Well, this is where I'll tell something about
British writers after 1800 whose ideas about religion shifted back and forth between faith and agnosticism.
But I am not ready yet, so come back soon!
That's too soon.
Some of these writers may appear
on the "pro" or "con" pages, too, because once they were done waffling, they
were devoteder; or they had been so before, and had written on the subject.
The Introduction to an anthology of Victorian Literature by C. C. Cunningham
(Sorry, I'm not sure about the exact title!) gives some more details, which
I should follow up later. No time now!
Matthew Arnold had been a Christian but was "losing [his] traditional
faith" (CCC). He stated that clearly people could not do without the
church, but in spite of that, it was also clear that people could not do
with the church as it was at the time. Nevertheless, he was strongly
moral and felt that as a substitute for religion, people should embrace (didactic)
culture.
In Memoriam AHH, by the Poet Laureate (1850) Tennyson is a
classic example of "religious hesitation and question, that long journal
of repeatedly staggered faith," as CCC puts it. Nevertheless, he emerges
at the end of the poem calling Hallam "my friend who lives in God" and seems
to have returned to faithic stability.
Visit the "non-Christian" or "Christian" homepages, now, or go back to the Get Lit! main page.