Wayne State University Wayne State University Dissertations 1-1-2012 Hallowed ground: literature and the encounter with god in post-reformtion england, c. 1550 - 1704 Michael Thomas Martin Wayne State University, Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/oa_dissertations Part of the English Language and Literature Commons, and the Other Religion Commons Recommended Citation Martin, Michael Thomas, "Hallowed ground: literature and the encounter with god in post-reformtion england, c. 1550 - 1704" (2012). Wayne State University Dissertations. Paper 456. This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@WayneState. It has been accepted for inclusion in Wayne State University Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@WayneState. HALLOWED GROUND: LITERATURE AND THE ENCOUNTER WITH GOD IN POST-REFORMATION ENGLAND, C.1550 – 1704 by MICHAEL MARTIN DISSERTATION Submitted to the Graduate School of Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 2012 MAJOR: ENGLISH Approved by ____________________________________ Advisor Date ____________________________________ ____________________________________ ____________________________________ ____________________________________ © COPYRIGHT BY MICHAEL MARTIN 2012 All Rights Reserved DEDICATION for Bonnie “since all Divinity is love or wonder” ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I could never have completed—or even contemplated—this dissertation without the direction, help, and support of mentors, colleagues, friends, and family members. I could never begin to repay them for their generosity, which has given me a deeper appreciation for the admission, “Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks.” Ken Jackson’s forthrightness, insightful readings of my drafts, and knowledge of both early modern English literature and Continental philosophy were of great benefit to me as I worked through the issues of this study. Likewise, Jaime Goodrich’s scholarly integrity and recommendation that I move away from considering my subjects exclusively in the light of “mysticism” impelled me to ever more careful scholarship and attention to detail. Michael Joseph Giordano, with his rich knowledge of mysticism, early modern religion, and blessing of my use of “contemplation” as a critical term, did much to help me develop each of the chapters and their relation to the whole. And finally, my advisor Arthur F. Marotti’s guidance throughout my doctoral candidacy as well as through the writing of this dissertation made significant contributions not only to the contents of this study, but also to the development of its author as a scholar. To all of them I am deeply grateful. I am also indebted to the library staff at Marygrove College. Laura Manley, Christy Malmsten, and, especially, Sylvia Turner went to great lengths to secure texts for me that were otherwise unavailable. Without their help, this study would be severely deficient. I also extend my thanks to Cheryl Blumenstein and Ryan O’Rourke, my colleagues at Marygrove, and to fellow Wayne State University graduate students Bradley Stabler and Ken Faulkner, who all read parts of my work at different stages throughout the process of writing and iii made valuable comments and suggestions. Elizabeth Sklar’s guidance through a study of late- medieval English mysticism helped me considerably by giving me a thorough grounding in the English mystical tradition and she simultaneously reaffirmed the joy of scholarly discovery and the necessity for intellectual openness. I likewise extend my thanks to Professor Simone Chess for her advice during an earlier phase of my doctoral studies, as well as to Professor Michael Scrivener whose approach to religious issues in literature encouraged me to pursue the subject of this study. Likewise, I offer my heartfelt gratitude to professors Lynne Schaeffer, Maureen Desroches, and Edwin DeWindt, my mentors from an earlier pair of lives. I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the friendship and support of Carissa Handrinos, Johanna Borman, and Carly Czajka, whom I mercilessly treated as sounding boards when stuck on a particular problem. And I am particularly thankful for the support and encouragement I received from my dear friend, the poet, teacher, and writer Donald Levin, Chair of the Department of English and Modern Languages at Marygrove. Outside of Wayne State University and Marygrove College, several other colleagues have lent their scholarly insight and support to the project, particularly Harold Bloom and Yaakov Mascetti. Professor Bloom kindly responded to my queries about metalepsis as I worked through the Digby chapter, and Professor Mascetti’s humor, kindness, and enthusiasm for metaphysical poetry reminded me why I