Anglican Enlightenment
Orientalism, Religion and Politics in England and its Empire, 1648–1715

An original interpretation of the early Enlightenment and the politics of religion in later Stuart England and its global empire.

William J. Bulman (Author)

9781107073685, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 12 May 2015

357 pages, 6 b/w illus.
23.5 x 15.8 x 2.4 cm, 0.66 kg

'This is an important and thought-provoking book which deserves to be taken seriously by scholars … This book joins those by Grant Tapsell and Brent Sirota in making the case for the period as one which was marked by intellectual and religious vitality and cannot be ignored by scholars.' William Gibson, The English Historical Review

This is an original interpretation of the early European Enlightenment and the religious conflicts that rocked England and its empire under the later Stuarts. In a series of vignettes that move between Europe and North Africa, William J. Bulman shows that this period witnessed not a struggle for and against new ideas and greater freedoms, but a battle between several novel schemes for civil peace. Bulman considers anew the most apparently conservative force in post-Civil War English history: the conformist leadership of the Church of England. He demonstrates that the church's historical scholarship, social science, pastoral care and political practice amounted not to a culturally backward spectacle of intolerance, but to a campaign for stability drawn from the frontiers of erudition and globalization. In seeking to sever the link between zeal and chaos, the church and its enemies were thus united in an Enlightenment project, but bitterly divided over what it meant in practice.

Introduction: from learning to liberalism?
Part I. Foundations: 1. Literature and violence
2. Empires, churches and republics of the globe
Part II. Culture: 3. Histories
4. Universals
Part III. Religion: 5. The propagation of the faith
6. The worship of God
Part IV. Politics: 7. Restoration
8. Revolution
Conclusion: from pastor to spectator
Select bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: History of ideas [JFCX], Church history [HRCC2], Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH]