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The Common Ground of Wesley and Edwards

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Richard E. Brantley
Affiliation:
University of Florida

Extract

Although evangelicalism is “spiritual” and empiricism is “natural,” the great principle of empiricism, that one must see for oneself and be in the presence of the thing one knows, applies as well to evangelical faith. Each of these two methodologies operates along a continuum that joins emotion to intellect; each joins externality to words through “ideas/ideals of sensation,” that is, through either perception or grace-in-perception or both. While empiricism refers to immediate contact with and direct impact from objects and subjects in time and place, evangelicalism entertains the notions that religious truth is concerned with experiential presuppositions and that experience need not be nonreligious. On the basis of the experiential common denominator between empiricism and evangelicalism, through the “both/and” logic of philosophical theology, I argue that John Wesley (1703–91), founder of British Methodism, and Jonathan Edwards (1703–58), leader of the American Great Awakening, theologize empiricism. They ground transcendentalism in the world, balance religious myths and religious morality with scientific reverence for fact and detail, and ally empirical assumptions with “disciplined” spirit. Above all, they share the simultaneously rational and sensationalist reliance on experience as the avenue to both natural and spiritual knowledge.

Type
Research Articles
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1990

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References

1 See my Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1984)Google Scholar . Many thanks to Melvyn New, A. Carl Bredahl, and David Leverenz for their comments on this essay, parts of which I presented to the Eighth Oxford Institute for Methodist Theological Studies, the American Academy of Religion, and Perspectives on the Romantic Movement: An Interdisciplinary Conference at Baylor University.

2 See, e.g., Fiering, Norman, Jonathan Edwards's Moral Thought and Its British Context (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981)Google Scholar ; and Wainwright, William J., “Jonathan Edwards and the Language of God,” JAAR 48 (1980) 519–30Google Scholar.

3 For samples of Perry Miller's argument for Edwards as a Lockean, see , Miller'sJonathan Edwards (New York: W. Sloane, 1949) and hisGoogle ScholarJonathan Edwards and the Sense of the Heart,” HTR 41 (1948) 123–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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8 Wallace E. Anderson, “The Development of Edwards' Philosophical Thought,” in idem, ed., The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 6 : Scientific and Philosophical Writings (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980) 101–2Google Scholar.

9 See the discussion in , Anderson, “The Development of Edwards' Philosophical Thought,” 101–2Google Scholar . See also Davidson, Edward H., “From Locke to Edwards,” JHI 24 (1963) 355–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Smith, Claude A., “Jonathan Edwards and the ‘Way of Ideas,’” HTR 59 (1966) 153–73CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; and Helm, Paul, “John Locke and Jonathan Edwards: A Reconsideration,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 7 (1969) 5161CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 For my overview of Locke, see Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, esp. 12–13.

11 Jenson, Robert W., America's Theologian: A Recommendation of Jonathan Edwards (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), esp. 3.Google Scholar

12 Rogers, Charles, “John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards,” Duke Divinity School Review 31 (1966) 2038.Google Scholar

13 See Jackson, Thomas, ed., The Works of the Rev. John Wesley, A. M. (London: Wesleyan-Methodist Book-Room, n.d.) 10. 463, 467, 475.Google Scholar

14 Ibid., 10. 460.

15 Outler, Albert, John Wesley (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964) 16.Google Scholar

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17 Many thanks to Frederick Dreyer for corresponding with me about his work in progress, which builds on his Faith and Experience in the Thought of John Wesley,” AHR 88 (1983) 1230Google Scholar.

18 The essay and Harvey G. Townsend's discussion of it are in Townsend, ed . The Philosophy of Jonathan Edwards From His Private Notebooks (Eugene: University of Oregon Mono-graphs, 1955) xi-xiii, 120Google Scholar.

19 See esp. chaps. 1 and 2 of Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism.

20 The other four of Edwards's works abridged by Wesley are A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God in the Conversion of many hundred souls in Northampton (Edinburgh: J. Oswald, 1736)Google Scholar ; The Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God (Boston: S. Kneeland and T. Green, 1741)Google Scholar ; Some Thoughts Concerning the Present Revival in New England (Boston: S. Kneeland and T. Green, 1742)Google Scholar ; and An account of the Life of the Late Reverend Mr. David Brainerd (Boston: D. Henchman, 1749)Google Scholar . Wesley's abridgments of these works are A Narrative of Many Surprising Conversations in Northampton and Vicinity (Boston: Felix Farley, 1744)Google Scholar ; The Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God (London: W. Strahan, 1744)Google Scholar ; Thoughts Concerning the Present Revival of Religion (London: W. Strahan, 1745)Google Scholar ; and An Extract of the Life of the Late Rev. Mr. David Brainerd (Bristol: William Pine, 1768)Google Scholar.

