Paradise Within

The literal approach to texts which became increasingly dominant in the sixteenth century had the consequence that objects in the natural world could no longer be regarded as signs. As a result, those who believed that the Deity had imposed a particular order on the cosmos moved their attention away from the symbolic functions of objects and focused instead on the ways in which the things of nature might play some practical role in human welfare. As we saw in the previous chapter, the scientific investigation of nature in the seventeenth century was motivated to a large degree by the necessity to find uses for the numerous objects which had hitherto derived their purpose and place in the cosmos by acting as signs or symbols. The literalist mentality which effected these transformations, it need hardly be said, also had important implications for the way in which the Bible was read.