Harold Chancellor Harold Chancellor The Voice of God in Early Modern English Literature and Culture, c. 1590-1671 Submitted for the award of PhD Dept. of English Language and Literature UCL October 2020 1 Harold Chancellor Declaration I, Harold Chancellor, confirm that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Where information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been indicated in the thesis. 2 Harold Chancellor Abstract This thesis offers the first sustained study of the various ways that English- language authors represented the voice of God during the early modern period. By situating the idea of God’s voice in the context of Protestant anxiety over scriptural usage, I consider how writers working across a broad range of early modern literary genres – such as prose tracts, printed sermons, lyric poems, prophecies, and epic poems – gave voice to God. Chapter One considers Thomas Nashe’s employment of the classical rhetorical technique prosopopoeia to give voice to Christ in Christ’s Tears over Jerusalem. Chapter Two surveys how key biblical proof-texts for the voice of God were explicated in early seventeenth-century printed sermons; and Chapter Three focuses on George Herbert’s rhetorical representation of God’s voice in The Temple. Chapter Four, which surveys a range of prophecies authored at around the time of the English Civil Wars and Interregnum, considers how the voice of God was often thought to be mediated by individuals ordinarily lacking in authority. Chapter Five, which attends to John Milton’s dialogic treatment of the voices of God the Father and the Son of God in Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, suggests that the poet’s epic verse emphasises the necessity of responsiveness to God’s voice. This thesis argues that representing the voices of God the Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit, in literary forms, became much more heavily scrutinised in the post-Reformation era. I demonstrate that, over the course of the seventeenth century, new opportunities for giving God’s voice within texts began to emerge in English Protestant culture, across a broad range of genres. 3 Harold Chancellor Impact Statement How can a mortal author give voice to God? This interdisciplinary thesis – worthwhile from the perspectives of literary, ecclesiastical, and political history – explores the solutions arrived at by English Protestant authors from around 1590 to 1671. Considering major writers such as Nashe, Herbert, and Milton, alongside a range of lesser-known preachers and prophets, this project analyses how humanist interest in rhetorical voice intersected with post-Reformation anxieties about scriptural usage. Within an academic context, this thesis furthers scholarly understanding in a few important ways. Firstly, it contributes to historical understanding of the Reformation and its impact, demonstrating that theological debates about how the Protestant individual might encounter the voice of God came to permeate all sectors of English reformed culture. Secondly, by close-reading exemplary English Protestant texts from different literary genres, this thesis reveals how rhetorical representations of God’s voice were influenced by religio-political developments: most notably, the upheavals of the Civil War period. Lastly, and most collaboratively, this project builds on recent developments in our understanding of how early modern English authors constructed voices in books. It does so by providing a thesis-length study of how the Bible, in its variant forms, became one of the most vital inspirations for rhetorical voices. This thesis also has the potential to make an impact within the discourses of popular history and popular literary criticism. Public interest in the English Reformation is ongoing: thus, material from the thesis could be disseminated in literary newspapers, and by holding talks in schools, churches, and museums. 4 Harold Chancellor Table of Contents Acknowledgments 6 List of Illustrations 7 A Note on the Text 8 Abbreviations 9 Introduction: The Voice of God in Early Modern English Literature and Culture, c. 1590-1671 10 Chapter One: Nashe’s Christ and the Limits of Repentance 60 Chapter Two: The Voice of God in English Printed Sermons, c. 1600-1625 102 Chapter Three: Herbert and God’s Resolving Voice 149 Chapter Four: Heavenly Voices in English Prophetic Writing, c. 1630-1660 198 Chapter Five: Obeying God’s Voice in Milton’s Verse 246 Conclusion: Voicing the Word 294 Bibliography 312 5 Harold Chancellor Acknowledgements My deepest thanks go to my supervisor, Alison Shell, for being a constant source of inspiration, encouragement, and support. Thanks also to René Weis, for illuminating insights and penetrating questions; and to Anthony Ossa- Richardson, for helping to bring this project to fruition. Thank you to Robyn Adams and Matt Symonds, for convening the excellent Early Modern Studies MA at UCL, and for discussions about Nashe, Harvey, and various other matters. Thanks also to Paul Davis, Helen Hackett, Arnold Hunt, Bonnie Lander Johnson, Eric Langley, David Loewenstein, Sophie