21 See Wesley, John, The Works of the Rev. John Wesley (32 vols.; Bristol: J. Paramore, 1771-1774)Google Scholar , and the discussion in John E. Smith, ed., The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol 2 : A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1959) 79Google Scholar . My quotations of the abridgment are from a widely available reprint of it in the following collection of Wesley's abridgments : Wesley, John, ed., A Christian Library: Consisting of Extracts from and Abridgments of the choicest Pieces of Practical Divinity which have been published in the English Tongue (50 vols.; Philadelphia: Jonathan Pounder, 1819-1827); see 30. 308–76Google Scholar.

22 See Gordon, William, ed., A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections: In Three Parts (London: T. Field, 1762).Google Scholar

23 Clapper, Gregory S., “True Religion' and the Affections: A Study of John Wesley's Abridgment of Jonathan Edwards's Treatise on the Religious Affections,” in Runyon, Theodore, ed., Wesleyan Theology Today (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1985) 418.Google Scholar

24 See, e.g., Baker, Frank, “A Study of John Wesley's Readings,” The London Quarterly and Holborn Review 168 (1943) 237–49Google Scholar.

25 See, e.g., Herbert, T. W., John Wesley as Editor and Author (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1940) 7579.Google Scholar

26 Many of the alterations are more aesthetically motivated than pursuant to Wesley's fears about whether his readers would follow Edwards's thought. Characteristically, Wesley excises verbiage, thus clarifying Edwards's intentions and enhancing his treatise. The following instance is typical (brackets enclose Wesley's omissions): “The kindling [and raising] of gracious affections is like kindling a flame, the higher it is raised, the more ardent it is; [and the more it burns, the more vehemently does it tend and seek to burn].” (Gordon's edition of , Edwards, A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, 211Google Scholar and , Wesley, “An Extract from a Treatise Concerning Religious Affections,” in A Christian Library, 30. 363)Google Scholar . See also , Edwards, Treatise, 50Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 334Google Scholar ; Edwards, 54–55 and Wesley, 336; Edwards, 202 and Wesley, 359; and Edwards, 205 and Wesley, 361. Wesley's omissions of many biblical quotations constitute a major means by which he achieves economy of expression: see Edwards, 39–41 and Wesley, 329; Edwards, 42 and Wesley, 330; Edwards, 43 and Wesley, 330; Edwards, 53 and Wesley, 335; Edwards, 54 and Wesley, 336; Edwards, 79–80 and Wesley, 344; Edwards, 81 and Wesley, 344; Edwards, 82 and Wesley, 344; Edwards, 157 and Wesley, 346; Edwards, 188 and Wesley, 353; Edwards, 199 and Wesley, 358; Edwards, 200 and Wesley, 359; Edwards, 204 and Wesley, 360; Edwards, 255–56 and Wesley, 374; and Edwards, 256–57 and Wesley, 374. Gordon, like Edwards, tolerates repetitiousness; Wesley does not: see Edwards, 17–18 and Wesley, 317; Edwards, 65 and Wesley, 342; Edwards, 74–79 and Wesley, 343; Edwards, 87–155 and Wesley, 346; Edwards, 170–71 and Wesley, 349; Edwards, 192–93 and Wesley, 355; Edwards, 202 and Wesley, 359; Edwards, 214–15 and Wesley, 363; Edwards, 217 and Wesley, 364; Edwards, 225–26 and Wesley, 366; Edwards, 237–53 and Wesley, 367; and Edwards, 244–47 and Wesley, 368. Wesley achieves his combination of brevity and fidelity to the original in part by omitting subtopics of a clearly established line of argument: for an especially notable example, see Edwards, 167–70 and Wesley, 349.

27 I take this epitome of Arminianism from Hymn 17 of the Wesley brothers' Collection of Hymns, for the Use of the People Called Methodists (London: J. Paramore, 1780)Google Scholar ; for a characterization of the Wesleys' Arminianism see my Charles Wesley's Experiential Art,” Eighteenth-Century Life 11 (1987) 111Google Scholar.

28 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 33Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 326Google Scholar.

29 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 53Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 335Google Scholar.

