This volume completes Isabel Rivers' widely acclaimed exploration of the relationship between religion and ethics from the mid-seventeenth to the later eighteenth centuries. She investigates the effect of attempts to separate ethics from religion, and to locate the foundation of morals in the constitution of human nature. Focusing on moral philosophy and the educational institutions in which (or in spite of which) these ideas were developed, the book pays close attention to the movement of ideas through the British Isles, in particular the spread of Shaftesbury's thought from England to Ireland and Scotland, and the varied reception of Hume's scepticism north and south of the border. It also demonstrates the enormous influence of Shaftesbury's moral thought and the ultimate triumph of the English interpretation of Shaftesbury with the rise of Butler. Meticulously researched and accessibly written, this volume makes a vital contribution to our understanding of eighteenth-century
The period 1660–1780 saw major changes in the relationship between religion and ethics in English thought. In this first part of an important two-volume study, Isabel Rivers examines the rise of Anglican moral religion and the reactions against it expressed in nonconformity, dissent and Methodism. Her study investigates the writings which grew out of these movements, combining a history of the ideas of individual thinkers (including both prominent figures such as Bunyan and Wesley and a range of lesser writers) with analysis of their characteristic terminology, techniques of persuasion, literary forms and styles. The intellectual and social milieu of each movement is explored, together with the assumed audiences for whom the texts were written. The book provides an accessible, wide-ranging and authoritative new interpretation of a crucial period in the development of early modern religious and moral thought.
In John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress, the pilgrims cannot reach the Celestial City without passing through Vanity Fair, where everything is bought and sold. In recent years there has been much anal
The period 1660-1780 saw major changes in the relationship between religion and ethics in English thought. In this first part of an important two-volume study, Isabel Rivers examines the rise of Angl
This volume completes Isabel Rivers' widely-acclaimed exploration of the relationship between religion and ethics from the mid-seventeenth to the later eighteenth centuries. She investigates what happ
Since publication in 1979 Isabel Rivers' sourcebook has established itself as the essential guide to English Renaissance poetry. It:provides an account of the main classical and Christian ideas, outli
Joseph Priestley was one of the most remarkable thinkers of the eighteenth century. Best known today as the scientist who discovered oxygen, he also made major contributions in the fields of educatio
The introduction of hymns and hymn-singing into public worship in the seventeenth century by dissenters from the Church of England has been described as one of the greatest contributions ever made to
This collection of eight new essays investigates ways in which significant kinds of 18th-century writings were designed and received by different audiences. Rivers explores the answers to certain cruc
