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ProQuest Information and Learning 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 800-521-0600 UMI Conversion, Revolution and Freedom: The Religious Formation of an American Soul in Edwards, Melville and Du Bois by Carole Lynn Stewart B.A., University of Calgary, 1993 M.A., University of Calgary, 1996 A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in the Department of English We accept this dissertation as conforming to the required standard Dr. G. D. Fulton, Supervi^r (Department of English) _______________ Dr. L. Carson, Departmental Member (Department of English) Dr. P. Grant, Departmental Member (Department of English) Dr. W. Magnusson, Outside Member (D çpaf^îe^t-ef^litical Science) _______________________________________ Dr. C. H. Long, Extem afË ^^ïner (Department of Religious Studies, UC Santa Barbara) © Carole Lynn Stewart, 2002 University of Victoria All rights reserved. This dissertation may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopying or other means, without the permission of the author. 11 Supervisor: Dr. G. D. Fulton ABSTRACT This dissertation brings together two well known interpretative problems in the understanding of the formation of the American nation and self: how a meaning of an American self arises as different from traditional cultures, and how religion is understood in the formation of the American national self. Since the 1950s in the works of Will Herberg, Sidney Mead, Robert Bellah, and Catherine Albenese, there has been a continuing discussion about the meaning of the American Republic in the terms of a “civil religion.” Several other works in literary criticism from Perry Miller to Sacvan Bercovitch have explored the religious dimension in the structuration of the American self from the point of view of literary texts. My dissertation falls within the context of these two problematics. I work within the context of an American civil religion and specify the meaning of civil religion in the terms of Conversion, Revolution, and Reconstruction. The chapter on Jonathan Edwards deals with the structure of conversion and community in pre-Revolutionary Northampton. The chapter on Herman Melville addresses the options and dilemmas - the “ambiguities” - in the attempt to construct a post-Revolutionary self. The chapter on W. E. B. Du Bois reflects on the recurring meaning of revolution as a confrontation with a limit, re-birth and reconstruction, following the Civil War, America’s Second Revolutionary War. I follow Hannah Arendt’s political theory on Revolution and provide a commentary on the cultural and philosophical meaning of the revolution as a basis for a civil order. Although the dissertation makes use of a notion of civil religion and the American “self,” unlike other Ill exemplars of these issues, I address a civil religious self as processual and consistent with a revolutionary formation, rather than with an established master narrative. I find that many uses of the “ironic” in American criticism presuppose the origin of the American Republic as normative instead of invoking the meaning of a revolutionary democracy. The inclusion of Du Bois enables new and different readings of both Edwards and Melville, and because all three are placed together, Du Bois is not a marginal figure, but rather, his work is essential to understanding an American soul. Examiners: Dr. G. D. Fulton, Supervisor (Department of English) Dr. L. Carson, Departmental Member (Department of English) ___________________ Dr. P. Grant, Departmental Member (Department of English) Dr. W. Magnusson, Outside Mem^eF-(D^artment of Political Science) Dr. C. H. Long, External Exitnin^(Department of Religious Studies, UC Santa Barbara) IV Acknowledgments Many people have either directly or indirectly helped in the writing of the dissertation. The ones who have helped me indirectly are too numerous to mention -- friends who have listened to me ramble about public space and conversion for a few years. Some have helped directly by funding and feeding me throughout the travail. The Department of English at the University of Victoria supported me with scholarships as well as teaching assistantships. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council provided me with funding for part of the research. Dr. Lazerevich and Graduate Studies helped me in the last year of the project, when personal circumstance had made the completion of the project seem dubious. The Center for Studies in Religion and Society at the University of Victoria also was gracious enough to host me as an Ian H. Stewart doctoral fellow for one year, a time which helped me try out my ideas and develop them in a warm and vibrant space for intellectual exchanges. I am thankful for the opportunity I had to work with Dr. Luke Carson and for his commentary on and discussions about many drafts of the project. Dr. Fulton and Dr. Grant have also been generous with their time, their availability and the time they have spent reading the project. I am particularly gratefiil to Dr. Warren Magnusson for going beyond the call of duty, listening to me throughout the years and devoting much of his time to helping me iron out and clarify problems in the almost. final draft. Charles H. Long’s work proved inspirational and helped me to specify the notion of Civil Religion. And finally, thank you to my parents, family, and friends in my hometown for their support - to my mother, who, though she may not understand all of the thesis, is fully aware of the novelty of birth. V Table of Contents Introduction: Conversion and the “New” Beginnings in America’s Civil Religion. .1 N otes...............................................................................................................................29 Chapter One: The Beginning o f the American Revolution in the Conversion of Northampton ..........................................................................................30 i. Jonathan Edwards and His Role in American Revivalism ...................................30 ii. The Travail of the Puritan Covenant .........................................................................33 iii. Original Sin: The Limits of the Human and the Openness of Community .......... 52 iv. God is No Respecter of Persons: The Ordinary, Lowly, Infantile Nature of the Revival ................................................................................................................................83 V. The “Strange Revolution” versus American Parochialism and “Exceptionalism” 103 vi. The Aesthetics of Grace: Diversity, Exchanges, and Freedom ..............................122 Notes.................................................................................................................................142 Chapter Two: Pierre; or The Ambiguities and the Formation of the American Dilemma i. Melville’s Strange “Rural Bowl of Milk” ...................................................................151 ii. A Revolutionary Marriage Deferred: Familial Reform and the Domestication of the Revolution ..........................................................................................................................164 iii. The Fear of Novelty and Mystery: Pierre’s Flight from the Disappointing “Little Lucy” ................................................................................................................................. 192 iv. The Mystery/ Riddle of Melville’s “Darkwoman” Isabel ......................................212 V. The Power of Blackness: Melville’s Calvinism versus Young America’s Manifest Destiny................................................................................................................................240 N otes...................................................................................................................................249 VI Chapter Three: From “Self’ to “Soul”: W.E.B. Du Bois’ Critical Understanding of the Ideals of Liberal Democracy in the New World ..............................................................256 i. Introducing the Strange Jeremiah: Civil Religion and Public Intellectual .................. 256 ii. America’s Revolutionary Origins and Missed Opportunities for the Promised Land; the Ordinary, Unlovely and Plural American Soul................................................................ 267 iii. African American Leadership Reconsidered: The Work Ethic’s Colonizing Heroes versus Du Bois’s “Talented Tenth” ...................................................................................287 iv. The

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