The Idea of Progress - An inguiry into its origin and growth by J. B. (John Bagnell) Bury
page 43 of 354 (12%)
page 43 of 354 (12%)
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indicated by the fact that while Bruno and Campanella accepted the
Copernican astronomy, it was rejected by one who in many other respects may claim to be reckoned as a modern--I mean Francis Bacon. But the growing tendency to challenge the authority of the ancients does not sever this period from the spirit which informed the Renaissance. For it is subordinate or incidental to a more general and important interest. To rehabilitate the natural man, to claim that he should be the pilot of his own course, to assert his freedom in the fields of art and literature had been the work of the early Renaissance. It was the problem of the later Renaissance to complete this emancipation in the sphere of philosophical thought. The bold metaphysics of Bruno, for which he atoned by a fiery death, offered the solution which was most unorthodox and complete. His deification of nature and of man as part of nature involved the liberation of humanity from external authority. But other speculative minds of the age, though less audacious, were equally inspired by the idea of freely interrogating nature, and were all engaged in accomplishing the programme of the Renaissance--the vindication of this world as possessing a value for man independent of its relations to any supermundane sphere. The raptures of Giordano Bruno and the sobrieties of Francis Bacon are here on common ground. The whole movement was a necessary prelude to a new age of which science was to be the mistress. It is to be noted that there was a general feeling of complacency as to the condition of learning and intellectual pursuits. This optimism is expressed by Rabelais. Gargantua, in a letter to Pantagruel, studying at Paris, enlarges to his son on the vast improvements in learning and education which had recently, he says, |
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