Book contents
- The Italian Renaissance and the Origins of the Modern Humanities
- The Italian Renaissance and the Origins of the Modern Humanities
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- 1 Philology, the Italian Renaissance, and Authorship
- 2 Lorenzo Valla, Philology, Emotion
- 3 Losing Your Identity: Angelo Decembrio
- 4 Trust and Authenticity
- 5 Pursuing a Love of Knowledge
- 6 Shaping Knowledge
- 7 Forgetting Philology: René Descartes
- 8 Certainty. Skepticism
- 9 Echoes
- Bibliography
- Index
5 - Pursuing a Love of Knowledge
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 November 2021
- The Italian Renaissance and the Origins of the Modern Humanities
- The Italian Renaissance and the Origins of the Modern Humanities
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- 1 Philology, the Italian Renaissance, and Authorship
- 2 Lorenzo Valla, Philology, Emotion
- 3 Losing Your Identity: Angelo Decembrio
- 4 Trust and Authenticity
- 5 Pursuing a Love of Knowledge
- 6 Shaping Knowledge
- 7 Forgetting Philology: René Descartes
- 8 Certainty. Skepticism
- 9 Echoes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
This chapter focuses on an important work of Angelo Poliziano, called Lamia. In it, Poliziano does two things relevant to the humanities today: he offers a new way of thinking about the enterprise of philosophy as it was understood since antiquity – the search for human wisdom and a wise style of life. In doing so, he suggests that academic philosophy as practiced in universities is not enough in the project of gaining wisdom and living wisely. Second, he suggests that philology – the deep, borderless reading of texts – represents a master discipline and one that is in fact more in line with philosophy’s authentic mission. Poliziano makes his most trenchant points by using narratives and fables, rather than syllogistic argumentation. In so doing, he makes a case for philology as an overarching discipline of disciplines and sets forth a new way of looking at philosophy
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- The Italian Renaissance and the Origins of the Modern HumanitiesAn Intellectual History, 1400–1800, pp. 108 - 127Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021