The influence of romanticism on Renan's historical treatment of religious beliefs

Abstract

Renan, by applying historical methods to religious beliefs, introduced a new subject into French literature. How far was he indebted to Romantic ideas? (1) His conception of religion as a permanent disposition of the human mind and as an emotion independent of dogma; this a favourite Romantic theory springing from the new thirst for Individualism (2) In dividing religions into reflective and spontaneous types, and in confining his interest to the more primitive, Renan influenced by Romantic theories His identification of the religious with the aesthetic sentiment shows the influence of Chateaubriand. (3) Large element of conjecture and divination in his work; this appeals to his Romantic love of vagueness, but Renan too scientific to succumb to the worst faults of subjectivity such as characterised Michelet (4) Debt of Renan as a historian, both in method and treatment, to previous Romantic historians. (5) Renan's sympathetic insight into the religious mind shows influence of the Romantic - Psychology (6) As a builder of scientific utopias and as a worshipper at the shrine of German thought, Renan following the Romantic tradition (7) His theory of the influence of time, race, and nature on religion not new, but found in Herder and other Romantic writers (8) Renan's description of the life of peoples, their mental outlook and material surroundings; treated as necessary part of description of growth of a religion; influence here of Romantic love of local colour and of the picturesque(9) His Romanticism not explained by his Celtic- blood; effect of childhood and of years at St. Nicholas du chardonnet on his future literary development. Renan a curious combination of the scientist and the literary artist; lasting worth due to the fact that he brought to his history some of the richest gifts of which the Romantic genius is capable.