Somewhere Between the Man and the Madness

In the Renaissance, man was regarded in a much lighter sense then he had been before. Of course, as is usual in the world, that didn't mean the same thing to every person, even in the same field. Humanism has no finite, structured meaning now, just as it didn't back then. Comparing the works of Italian, Niccoló Machiavelli and Spanish, Miguel de Cervantes is a great indication of that. These two men we both prominent writers during the Renaissance period, but their views on the ideals of the time couldn't be more different. 

Don Quixote de la mancha by Andrey Zhelkovsky (2005)

Cervantes viewed man as a being whose potential was being above all the malice and drudgery of the world. His version of man had the responsibility of overcoming the negativity that surrounded him in and ever-darkening world. He felt that the real success was not climbing a social ladder but proving that man truly was not fallen and could be kind and virtuous.

Machiavelli, being a politician, had a different sense of man as a being that held no moral responsibility for his actions. His version of man had the duty to take any measures in order to achieve his potential. He felt that "it is better to be fear than be loved." He saw the darkness in the world and felt that there was no way to overcome it, and a man had a better chance of success if he used the darkness to his benefit.

The idea of humanism in the Renaissance was a relatively new concept: the idea that man had potential and was more than a depraved, fallen being. However, the ways that people felt that man could best reach this potential was vastly different. It's common to believe that there was a sense of unity in past eras of the world that isn't found today, but in reality, there always has been conflicting ideas, even when the foundation of the belief is the same.