The Zeitgeist of the Middle Ages can be easily seen through this corruption of the Catholic Church, a topic brought to focus in Geoffrey Chaucer’s novel The Canterbury Tales. Here, in his novel, Chaucer’s characters often convey personalities that are appalling; some of them have faults that could fill an entire cup more than full. To make matters even more scandalous, a good number of these characters are affiliated with the Catholic Church. Furthermore, their corruption and that of the Catholic Church at large can be analyzed through their deviation from the vows of poverty, obedience, and chastity, which are essential to being a devout Catholic. First of all, Catholic’s believe that in order to be religious, one must surrender worldly goods and be poor in reality as well in spirit.
Moliere’s Tartuffe In Moliere’s satire, Tartuffe, the author fires his caustic wit upon the social topics of religious hypocrisy and the inability of obsessed characters to hear the voices of reason around them. At first glance, the focus of this work seems to be religious hypocrisy; however, it is the underlying subplots of obsessive behaviors stay in the mind’s eye until end. Moliere’s portrayal of obsessive characters is certainly exaggerated, but there is a clear note of truth that rings through in their powerlessness to hear reason. Until the spell that binds them to their compulsion is broken, these characters are unable to hear the voices of reason that are shouting the truth to them. The main actor of this play who displays the deafness that comes with obsession is Orgon with his religious fervor that blinds him to his responsibility to his family.
Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. We born again Christians are passing through the most astonishing era of history, in which many false religions and soul destroying hellish doctrines are surrounding everywhere we live. There is a rise of hedonism, Paganism and other false worldviews causing a serious attack against the true Christian faith. The dark clouds of great apostasy are gathering
The next most important reason for the collapse was religion and Charles’ push toward Arminianism and absolutism. The fear of Charles becoming absolutist shaped how his policies were viewed and the MP’s political attitudes. Appello Ceasarum produced by Montagu and commissioned by the King angered many MPs as it argued the similarities between Protestantism and Catholicism. This brought MPs to call for the impeachment of Montagu as they felt it promoted anti-Calvinism. Charles’ reaction to this, as he imposed his prerogative as the Divine Right Monarch, promoted Montagu to Royal Chaplain.
The ideas of the Reforms came from the side of Martin Luther and the common people of the Catholic church who had started to question the clergy of the Catholic Church such as the pope. The theories of Luther scared the Catholic church and the trusted followers of the pope which
Through the novel, The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the reader learns that the Puritan religion looks down on sinning and punishes sinners harshly. Through several examples throughout the text, the reader can conclude that Hawthorne did not agree with the Puritans’ attitude toward sin. Hawthorne uses satire throughout the novel to make fun of the Puritan views. The main character of the novel is Hester Prynne, who is found cheating on her husband. As a result, she is forced to wear a sewn scarlet “A” on her clothing.
The True Meaning Behind Candide Candide is a literary work by Francois-Marie Arout, more commonly known by his penname, Voltaire. Candide, otherwise titled Optimism, is the tale of a young German lad named Candide and the adventures that he undergoes. While the plot of the novel is interesting, the book is considered a classic because of the not-so-subtle humorous ridiculing of everything that Voltaire wished to mock. Voltaire ridicules the church, the state, and everything in between through the use of allegory. Voltaire used certain literary techniques and language, such as humor, in order to effusively express his contempt of what was happening in his world.
Within the source it is stated how More was often “taunting and mocking” people. This suggests More was cruel towards others and those below him in both rank and society. However, this evidence could be seen as an attack on More by his enemies. This is because the torture acts mentioned in Source N were taken from John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. This book documented the acts of torture and violence against protestants, and would therefor be highly critical of those in high positions, such as More.
By describing the priests as ‘ravenous wolves’, suggests hatred towards the church, and due to how bold and vivid this description is, implies really negative connotations of how severe the exploitation was. This description is so bold however that it does make us question the reliability of the source, because it seems so exaggerated that it doesn’t seem to be a realistic reflection of true events. Further in the source, when it exclaims, ‘What money they pull in by their fees, for wills and testaments, pilgrimages and first masses’, demonstrates exploitation by telling people they need these things, implying that
First the sun is mocked, and then a wide social spectrum is satirized. The speaker next satirizes “hours, days, [and] months,” which he lambastes as being the mere “rags of time” (10), but then he soon returns to satirizing the sun (11-18). He subsequently mocks “Princes” (23), honor (24), and “wealth” (24) before returning once more to satire of the sun (25-30).This poem, in other words, is a tour de force of satire, presenting an extremely self-confident speaker. Is it possible, however, that Donne himself is mocking the very speaker he presents? Is it possible that the speaker is a bit too cocky, a bit too self-centered, a bit too complacent and self-involved?