Introduction

Man is wired by his Creator to first play at that which he must eventually take more seriously. Indeed, children play at (towards) what they see occurring in the lives of their adult counterparts. James Schall, philosopher and prolific author on the subject of the spiritual ramifications of leisure,  said that play allows us to be “taken out of ourselves, in order to discover what is in some sense destined to be ours.”^[1] Play thereby acts as a linguistic tool for communicating the workaday world’s expectations, positioning play at the crossroads between workaday and festival, vocation and avocation, temporal and eternal, and secular and sacred. As representatives of the sacred and the secular, the church and the state also find themselves wrestling with one another at this intersection in an attempt to determine which is servile to the other. Turning to the play of chess, we notice that both church (the chess bishop) and state (the chess king) are placed on the board in a game whose rules of play have been used to communicate social and spiritual expectations. Ludwig Wittgenstein at least partially missed this point when he said, “When one shews someone the king in chess and says: ‘This is the king,’ this does not tell him the use of this piece . . .”^[2] Though a new player to the game may not know how many spaces or in which direction the king moves, an English-speaking player may reasonably infer that this ‘king’ must be the most important piece in some manner. Indeed, English chess documents from the late medieval and early modern periods show that the play of chess acted as a model of real-life social constructions and that the meaning of the game should be understood as a relationship between the crown and his subjects, including the bishop – an officer of the church. When chess migrated from Asia to Europe, the piece originally called the elephant (alfil in Arabic) would be known in other countries with terms ranging from ‘messenger’ to ‘jester.’ Only in English and Icelandic would it take the name of a clergyman – the bishop. With this piece as a representation of ecclesiastical power, various treatises allegorized it as subject to the king, serving as further evidence for the broader understanding in church history of a relatively diminished ecclesiastical power in England through the early modern period. This loss of proper perspective raises concerns over whether one should look to the state or to the church for authority in one’s life. As will be demonstrated through this essay, if one’s only knowledge came through the play of chess, one would understandably conclude that temporal powers may dictate behavioral expectations to the church due to the infinite and finite values respectively assigned to the chess king and the chess bishop.^[3] In this essay, I shall demonstrate that the chess king’s power over the chess bishop was commandeered by writers of chess documents to mirror the English monarchy’s clear domination of the church’s authority within its realm, demonstrating play’s linguistic capabilities and the sacred, non-workaday world to which it points.

We shall first survey the earliest occurrences in which the alfil came to be described as a bishop or was related in any way to a church office. Next, we will look at the earliest recorded references to the chess bishop in English writing, and how even these tangential instances display a world in which the bishop was clearly subject to the crown, highlighting the game’s linguistic pliability. Then, we will examine more explicit and thorough treatises in the seventeenth century that demonstrate the way in which chess, by this point in time, had concretized such that poets and playwrights felt at ease using the play of chess as allegorization for their current political climates. Finally, we shall consider conclusions, including specific ways in which the play of chess allows for a deeper exploration of the relationship between play and apologetics.

The Earliest English Usages of “Bishop” for a Chess Piece in the Late Middle Ages

Figure 1. Isle of Lewis Bishops. National Museums Scotland. https://www.isleoflewischessset.co.uk/lewis-design.html

In 1066, William the Conqueror invaded England, though not without first obtaining papal approval for war.^[4] The following five centuries, however, brought a drastic reduction in ecclesiastical authority in England, with the state officially encompassing church power upon Henry VIII’s Act of Supremacy in 1534. Chess would become a popular vehicle for the allegorization of power structures. Early modern English writers discovered in the play of chess a symbolism in which to reflect their understanding of the history occurring around them – a symbolism not available in the genre of historical narrative. Edward Gibbon would record an apocryphal tale that nonetheless illustrates this, saying, “to admonish kings that they are strong only in the strength of their subjects, the same Indians invented the game of chess, which was likewise introduced into Persia under the reign of Nushirvan.”^[5]  And yet, even before explicit allegorization would be utilized, physical representations of the chess bishop would assume temporal authority to be greater than ecclesiastical. Centuries before the chess bishop would be known by that name in English, British artisans designed alfils to look like ecclesiastical officers, as seen in the Lewis Chessmen – the earliest crafted chess pieces ever discovered. Among the pieces are sixteen bishops (see figure 1). Even a cursory glance at the Lewis bishops communicates a temporal ineffectiveness, making the bishop a seemingly odd choice for placement on the battlefield represented by the play of chess. For example, Nancy Marie Brown calls attention to the bishops’ ornate clothes, stating that “most of [these] bishops are fat – not fighters.”^[6] Little about these pieces could be said to exhibit the bishop in any way that could be construed as powerful. Around a century after the creation of the Lewis chessmen, a sermon attributed to John of Wales would mark the first recorded occurrence of this piece being referred to as a ‘bishop’ by an Englishman, albeit in Latin. This mid-thirteenth-century sermon disparages the clergy via the moveset of the alfil, whom John claims “are bishops” since they “take obliquely [diagonally] because nearly every bishop misuses his office through cupidity.”^[7] Returning to our remarks on apologetics, we see here that the spiritual office is allegorized as dishonest in its practice.

