Birth Of A New Era Essays - Medieval Philosophy, Historical Eras

Birth Of A New Era Despite the problems of the fourteenth century, it marked the beginnings of extraordinary changes in numerous facets of fifteenth century society. This astonishing revolution was coined the Renaissance, which meant rebirth. The Renaissance led to such literary pioneers as Niccol? Machiavelli. His work, The Prince, gave detailed instructions as to what qualities a perfect leader must possess and how to use these qualities. Machiavelli presented a thorough account of a perfect prince and how he achieved and maintained power. Machiavellis The Prince is a classic literary example of Renaissance writing in the ideas it conveys and how it conveys them. The Renaissance, a time of cultural achievements and economic and political evolution, developed out of the plague, famine, and death of the fourteenth century. As opposed to the Middle Ages, the Renaissance introduced such ideas that embodied three characteristics: individualism, humanism, and secularism. With the arrival of the Renaissance came the cultural evolution and the introduction of many remarkable individuals, such as Michelangelo. Due to the emphasis in the Middle Ages to religion, individualism during the period was nonexistent because of the Christian determent of self-absorption. Literature emerged in the Renaissance accentuating the individual, which helped to give birth to talented artists and writers. Individualism put emphasis on personality and uniqueness and using ones abilities to their full potential. The Renaissance was all about a quest for glory. Oddly enough, Middle Age artists typically painted and sculpted anonymously but the Renaissance saw the emergence of artwork with the artists signature. Pages 232-234 of Discovering the Western Past illustrate examples of Renaissance artwork and the cultural achievements of the period. Each page contains a portrait of an individual, something unheard of during the medieval period because of the medieval periods tendency to stress the group. Painters began painting realistically in the attempt to mirror reality and the wealthy hired painters to paint their portrait to immortalize a part of themselves in a depiction of their glory and accomplishments. The Middle Ages introduced the importance of education of becoming a civilized person, and learning was still an important aspect that continued into the Renaissance. The difference between the two periods was how scholars went about their studies of past literary culture. The Renaissance style of learning became known as humanism, or new learning. Humanists studied the Latin classics to learn about human nature and emphasized human beings achievements, interests, and capabilities. On the other hand, medieval scholars studied ancient works to understand God and interpreted them purely in a Christian sense. Although Renaissance humanists possessed strong Christian values, they studied the classics far differently than those in the Middle Ages. While medieval writers used the classics to reveal God and Christian ideas, humanists tended to look at the way these ideas were expressed rather than the ideas themselves. An interesting repercussion of the crisis of the fourteenth century was the economic prosperity that followed. Apparently the famine, plague, and numerous deaths of the fourteenth century served as an effective population control and managed to increase the demand for labor. The increase in the demand for labor allowed for increased wages and people were back to pre-plague levels of income. With this increase in material wealth came more importance placed upon the material world instead of the eternal world of spirit. Even though medieval people were ruthless in their pursuit of the almighty dollar, they still dominantly focused their attention on life after death. Renaissance people were quite the opposite in their interests by holding strong religious values yet centering their concentration on the present material world and the acquisition of material things. The rising economic prosperity caused people to realize thoughts about penance and purgatory did not allow them to enjoy th e material pleasures they could now afford. The people had not endured the crisis of the fourteenth century only to spend their time focusing their attentions to the faith. They wanted to take advantage of their new prosperity and enjoy their leisure time and discover the joys of living a comfortable life. Unfortunately, the church was no exception to the sin of avarice. The pope and high church officials were notorious for throwing their money around and the importance the church