30 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 5556Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 336Google Scholar ; and , Edwards, Religious Affections, 217–21Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 364Google Scholar.

31 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 38Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 329Google Scholar.

32 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 38Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 329Google Scholar . See also , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 53Google Scholar , 68, 233 n. 44.

33 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 21Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 319Google Scholar ; Edwards, 171–72 and Wesley, 349; Edwards, 179–80 and Wesley, 352; Edwards, 200 and Wesley, 358; Edwards, 201 and Wesley, 359; Edwards, 203 and Wesley, 360; and Edwards, 260–63 and Wesley, 376.

34 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 50Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 334Google Scholar ; Edwards, 53 and Wesley, 335; Edwards, 66 and Wesley, 342; and Edwards, 86 and Wesley, 345.

35 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 9Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 314Google Scholar ; Edwards, 24 and Wesley, 321; Edwards, 42 and Wesley, 330; Edwards, 60 and Wesley, 340; Edwards, 79 and Wesley, 343; Edwards, 85–86 and Wesley, 345; Edwards, 177 and Wesley, 351; Edwards, 204 and Wesley, 360; Edwards, 211 and Wesley, 363; and Edwards, 223–24 and Wesley, 365.

36 I refer to Blake's “The Mental Traveller” (1801-05?).

37 I refer to Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1793).Google Scholar

38 , Wesley, “Extract,” 308.Google Scholar

39 See , Clapper, “True Religion' and the Affections,” 417Google Scholar . “Against the encroachments of Arminian liberalism, which emphasized human reason, free will, and a benevolent Deity,” wrote John Patrick Diggins (in a statement pointing to the difficulty of irenically reading Arminianism and Calvinism), “Edwards waged a rearguard defense of Calvinism's essential principles: man's utter depravity and inability to influence salvation through good works; the election of a few by a transforming grace that cannot be resisted; the uncertainty of the state of one's soul, even for the elect, hence the perseverance of the saints; and within this drama of redemption and damnation, the inscrutability of God's nature.” See , Diggins, “Puritans and Pragmatists,” The New Republic, 28 04 1986, 39Google Scholar.

40 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 6061Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 340Google Scholar ; Edwards, 61–63 and Wesley, 340; and Edwards, 70–73 and Wesley, 343.

41 , Clapper, “True Religion' and the Affections,” 418.Google Scholar

42 For a paradoxical argument that Edwards's ontology is finally epistemological, that according to Edwards's thought “dispositions and habits … can mediate between being and becoming, permanence and process,” see Lee, Sang Hyun, The Philosophical Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) esp. 3, 115–70Google Scholar.

43 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 3Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 311Google Scholar.

44 Ibid. See also Edwards, 2 and Wesley, 310; and Edwards, 189–91 and Wesley, 354.

45 See the discussion in , Clapper, ‘“True Religion' and the Affections,” 418–19Google Scholar.

46 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 3031Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 324Google Scholar ; and Edwards, 198 and Wesley, 358. See also , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 15, 17, 125Google Scholar.

47 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 8Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 313Google Scholar.

48 , Edwards, Religious Affections, 4849.Google Scholar

49 See , Wesley, “Extract,” 333Google Scholar , where the passage would have appeared.

50 See , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 2021.Google Scholar

51 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 1819Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 317Google Scholar.

52 See , Edwards, Religious Affections, 9Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 315Google Scholar . See also Edwards, 22 and Wesley, 319; Edwards, 26–27 and Wesley, 321–22; and Edwards, 33–34 and Wesley, 326–27.

53 See , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 15, 4849Google Scholar , 61–62, 89, 100, 250 n. 31.

54 For Edwards's most overt “empiricism,” and for Wesley's fidelity to it, see , Edwards, Religious Affections, 13Google Scholar and , Wesley, “Extract,” 312–13Google Scholar ; Edwards, 17 and Wesley, 317; Edwards, 18 and Wesley, 317–19; Edwards, 33 and Wesley, 325–26; Edwards, 43 and Wesley, 330; Edwards, 48 and Wesley, 333–35; Edwards, 58–60 and Wesley, 338–39; Edwards, 86–87 and Wesley, 345–46; Edwards, 166 and Wesley, 348; Edwards, 221–22 and Wesley, 364–65; Edwards, 224–25 and Wesley, 365; Edwards, 253–55 and Wesley, 372–73; and Edwards, 256 and Wesley, 374–75. , Clapper, in ‘“True Religion' and the Affections,” 419Google Scholar , recognizes “spiritual empiricism” in what the abridgment includes of the treatise's third part, but “spiritual empiricism” is scattered throughout the abridgment.