Read, and Chris Stamatakis, for help, support, and sage guidance, and to all the academic and administrative staff at UCL and St. Hugh’s College, Oxford. Thanks are due to the organisers and audiences at the conferences and seminars at which parts of this work have been presented, especially: ‘Remembering the Reformation’ at Lambeth Palace; ‘Synaesthesia’ at UCL; and the UCL Postgraduate Research Seminar. Thank you to the British Schools’ Charity for the research grant. Thanks to the staff at the Bodleian Library, the British Library, Cambridge University Library, and UCL Library, and to all who have shared lunches, pints, and conversation, especially Sam Caleb, Niall Ó Cuileagáin, Jess Hannah, Ste Hills, Naomi Hinds, Lisa Nicholson, Alberto Tondello, Hannah Tran, and Tymek Woodham. Thank you to my brother Ed and my sister Immy, for their love and support throughout the process of writing this thesis. Thank you to my parents, Matthew and Deborah, for always being there for me. And last, but most certainly not least, thank you to my partner Jenny, and to the youngest person mentioned on this page – my son Isaac. I dedicate this thesis to them, with love. 6 Harold Chancellor List of Illustrations 1.1 Engraving from Cor Jesu Amanti Sacrum (Antwerp, c. 1586), a series of engravings by Anton Wierix the Younger, Royal Library of Belgium, Brussels. Used with permission. 3.1 Engraving of ‘Absolvor’ [I am absolved], taken from Daniel Cramer’s Emblemata Sacra (Frankfurt, 1624), Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel. Used with permission. 4.1 Detail from title-page of John Taylor’s A Swarme of Sectaries (London, 1642), BL, Thomason / 28:F.158[1]. Used with permission. 4.2 Detail from title-page of The Ranters Ranting (London, 1650), BL, Thomason / E.618[8]. Used with permission. 7 Harold Chancellor A Note on the Text Original spellings, italicisation, and typesetting have been retained in all quotations taken from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century printed editions. Titles of early modern works have been capitalised for clarity. All quotations of more than forty words begin on a new line and have been indented. Throughout this thesis, all non-literary references to God and Christ will use the capitalised pronouns ‘He’ and ‘Him’; whilst discussions of literary representations of God and Christ will be differentiated through the use of the lower-case pronouns ‘he’ and ‘him’. The default Bible translation employed in this thesis is the King James Version (1611). All quotations from scripture in Chapters Two, Three, and Four are taken from The Bible: Authorized King James Version, ed. Robert Carroll and Stephen Prickett (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), unless otherwise indicated. However, Chapter One makes use of the Geneva Bible (1560), the most popular English Protestant translation of the late sixteenth century. Here, the modern edition referred to is The Geneva Bible: A Facsimile of the 1560 Edition, introduced by Lloyd E. Berry (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Bibles, 2007). Chapter Five, which focuses on Milton’s epic verse, requires various English translations of the Bible to be used alongside each other, given that Milton would have known and read from several. Whilst the King James Version remains my default Bible translation in Chapter Five, wherever there is reason to believe that Milton was drawing on another English translation, this will be noted in the thesis. 8 Harold Chancellor Abbreviations The following abbreviations have been used: BCP The Book of Common Prayer: The Texts of 1549, 1559, and 1662, ed. Brian Cummings (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011) BL British Library, London EEBO Early English Books Online (© ProQuest LLC, 2003-2019) <http://eebo.chadwyck.com/home> ELR English Literary Renaissance ES English Studies GHJ George Herbert Journal HLQ Huntington Library Quarterly JEH Journal of Ecclesiastical History MPW Complete Prose Works of John Milton, 8 Vols., ed. Don M. Wolfe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1953-1982) MQ Milton Quarterly MS Milton Studies NQ Notes and Queries OCD The Oxford Classical Dictionary, ed. Simon Hornblower, Antony Spawforth, and Esther Eidinow (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012 [4th edn.]) <https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/978019 9545568.001.0001/acref-9780199545568> ODNB Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) <https://www.oxforddnb.com/> OED Oxford English Dictionary (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019) <https://www.oed.com/> PS Prose Studies RS Renaissance Studies SP Studies in Philology 9 Harold Chancellor Introduction: The Voice of God in Early Modern English Literature and Culture, c. 1590-1671 I am gracyus and grete, God withoutyn begynnyng, I am maker vnmade, all mighte es in me; I am lyfe and way vnto welth-wynnyng, I am formaste and fyrste, als I byd sall it be. My blyssyng o ble sall be blendyng, And heldand, fro harme to be hydande, My body in blys ay abydande, Vnendande, withoutyn any endyng.1 (ll.