What is the mainstream thought of the Renaissance?

The bourgeois ideology formed during the Renaissance is called humanism. Humanists advocate that everything should be "human" oriented and oppose the authority of God. This is because "all other forms of ideology were integrated into theology in the Middle Ages", so that "all attacks on feudal system must first be attacks on the church". The bourgeoisie should reevaluate the religious beliefs and other feudal ideas that hinder its development. In order to oppose the church's fallacy that life is suffering and evil, asceticism and the concept of the afterlife, the bourgeoisie affirms secular life, affirms people's right to pursue wealth and personal happiness, praises love, demands the liberation of personality, develops personal intelligence in various ways and advocates the spirit of adventure. In order to oppose obscurantism and mysticism, the bourgeoisie advocates rationality, believing that man is a rational animal and should pursue knowledge, explore nature and learn science and materialist philosophy. In order to oppose the cruel oppression of feudalism, the bourgeoisie advocates kindness and fraternity; In order to oppose the hierarchy, the bourgeoisie praises friendship and personal morality and advocates equality. In a word, humanism reflected the requirements of a new class, was a progressive thought at that time, and showed vigorous revolutionary vitality, confident optimism and great creativity. It was the initial ideological preparation for the later bourgeois revolution.

However, the "people" that humanists think and admire essentially refers to the bourgeoisie itself and the people of this class. They rationalize the demands of the bourgeoisie and individuals, and individualism is regarded as a natural norm. While advocating personal intelligence and enterprising spirit, the bourgeoisie shows the predatory nature of the jungle; While opposing aristocratic descent, they look down on the lower class. Some humanists, such as Machiavelli, advocate the use of deception to seize and maintain power without any moral constraints.

Humanists undertook the task of bourgeois anti-feudal struggle in the field of culture and thought. One of the most outstanding is "a giant with thinking ability, enthusiasm and personality, versatility and erudition". They have made great contributions to European culture. Their activities go deep into all fields of social life. At first, they collected ancient manuscripts and studied ancient languages, philosophy and literature. The outstanding representatives are Italian Peterak, Bougaccio and Bordeo Bracciurini, followed by French Biday, German Reichlin, Dutch Ailas Mu Si, British Moore and Spanish Weiwei. Their purpose is to absorb ideological nutrition from ancient culture. At the same time, in all aspects of natural science, such as Italian Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Polish Copernicus, German Képler, etc. Philosophically, such as Italian Valla and Mirandola, French Montaigne and British Bacon; Social theory, such as British Moore and Italian campanella; In terms of art, such as Leonardo da Vinci in Italy, Michelangelo, Raphael and Dulle in Germany, they have all made great achievements. In the field of science, they laid the foundation of natural science and promoted productivity; In the field of philosophy, they contributed to the development of materialism; In the field of social thought, utopian socialism appeared for the first time; In the field of art, they opposed the dull, symbolic and illusory art in the Middle Ages and showed a lively and realistic spirit.

The development of bourgeois ideology is not without struggle. This kind of struggle is particularly sharply reflected in philosophical issues. 14-/kloc-the long-term debate about Aristotle's soul theory in the 0/6th century is the expression of this struggle. Similarly, the debate on the relationship between theology and literature from Petrarch and Bougacho, as well as the efforts to strive for the status of poetry, also reflected the dispute between the old and the new.

The church is extremely hostile to humanists and seriously destroys them. The Italian philosopher Pang Bo Naz doubted the immortality of the soul. He was persecuted by the Pope and his works were burned. Copernicus, a Polish astronomer, opposed the theory that the earth is the center of the universe, and his works were banned by the Catholic Church. The works of French writer rabelais were condemned by the Catholic fortress Paris University. Dole, a French humanist, denied the immortality of the soul and was burned at the stake. Similarly, the Italian philosopher Bruno inherited and developed Copernicus's theory, was expelled from one country to another by the Catholic Church, and was finally burned at the stake by the Inquisition. In addition, Galileo and campanella were persecuted by the Inquisition. Campanella was imprisoned for 27 years for organizing an uprising against Spanish rule.

Humanists played a great role in the historical process of this period. But most of them, especially some scholars, have a certain distance from the lower class. They often compromise or communicate with churches and nobles, some of whom are nobles and some are monks. Although they sympathize with the people, they often take a condescending attitude and sometimes even are hostile to the people. Philosophers and scientists among them are not complete materialists.

The new literature in western Europe during the Renaissance was based on humanism. This is the beginning of European bourgeois literature. At this time, literature has more national characteristics and richer national history content; Excellent writers ask questions about the fate of the country and are full of patriotism. Humanists, except a few scholars who write in Latin, all write in their own languages, on the one hand to show national pride, and on the other hand to make their works acceptable to more readers. They absorbed nutrition from ancient languages and people's languages, expanded the expressive ability of languages and made great contributions to the formation of their own literary languages.

