Page:Poet Lore, volume 4, 1892.djvu/562



HE thought of Chaucer as religious, in the accepted sense of the term, is a pleasing absurdity. Mr. Lounsbury’s recent monograph, however, has raised a query about the relation of Chaucer to the religion of his time. It is the work of a profound student. No stone has been left unturned to prove Chaucer irreligious. For my own part, although I agree with Mr. Lounsbury in most particulars, I should like to lay the stress a little differently. I shall try to restate the whole question more briefly, from a less scholarly standpoint, to prove Chaucer, in a special sense, religious. This is begging the question. Mr. Lounsbury has declared Chaucer pre-eminently a man of letters and an artist in his profession, and he has explained the poet’s philosophy; but in support of Chaucer’s twofold ability as critic and as artist, I would dwell even more forcibly, if possible, upon a twofold influence of historic significance; namely, contemporary art in Italy, and the development of rationalism in religion.

Readers of Chaucer are familiar with the religious figures of Monk, Friar, Pardoner, and Summoner of the ‘Canterbury Tales,’