Theological Origins of Modernity

humanism and the apotheosis of man 75
Dioigi of Borgo San Sepolcro and Luigi Marsili who were well acquainted
with nominalism. 21
Even if one rejects the notion that Petrarch was shaped by or was responding
to nominalist thought, there is no question about the infl uence
of nominalism on later humanist thought. Th e parallels are obvious. 22
Ontologically, both nominalism and humanism reject realism in favor of
individualism. Both also reject syllogistic logic. Th e nominalists seek to
replace it with a logic of names or terms. Humanists turn to rhetoric. 23
Th eologically, both portray God as radically omnipotent and consequently
reject rational theology in favor of Scripture. 24 Both also draw heavily on
Augustine. Cosmologically, both see the world not as an immutable natural
order but as a chaos of individual bodies in motion. Finally, both see
human beings not as rational animals but as individual willing beings. 25
In the political realm, they both also sought to develop more republican
theories of authority. 26 All of these similarities, however, might be simply
accidental. Moreover, there are real and important diff erences between
humanism and nominalism in all of their diff erent forms and permutations.
To understand the connection of humanism and Christianity we
thus need to examine the development of humanism more carefully.
Humanism from the beginning was a strange construction of what at
times seemed to be incommensurable parts. Th e admiration of pagan antiquity,
of its moral and political heroes, its art and philosophy, its tragic
literature and rhetorical practices was not easily compatible with original
sin, the adoration of martyrs, monastic withdrawal, Christian charity, the
preeminence of Scripture, or asceticism, and it was always a struggle to
hold the two together. As we saw in the last chapter, Petrarch admired
and praised the vita activa and the virtues needed to sustain it, but he also
recognized the virtues of the vita contemplativa practiced by the monks
and developed a new vision of a secular private life with its own leisure for
contemplation and creation. He thus sought to combine the active political
life of the heroic Romans he so admired with the Augustinian Christianity
he found so compelling. He was critical of corruption in the church, but
he saw the source of this corruption not in Christian doctrine or in the institutional
structures of the church but in the weakness of human nature.
He also doubted that human beings could live entirely secular lives. While
he asserted in his most secular work, Remedies for Fortune Fair and Foul,
that reason could play an important role in ameliorating human diffi culties,
he also recognized that the solution to earthly problems could not
be separated from the question of salvation. Finally, although he admired
noble men such as Scipio and Cato, he never forgot that they were pagans,