiricism Challenge Innate Ideas?
- Locke’s Political Philosophy: How Did He Justify Government by Consent?
