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Protestantism and Capitalism in Pre-Revolutionary England

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Charles  and
Katherine George
Katherine George
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
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Extract

It has become a truism of historical thought that some degree or kind of positive relationship exists between the ideology of Protestantism and the psychology of early capitalists. Statements of the nature of this relationship have varied, however, and have been often based upon inadequate sampling of the relevant literature or inexact analysis of Protestant social theory.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 27 , Issue 4 , December 1958 , pp. 351 - 371
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1958

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References

1. For an introduction to the problems in volved see especially Troeltsch, Ernst, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches (2 vols., N. Y., 1931)Google Scholar; Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (London, 1930)Google Scholar; Brentano, Lujo, Die Anfänge des modernen Kapitalismus (München, 1916)Google Scholar; Tawney, R. H., Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (N. Y., 1926)Google Scholar; the of Talcott Parsons, for which the bibliography in Essays in Sociological Theory (rev. ed., Glencoe, , Illinois, , 1954)Google Scholar; Hudson, W. S., “Puritanism and the Spirit of Capitalism,” Church History (March, 1949)Google Scholar; Wood, Herbert G., “Puritanism and Capitalism,” The Congregational Quarterly (April, 1951)Google Scholar; and the bibliographical essay by Tawney, in The Times Literary Supplement, January 6, 1956.Google Scholar

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9. Ibid., 100–101.

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17. Adams, , The Works, 1147.Google Scholar

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26. Dent, op. cit., 116.

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29. Robinson, op. cit., I, 122.

30. Sanderson, Robert, XXXVI Sermons (London, 1689), 205.Google Scholar

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32. Perkins, op. cit., Dedicatory Preface.

33. Sanderson, op. cit., 215.

34. Sibbes, , Bowels Opened … (London, 1639), 17–18.Google Scholar

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36. Ibid., 757.

37. Ibid., 773.

38. Bolton, op. cit., 48.

39. Perkins, , Workes, I, 194.Google Scholar

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46. St. Thomas Aquinas has served throughout this study as the particular point of reference for our summations of the social theory of medieval Roman Catholicism. In the rich literature of controversy and commentary surrounding the Angelic Doctor viewpoints undoubtedly exist which differ from his and which in some instances may approach more nearly to the viewpoints of the Protestant writers we are analyzing. But in the light of Roman Catholicism's own long and often avowed acknowledgment of the preeminence in the Church of St. Thomas and the structure of doctrine he erected, one is surely justified in employing him as the spokesman par excellence of the Roman Catholic position for the period with which we are concerned. It is in his works, moreover, that one finds most fully developed that tension between Christian philosophy and an idealized feudal society which constitutes the basis, and, in one sense, the whole essence of the difference between Roman Catholic and Protestant social theory.

47. Robinson, , Works, I, 116.Google Scholar

48. Sanderson, op. cit., 56.

49. Adams, , Works, 419.Google Scholar

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52. Ibid., 391.

53. Hall, Joseph, Holy Observations (London, 1607), 137.Google Scholar

54. See Archibald (George), Katherine, “The Concept of Social Hierarchy in the Writings of St. Thomas Aquinas,” Historian, XII (1949), 50.Google Scholar