The Unlikely Brotherhood of the Reformation and Romanticism

"War to the chateaux, peace to the cottages."

This French Revolutionary slogan encapsulates much of the political atmosphere of the Romantic period. The Romantic period was one that glorified and romanticized the extreme, and even the unknown. People began to take great interest in emotional expression and placed high value on the individual. In many ways, this eruption of emotion and revolution was unprecedented in history, but perhaps history is less of a linear procession of events, and more of a tessellation, where everything repeats itself, but sometimes at greater degrees and at different points. Perhaps the revolution and raw desire that filled the Romantic period has its roots in the somewhat milder Reformation movement against the Catholic church.

In both historical periods, there was a distinct sense of finding voice. Protestant reformers like Martin Luther found their voice through the written word. Martin could find no other outlet to express himself fully, something that he felt obligated to do. Luther declared in response to pressures by church and political leaders to recant his words, "I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen." Romanticists also found their voice through the written word although some writings resulted in a much less direct approach. Upon careful consideration, one can see the beautiful lines of the anonymous poem, The Cyclops, are not simply a narrative about craftsmanship, but a calculated jab at the sins of industrialism and factory work.

A nod to Romantic-era stained glass, Bill Jackman, 2014

The Protestant era was in many ways a precursor to the ideals of the Romantic period. The renewed and more intense spirituality of the Protestant era made people more attuned to all of the ways God is manifest in our lives. Martin Luther wrote, "God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on the trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars." He emphasized that God was in everything--the gospel could be found in any aspect, in all of God's creations. Acknowledging nature during the Protestant Reformation spurred the focus of nature in the Romantic era. Taking a deeper, more dramatic, more intricate look at the aesthetic and meaning of nature was a motif in this unique era. Artists and writers of the time took Martin Luther's attention to nature functioning as a means to access God and the gospel, and magnified it. They emphasized it and put even more passion and emotion to that belief.

Another way in which the Romantic era is reflective of Protestant values is the consistent theme of resistance to authority. The great superpower of the Reformation was (emphasis on was) the Catholic church. The degree of its power and reach is perhaps difficult for us to understand in our modernized world. To those in the Reformation period the Catholic church was THE religion and was incredibly integrated across society and nearly the entire Old World. Challenging such authority was unprecedented, at least not without dire consequences. The raw emotion of Martin Luther and his supporters is what made reform possible. In similar fashion, the Romantic period features revolutions which challenged the biggest political superpowers of the time, England and France, all in the name of liberty, freedom, and equality.

The protestant reformation themes carry on throughout history, surfacing in many different ways during the Romantic period. The way romanticists expressed themselves through writing, the love that they had for nature and the political courage they had, can all be traced back to Protestant themes. In a way, the Reformation can be seen as the bubbling of magma to the top of a volcano. Romanticism was the explosion.

William Turner, 1812

Fay Walker, Jacob Lang, Maddie Smith