55 Donoghue, Denis, The Third Voice: Modern British and American Verse Drama (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959) 18.Google Scholar

56 John Locke, Essay, 4.9.3 and 4.10.6 in Nidditch, Peter H., ed., An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975) 618, 621Google Scholar . Subsequent references to this edition are abbreviated “Nidditch.”

57 , Locke, Essay, 4.11.1; Nidditch, 630.Google Scholar

58 , Locke, Essay, 4.19. 5Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 698–99.

59 , Wesley, “Extract,” 333Google Scholar . Cf. Eccl 11:5.

60 , Locke, Essay, 4.19. 16; Nidditch, 705.Google Scholar

61 “God when he makes the Prophet,” Locke observes, “does not unmake the Man,” and Locke adds that God “leaves all Man's Faculties in their natural State, to enable him to judge of his Inspirations, whether they be of divine Original or no.…We cannot take it for a Revelation, or so much as for true, till we have some other Mark that it is a Revelation, besides our believing that it is so.… Gideon was sent by an Angel to deliver Israel from the Midianites, and yet he desired a Sign to convince him, that this Commission was from God” (Essay 4.19.14-15; Nidditch, 704).

62 , Wesley, “Extract,” 325.Google Scholar

63 Ibid., 333.

64 Ibid., 339.

65 Ibid., 346. Cf . , Locke, Essay, 4.18. 10Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 696.

66 , Wesley, “Extract,” 317.Google Scholar

67 For Locke's discussion of “constant impressions” in the mind, see , Locke, Essay, 1.2. 25Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 49–51.

68 I refer to Wordsworth's “Expostulation and Reply” (1798).

69 See the discussion in Hugh Sykes Davies, “Wordsworth and the Empirical Philosophers,” in idem and Watson, George, eds., The English Mind: Studies in the English Moralists Presented to Basil Willey (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1964)Google Scholar . Davies focuses on Wordsworth's objective usage of impulse, as in this stanza from “The Tables Turned” (1798): “One impulse from a vernal wood / May teach you more of man, / Of moral evil and of good, / Than all the sages can” (my italics).

70 , Locke, Essay, 4.19. 6Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 699; (my italics).

71 , Wesley, “Extract,” 337Google Scholar ; (my italics).

72 , Locke, Essay, 2.9. 4Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 144; (my italics).

73 Saunders, Richard, A Discourse of Angels: Their Nature and Office, or Ministry; also Something Touching Devils, Apparitions, and Impulses (London: Thomas Parkhurst, 1701).Google Scholar

74 , Wesley, “Extract,” 374.Google Scholar

75 Hymn 280 , A Collection of Hymns, for the Use of the People Called Methodists (1780)Google Scholar ; see the discussion in Vallins, G. H., The Wesleys and the English Language (London: Epworth, 1957) 87Google Scholar.

76 , Wesley, “Extract,” 340.Google Scholar

77 Ibid., 342.

78 See , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 12.Google Scholar

79 See, for example, in , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 3744Google Scholar , how Wesley's definition of faith “delineated, for the first time, revelation's inward as well as outward setting and hence its commensurability with empirical philosophy's subject/ object emphasis.” The other four of Edwards's works abridged by Wesley are “Lockean,” too, but unlike Locke's Essay, as well as unlike Edwards's Religious Affections, they stress experience to the point of subordinating reason.

80 , Wesley, “Extract,” 325.Google Scholar

82 Ibid.; cf . , Locke, Essay, 4. 19Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 697–706.

83 Ibid., 326.

84 Ibid., 325.

85 , Locke, Essay, 4.19. 15Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 705.

86 , Wesley, “Extract,” 326.Google Scholar

87 Ibid., 322. Cf. Matt 6:29; Ps 73:1, and Heb 3:16.

88 Ibid., 319.

89 This satisfying strain of the abridgment's experiential theology, incidentally, finds an illuminating counterpart in another “both/and” permutation of Locke by Wordsworth; here, from “Expostulation and Reply,” is the full context of “wise passiveness”: “The eye—it cannot choose but see; / We cannot bid the ear be still; / Our bodies feel, where'er they be, / Against or with our will. / Nor less I deem that there are Powers / Which of themselves our minds impress; / That we can feed this mind of ours / In a wise passiveness.”

