UCLA UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Unbelief: Atheism in the Literary Imagination, 1690–1810 Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9c56g7gr Author Reeves, James Bryant Publication Date 2016 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Unbelief: Atheism in the Literary Imagination, 1690–1810 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in English by James Bryant Reeves 2016 © Copyright by James Bryant Reeves 2016 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Unbelief: Atheism in the Literary Imagination, 1690–1810 by James Bryant Reeves Doctor of Philosophy in English University of California, Los Angeles, 2016 Professor Felicity A. Nussbaum, Chair This dissertation argues that eighteenth-century British authors often employed atheism to explore both the limits of modern selfhood and the limits of literary representation. Authors like Jonathan Swift, Sarah Fielding, Phebe Gibbes, and William Cowper imagined godless worlds dominated by atheists and atheistic tenets to interrogate Lockean and later Scottish Enlightenment understandings of the self. These authors cast the atheist as the fundamental incarnation of a completely autonomous self, and they each raised the issue of that self's ability (or, more accurately, inability) to integrate successfully into a wider community defined by developing notions of civility, sociability, and fellow feeling. Perhaps unsurprisingly, this atheistic self was found wanting. For the authors discussed throughout “Unbelief,” a truly sociable self was a believing self. And, because atheism barred one from sociability, theists from ii" " all corners of Britain's empire were entitled to participate, if in varying degrees, in the believing world these authors promoted. How authors went about this was counterintuitive. Instead of directly addressing atheistic arguments in the manner of sermons and apologetic tracts, literary works instantiated a speculative genre that takes atheism's premises for granted, depicting worlds in which God is absent and atheists rule the roost. Hence, the narrator of Swift's An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity (1708) begins by informing us that two men recently discovered there is no God. Swift notably satirizes these British atheists by juxtaposing them to Turkish Muslims, who to their credit still believe in God. Although Swift most certainly felt little attraction to Islam, it is nonetheless telling that the chasm between real, substantive Christianity and the religions Britain encountered in the East was narrowed for him by the more troubling presence of atheism at home. In response to atheism's perceived spread, this chasm continued to shrink throughout the century. Thus, just as texts like Swift's Argument present speculative fictions meant to forestall the rise of real-world unbelief, so too did religious pluralism arise, at least in part, as a reaction against atheism. iii" " The dissertation of James Bryant Reeves is approved. Helen E. Deutsch Margaret C. Jacob Felicity A. Nussbaum, Committee Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2016 iv" " DEDICATION For Benjamin, Brooklyn, and William. I’ll always believe in you. v" " TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements vii Vita ix Introduction 1 I. Jonathan Swift: “A Compleat System of Atheism” 30 II. Sarah Fielding: The Limits of Self in David Simple and Volume the Last 99 III. Phebe Gibbes: Theism, Gender, and the Orient 142 IV. William Cowper: Ecumenical Poetics 188 Coda. Shelley, Sympathy, and Unbelief 236 Bibliography 260 vi" " ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this dissertation was supported by a Dissertation Year Fellowship I received from UCLA’s Department of English in 2015–2016. Without the department’s unqualified support, this project would not have been possible. I am also grateful to my fellow graduate students for their comments and encouragement throughout the writing process. I am indebted to Ben Beck, Katie Charles, Cailey Hall, Kim Hedlin, Alex Erich Hernandez, Jay Jin, Leigh-Michil George, Grant Rosson, Kiel Shaub, Samir Soni, Taylor Walle, Jordan Wingate, and Martin Zirulnik. Angelina Del Balzo, who co-chaired the 18th Century/Romantics Working Group with me from 2014–2016, deserves special thanks for her patience and kindness. I’d also like to thank Sarah Kareem for her contributions to the group and for her wonderful feedback on several papers I presented. The Center for 17th- and 18th-Century Studies provided timely aid by hiring me as a Graduate Researcher in 2014, and I am thankful for the ongoing help and feedback given by Professor Barbara Fuchs. UCLA’s Graduate Division supported my research in 2016 by providing another Dissertation Year Fellowship. The project’s coda was completed during my time as a Leeds-Hoban Exchange Fellow at Linacre College, Oxford. I am obliged to both the Huntington Library and Linacre College for their generous support. Several Oxford librarians were immensely helpful, including Georgie Edwards, Clare Hopkins, and Nicholas Davidson. Robin