was doing this in the first place at a time when I was starting to forget. Fr. Cyril Attack, O.F.M. was a wonderful resource and shared much of his considerable knowledge of theology and Church history with me in our many conversations over sips of green tea and/or Metaxa. I am also indebted to the anonymous readers of an earlier draft of my chapter on Kenelm Digby which was published in the journal Prose Studies under the editorship of iv Ronald Corthell. I am thankful to Taylor & Francis Publishing for allowing me to include that material in this study. In Genesis, after the creation of Adam, the Elohim observe, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (2:18). This dissertation would not have been possible without the love and encouragement of my wife, Bonnie. I, surely, have sacrificed much in order to see this study come to completion. She has sacrificed more. Her encouragement, patience, and support while I worked on this project have been immeasurable. Dissertation-writing can be an often lonely undertaking. But I was never alone. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Dedication ..……………………………………………………………………………. ii Acknowledgements .…………………………………………………………………... iii List of Figures .……………………………………………………………………….... viii Introduction: Toward a Criticism of Contemplation ……………………………... 1 Apophasis: The Problem of Religious Experience ..…………………………… 18 Methodology …………………………………………………………………… 22 Chapter One: John Dee: Mysticism, Technology, Idolatry ……………………… 26 “Testimonies of my studious lyfe” .…………………………………………….. 30 Dee as Religious Thinker .……………………………………………………… 38 The Technology of the Created Vision ..……………………………………….. 48 Dee and Spiritual Discernment .……………………………………………….. 53 John Dee and the Gift .………………………………………………………….. 64 Chapter Two: A Glass Darkly: John Donne’s Negative Approach to God ......… 67 Donne and Negative Theology .………………………………………………… 79 Donne and Extasie ...…………………………………………………………… 93 Donne and the Visio Dei ...…………………………………………………….. 98 Holy Dying ……………………………………………………………………. 107 Chapter Three: Love’s Alchemist: Science and Resurrection in the Writing of Sir Kenelm Digby …………………………………..…….. 114 Digby and Palingenesis ……………………………………………………….. 117 In Praise of Venetia …………………………………………………………… 132 Digby the Catholic …………………………………………………………….. 139 vi Chapter Four: The Rosicrucian Mysticism of Henry and Thomas Vaughan …. 145 Worlds of Light ..……………………….……………………………………… 151 Rosicrucianism: Background and Teaching ...………………………………… 156 The Rosy Cross in England ...………………………………………………….. 163 The Rosicrucian Mysticism of Henry and Thomas Vaughan …….…………….. 169 Chapter Five: The Pauline Mission of Jane Lead ………………………………. 200 Lead’s Pauline Community ……………………………………………………. 214 The Pauline Mission, Part 1: The Event ………………………………………. 218 The Pauline Mission, Part 2: Flesh and Spirit ...……………………………… 229 The Pauline Mission, Part 3: Parousia ...…………………………………….. 238 Conclusion: …………………………………………………………………………… 247 Bibliography ..………………………………………………………………………… 249 Abstract ...…………………………………………………………………………….. 305 Autobiographical Statement ………………………………………………………… 307 vii LIST OF FIGURES 1.1: Title page to Dee’s Monas Hieroglyphica (1564)………………………………… 46 4.1: Title page to Heny Vaughan’s Silex Scintillans (1650) …………………….…….. 175 4.2: Emblem from Die Geheime Figuren der Rosenkreuzer (1785) ...………………... 177 4.3: Illustration from Robert Fludd’s Utriusque Cosmi Historia (1617 – 20) ..……….. 186 viii 1 INTRODUCTION: TOWARD A CRITICISM OF CONTEMPLATION In his important study, God Without Being, philosopher Jean-Luc Marion argues that “theological writing always transgresses itself, just as theological speech feeds on the silence in which, at last, it speaks correctly.” 1 For Marion, this is due to the fact that theology is underwritten by the writer’s awareness that he or she writes in the presence of the absolutely other, the presence of God. As a result, such a discourse “diverts the author from himself… it causes him to write outside of himself, even against himself, since he must not write what he is, on what he knows, in view of what he wants, but in, for, and by that which he receives and in no case masters.”2 Anyone who has ever undertaken the issue of God in writing is surely cognizant of the inability to speak from a position of absolute authority. Even Aquinas, toward the end of his career, concluded that his voluminous theological writings and hymns were unequal to his subject matter.3 In discourses that treat of God, no one can ever say, “Consummatum est.” Such an endeavor is never accomplished, always contingent. The figures whose work I examine in this study, each in his or her way, wrote and spoke of God. All of them hoped to awaken in their readers or audiences an experience of