Spenser's Religious Thoughts In His Literary Works

Emerging between the epoch of literary giants Chaucer and Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser was one of the most prominent poets in English history, whose numerous works exerted great influence upon poets afterward, including another genius poet during the Renaissance, Milton. Spenser created poems that were diverse in style, rich in thought, beautiful in rhythm and superb in skill, well worthy of the title"the poet's poet."Living during a revolutionary period fused with Protestant Reformation and political transformation, Spenser was deeply influenced by the social environment and shapes gradually his own specific religious theory. An exploration of Spenser's poetry, starting from the analysis of social background and personal experience, would provide with us a clear summary of the poet's religious ideas and promising aspects for further researches.As a pious member of Protestantism, Spenser inveighed Roman Catholicism in three layers: on theology, he insisted on justification by faith alone; on liturgical practices, simplicity and anti-superstition were emphasized; and finally on church organization, he denied popery, upholding Queen Elizabeth as the chief religious governor instead. However, Spenser didn't entirely break off ties with Catholicism for he still advocated episcopacy in the reformed church, which could be regarded an outward incarnation of the Golden Means.