John Colet: Humanism In Early Tudor England

By the end of the fifteenth century England as a result of its political and intellectual development seemed ripe for the reception of Remaissance ideas. Einglish Renaissance began in early tudor. Pre-Reformation Humanim is usually called Christain Humanim, it was much more closely related to the rehabilitation of Christion Literature and to the return to more accurate texts and a pure life with the church.While John Colet is not as well known a Christian humanist as Erasmus, his writings are reflective of Christain humanism. At Oxford Colet lectured on the epistles of St.Paul, replacing the old Scholastic method of interpretation with one more harmory with humanism. The lectures avoid citation of the Schoolmen, and turn to the early Church Fathers and the Neo-Plationists for their authorities. Instead of employing the dialectical method of the Scholastics in expounding his text, Colet adopted the guammatical method of the Italian humanists and the early Patrestic writers. Colet resdued to set apart a large portion of his great private fortune to endow the St.Paul'school where boys could enjoy the privilege of an education in Latin and Greek. He entrusted it to the care of the Mercers'Company. The school was the first example of non-clenical management in education. Though Colet disapproved of auricular confession and of the clerical celibacy, he never dream of a formal breach with Roman Catholicism. The needed reform he sought should be effected by wise and judicious but peaceful action beginning from within the Church and with those highest in it.