Renaissance European literature reached an important stage in the development of creative methods and made new achievements. In the struggle against feudalism and church, writers are more conscious of their creation. They love life, demand to know and reflect reality, abandon symbolism of medieval dream literature and pay attention to realism. The outstanding writers at that time all had a sense of the times and history, and their anti-feudal consciousness made their works strongly ironic. Some people even made a keen observation and criticism of capitalist relations, which indirectly reflected the wishes of the working people. Humanist writers describe the vast social life, create a series of unfortunate artistic images, and enrich the realistic tradition of European literature. They are full of confidence in human development, and their excellent works are not only healthy and optimistic, but also full of romantic enthusiasm and fantasy. The characters in their works often embody their ideals.

Many genres in modern European literature laid the foundation during the Renaissance, such as sonnets in lyric poetry, short stories with modern characteristics, novels around the experiences of one or several protagonists and with the background of a vast real society, dramas and essays that break the boundaries between tragedy and comedy, and so on.

Due to different historical conditions, different countries have different literary achievements. Italy's new literature was born the earliest, and Petrarch's lyric poems praising personal love opened the atmosphere for other western European countries. Bujiachu's short stories developed medieval folk stories and satirized the monk class bitterly. Some scholars' research on ancient knowledge has promoted the prosperity of literary theory and promoted other western European countries to establish new poetics suitable for the needs of the bourgeoisie. The rise of the German bourgeoisie is mainly reflected in the religious reform and the peasant movement. The humanistic movement is limited to a few intellectuals who study ancient languages, but folk literature and satirical literature are relatively developed. With the combination of the French Renaissance and the court, there appeared a poetic school with aristocratic color in literature, but there also appeared rabelais's novels full of humanist anti-feudal enthusiasm. Later, Montaigne's prose expressed the humanist's idea of opposing blind faith. In Spain, where feudalism is powerful, the literature of aristocrats and churches still has great influence. However, on the basis of medieval folk dramas, Spain developed dramas with national characteristics and produced unique vagrant novels. Humanism is mainly embodied in Cervantes' novel Don Quixote and some of Vega's plays. In the sixteenth century, the British bourgeoisie developed rapidly and the class contradictions were sharp. The special environment in Britain made English literature in this period have profound ideological connotation. British new literature was born in Italy and France. It absorbed their creative experience and achieved the greatest artistic achievements. The number and types of excellent works are also considerable, and drama is the most prosperous, becoming the peak of European literature during the Renaissance.

During this period, there were folk literature and feudal literature besides the new literature with humanism as its content. Many humanist writers often draw nutrition from folk literature, but they are also more or less influenced by feudal literature.

Folk literature continued to develop on the basis of medieval folk literature. The legend of Faust in Germany expresses people's desire to oppose religion and pursue knowledge. A large number of folk songs and Pigl's stories, two on history, reflect the anti-feudal struggle of farmers and craftsmen since the Middle Ages. The literature of urban civilians is constantly emerging, such as the poems and songs of poets from urban craftsmen. Stories, jokes, fables and folk dramas are also very popular.

Feudal literature did not disappear during the Renaissance, but it was still popular in areas with strong feudal forces. Through its writers, the church tried to continue to rule people's spiritual world and vigorously supported feudal literature. Thomas Aquinas' theological works have been printed and published many times since16th century. German monk Thomas Kembis (15th century) also wrote a book about imitating Christ. These two men were the most influential reactionary church writers in the late Middle Ages. /kloc-in the 6th century, loyola, a Spanish monk, wrote a book "Spiritual Exercise" for the Jesuits. In addition, the church also spread its reactionary ideas in the form of literature, resulting in the hymns of Spanish priestess Mother Teresa and a large number of other religious literature works. These works promote mysticism and asceticism, affirm the rule of the church, and aim at suppressing the religious reform and the Renaissance.

On the one hand, secular feudal literature is often integrated with religious mysticism literature, such as mysticism poetry popular in Spain in the 15th and 17th centuries; On the other hand, it is reflected in knight literature, such as/kloc-Death of King Arthur by Mallory in England in the 5th century, and/kloc-Amadeus of Gaul, which was popular in Spain from the end of the 5th century to the 6th century. The legend of knight is still very popular in Italy. At this time, the secular feudal literature, on the whole, was the last stream of medieval feudal literature, marking the decline of feudal nobles.

Literature in the Renaissance is mainly humanistic literature. With profound ideological content, high artistic generalization, free structure, all-encompassing figures and vivid and powerful language, it reflects the historical truth of this period, expresses the ideals of the emerging class and the wishes of the broad masses of people, promotes the development of European literature, lays the foundation of modern European bourgeois literature and makes contributions to human culture.