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w/Sincerity, Part I: The Drama of the Will from Augustine to Milton
- Christianity & Literature
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 67, Number 1, December 2017
- pp. 8-33
- Article
- Additional Information
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Abstract:
Studies of secularism and modern selfhood locate a transition in the early modern period toward the moral explanatory power of the self, by itself. In this essay, I challenge this view first by locating a distinct form of moral autonomy (sincerely sinning) in the work of Augustine, Anselm, and Scotus, and second by demonstrating this development's fraught legacy in early Protestant forms of conscience. Finally, I apply this history of sincerity to readings of Milton and Shakespeare, writers who illustrate the thematic potential of competing forms of sincerity and of the drama of the will.