Darwall-Smith and Dr. Bruce Barker- Benfield were courteous and gave learned responses to all my queries. My Master of Studies supervisor at Oxford, Freya Johnston, and my undergraduate mentor, Jennifer Snead, spurred my initial interest in the eighteenth century. I have been extremely fortunate in the rigorous, enthusiastic commentary and professional advice I have received from my dissertation committee. Margaret Jacob and Saree vii" " Makdisi inspired me with their academic work and with their comments on my own. Helen Deutsch taught me to read Swift, to think outside the box, and to always push my arguments just one step further. I am enormously indebted to her published work, her insightful commentary on my various articles and chapters, and the many lively, funny, and uplifting conversations we’ve had in her office. Finally, I owe more to Felicity Nussbaum than I’ll ever be able to put into words. Her generosity, encouragement, and commitment to her students are unparalleled. I couldn’t have asked for a better mentor. The dissertation’s completion is a testament to the constant encouragement of my parents, James and Rhonda Reeves, and my brother, Josh Reeves. For keeping me sane throughout the PhD process, I am thankful to my three children, Benjamin, Brooklyn, and William. The biggest thanks of all, however, goes to my wife, Elisabeth Reeves. She has been an unfailing source of optimism, reassurance, and graciousness. This project happened because of her. viii" " VITA James Bryant Reeves received a B.A. in English from Texas Tech University in 2008. In 2010, he earned a Master of Studies in English from the University of Oxford (St Edmund Hall), and he completed his M.A. at UCLA in 2014. He has been awarded Dissertation Year Fellowships by both UCLA’s Department of English and UCLA’s Graduate Division. In 2015, he was awarded the Leeds-Hoban Exchange Fellowship from the Huntington Library and Linacre College, Oxford. He has published articles on Samuel Richardson, the epistolary novel, and temporality, and on Sarah Scott, disability, and aging. His work has appeared in SEL Studies in English Literature 1500–1900 and Eighteenth-Century Fiction. ix" " INTRODUCTION Towards a Literary History of Atheism HERE are to be met with in these Western Parts, infinite Numbers of People, who not only despise and vilify our Law, but their own, and openly scoff at all Religions in the World. These are known by the Name of Libertines or Atheists, which is to say, People that profess themselves Enemies to the Belief of a God. A lewd and unthinking Herd of Animals… Giovanni Paolo Marana, Letters Writ by a Turkish Spy1 We live in an Age … much addicted to Atheism. Matthew Hole, Against Atheists2 The explicit aim of the inaugural Boyle Lectures delivered in 1692 by the theologian and classical scholar Richard Bentley was to prove "the Christian Religion against notorious Infidels, viz. Atheists, Deists, Pagans, Jews and Mahometans; not descending to any Controversies that are among Christians themselves."3 While the catchall term "Infidels" reflects the recently deceased Robert Boyle's desire that the lectures would promote Christianity over and against a wide variety of heterodox belief systems, it is nonetheless telling that the chief term associated with infidelity here is "Atheists." Indeed, Bentley's Boyle Lectures have absolutely nothing to say about "Pagans, Jews, and Mahometans." His eight sermons are instead devoted entirely to 1 Giovanni Paolo Marana, Letters Writ by a Turkish Spy, trans. William Bradshaw and Robert Midgley, vol. 2 of 8 (1684; London: Printed for A. Wilde, 1748), 251. 2 Matthew Hole, The Witnesses that God Almighty Hath Left Us of Himself, Against Atheists (London, 1720), 4. 3 Richard Bentley, Eight Sermons Preach’d at the Honourable Robert Boyle’s Lecture, in the First Year, MDCXCII, 5th ed. (Cambridge, UK: Cornelius Crownfield, 1724), Epistle Dedicatory. 1 demonstrating that "Speculative Atheism" is a "Labyrinth of Nonsense and Folly."4 Bentley's primary goal, in other words, was to defend theism, not a particular brand of Christianity. Following in the wake of the 1689 Act of Toleration and the Established Church's concomitant loosening of the reins over matters spiritual, the Boyle Lectures mark a sea change in British thinking about heterodoxy. As the lectures testify, atheism was one of British culture's chief concerns in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. To be sure, apologetic tracts, sermons, and books written against atheism were published at an astonishing rate in the period.5 Accusations of atheism were also rampant, despite the odd fact that many orthodox thinkers argued against the possibility of atheism's existence.6 Even men who professed to be Christians, such as Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Matthew Tindal, were not immune to the charge. Of course, freethinkers and deists like John Toland and Charles Blount were consistently labeled atheists. Despite the fact that his own A Tale of a Tub (1704) had proven controversial, for instance, Jonathan Swift, in his Mr.