デフォーの態度 : Occasional Conformityをめぐって
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概要
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During the reign of William III, the dissenters had enjoyed a period of comparative freedom. By practising 'Occasional Conformity', they might also qualify themselves for the holding of office. As soon as Anne was on the throne, a bill was introduced in the House of Commons for preventing Occasional Conformity. Immediately a conflict broke out in Parliament and throughout the country. Seeing that the old disabilities might be revived in all their rigor, Defoe came out in defense of his co-religionists. Throughout the controversy over the Occasional Bill, Defoe continued to busy himself, enrage his opponents, High Tories, and, we must add, to perplex posterity with his treatment of the issues of Dissent. Reading his Review, pamphlets, and letters, we are left wondering how much he really cared for his dissenting brethren. True, Defoe, a dissenter, a whig, remained the most strenuous opponent to the Occasional Bill. And yet the fact is that he proved himself several times to be no lover of Occasional Conformity. Defoe's writings often evoked a wail of frightened protest from his fellow Dissenters, while the High Church party was always furious with them. Is he a sort of opportunist? Far from it. (1) Defoe was basically an idealist who poured scorn upon those compromising 'Occasional Conformists' and insisted that a thing was either right or wrong. See especially his pamphlet published in 1698. (2) At the same time, however, he was ever a realist and could invariably write about religion in a completely realistic way. See, among others, his letter to Harley (Aug.-Sept., 1704?) in which Defoe speaks of his fellow Dissenters as callously as any High Tory. Who is Defoe, after all? It seems that Defoe in the Occasional Conformity controversy was a very much strange creature which was an idealistic realist.
- 一般財団法人日本英文学会の論文
一般財団法人日本英文学会 | 論文
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