90 , Wesley, “Extract,” 312.Google Scholar

91 , Locke, Essay, 2.10. 5Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 151–52.

92 , Wesley, “Extract,” 321.Google Scholar

93 Ibid., 312.

94 Although Wordsworth, in the following lines from his “Prospectus” to The Recluse, does not address the issue of perception as Wesley and Edwards do, i.e., although he does not on this occasion apprehend divine reality through the senses as analogues, tests, and receptors, he otherwise gets this “Wesleyan-Edwardsean,” indeed this Lockean, point just right: “My voice proclaims / How exquisitely the individual Mind / (And the progressive powers perhaps no less / Of the whole species) to the external World / Is fitted;—and how exquisitely, too— / Theme this but little heard of among men— / The external World is fitted to the Mind; / And the creation (by no lower name / Can it be called) which they with blended might / Accomplish:–this is our high argument.”

95 , Smith, ed., A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, 46.Google Scholar

96 , Wesley, “Extract,” 312–13.Google Scholar

97 Ibid., 364–65.

98 Ibid., 313.

99 , Smith, ed., A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, 46.Google Scholar

100 Ibid.; (my italics).

101 , Wesley, “Extract,” 338.Google Scholar

102 Cf. 2 Cor 3:18; 4:6.

103 , Wesley, “Extract,” 310Google Scholar ; (my italics).

104 Ibid., 339.

105 Ibid., 345–46.

106 One thinks, in this connection, of Wordsworth's “natural piety”: “My heart leaps up when I behold / A rainbow in the sky: / So was it when my life began; / So is it now I am a man; / So be it when I shall grow old, / Or let me die! / The child is father of the Man; / And I could wish my days to be / Bound each to each by natural piety.” These lines are thoroughly Lockean: see the discussion in Pickering, Samuel F., John Locke and Children's Books in Eighteenth-Century England (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1981) 160–68Google Scholar . The abridgment, in its Lockean dimension, is consistent with them. “Natural piety” is secularized piety, or so goes the wisdom about Wordsworth, but the phrase connotes a faith in the God of nature, and as Wordsworth responds to the rainbow, so Wesley and Edwards claim “sense perception” of God's promises.

107 , Wesley, “Extract,” 373.Google Scholar

108 Ibid.

109 , Locke, Essay, 4.16. 6Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 661–62.

110 , Wesley, “Extract,” 335Google Scholar ; (my italics).

111 , Smith, ed., A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, 17Google Scholar.

112 , Wesley, “Extract,” 375.Google Scholar

113 Cragg, Gerald, ed., The Appeals to Men of Reason and Religion (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975) 57.Google Scholar

114 See the discussion in , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 4853, 99–100, 109, 113, 116, 144, 221–23Google Scholar.

115 See Browne, Peter, The Procedure, Extent, and Limits of Human Understanding (2d ed.; London: W. Innys, 1729) 141–42Google Scholar , and the discussion in , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 3233Google Scholar.

116 See , Locke, Essay, 4.16. 12Google Scholar ; Nidditch, 667. See also , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism, 30–33, 3638Google Scholar.

117 See, for example, the discussion in Leopold Damrosch's review of , Brantley, Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism in Eighteenth-Century Studies 19 (1986) 438–41Google Scholar.

118 Jeffner, Anders, Butler and Hume on Religion: A Comparative Analysis (Stockholm: Diakonistyrelsense bokforlog, 1966) 185.Google Scholar

119 , Wesley, “Extract,” 313.Google Scholar

120 Ibid., 346.

121 I refer to Yeats's, W. B. “The Fascination of What's Difficult” (1910).Google Scholar

122 I refer to H. J. Zelley's hymn, “Heavenly Sunshine” (1898). See Reynolds, William J., ed., Baptist Hymnal (Nashville, TN: Convention Press, 1975) 472Google Scholar.

123 For Wesley's account of his conversion, see Curnock, Nehemiah, ed., The Journal of the Rev. John Wesley, A. M. (8 vols.; London: Robert Culley, 1909) 1. 475–76Google Scholar.

124 See MacLean, Kenneth, John Locke and English Literature of the Eighteenth Century (1936; reprinted New York: Russell & Russell, 1962)Google Scholar and Aarsleff, Hans, From Locke to Saussure: Essays on the Study of Language and Intellectual History (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1982)Google Scholar.

125 I refer to , Wordsworth's “Lines, Written a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey” (1798).Google Scholar