The Beginnings of the Allegorization of the Chess Bishop During the Sixteenth Century

The earliest reference to the chess bishop as such in the English language does not employ the allegorization that would be used by authors in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Still, it is of significant note as, even without explicit discussion of the relationship between temporal and ecclesiastical powers, the description of the piece as a ‘bishop’ implies the original audience’s ability to understand the piece’s role in the game. Those who lived in this period must not have found little unusual about a bishop being in the service of a king, and this presentation of ecclesiastical power bending to civil authority further testifies to the consensus of church history regarding the English Reformation. John Vidmar argues that the state of the Catholic Church and its power were ‘healthy’ in the decades preceding the English Reformation, pointing to the popularity of the Church among the masses, the recorded piety of English monasteries, and consistent observance of church practices.^[8] However, though the Roman Catholic Church could boast in these areas, Vidmar concedes that the bishops were “chosen by the king and were the king’s men.”^[9] Furthermore, Kenneth Carleton gives the following description of the Reformed Ordinals of 1550 and 1552:

All candidates for the three orders of deacon, priest and bishop, were required to swear an oath of the king’s supremacy. The form of the oath required the candidate to renounce the Bishop of Rome, to acknowledge the king as only supreme head in earth of the Church of England, and to undertake to uphold and maintain the laws relating to the king’s authority and the repudiation of the pope. The Litany and Suffrages included three petitions for the king, and only one each for the ministers of the Church and for those being ordered or consecrated.^[10]

There was no question in England as to who was on top in the struggle for power.

Figure 2. Chess Pieces, 15th Century, Ivory and Wood. Of the Italian School. Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford. Bridgeman Images. https://www.bridgemanimages.com/en/italian-school/chess-pieces-15th-century-ivory-and-wood/ivory/asset/152479

This type of political climate would foster the transition of the game’s language such that the church would be presented in submission to the state as the play of chess continued to communicate a subservience of the sacred to the secular. The first English usage of ‘bishop’ to refer to a chess piece would arrive in James Rowbothum’s The Pleasaunt and Wittie Playe of the Cheasts Renewed, published in 1562.^[11] This text is a translation of Pedro Damiano’s Questo libro e da imparare giocare a scachi et de li partiti.^[12] Damiano begins his treatise saying that a firm understanding of the pieces is of primary importance for the person learning chess. At this point in history, chess pieces did not share a standardized physical style; thus, Damiano notes that “some make [the chess pieces] lyke men, whereof the kyng is the highest . . .” In this set of descriptions, Rowbothum translates alphin into bishop, noting, “The Bishoppes some name Alphius, some fooles, & some name them Princes . . .”^[13] Further cementing the bishop’s look as an ecclesiastical figure, Rowbothum notes the piece’s physical appearance as being like a bishop’s miter (see second from left and second from right in figure 2). Other than this, Rowbothum’s translation says nothing of the bishop except how the piece moves in the game. Therefore, in these earliest usages, the bishop appears to have carried the ecclesiastical name, with only occasional and brief references to the game piece’s status as a symbol to be used for the exploration of history.

In what appears to be only the second usage of the chess ‘bishop’ in English print, the word is used only once. In 1588, John Rhodes authored The countrie mans comfort, Or Religious recreations fitte for all well disposed persons. Included in this collection of poetry is “A Game at Chesse with the Papists, or a Ditty made on that game against them and their evill practices.” Rhodes begins this poem by saying that this period is one in which “the Divell, Pope, and Spaniard did rage against our late [Queen] Elizabeth . . .” Such connection of evil, Roman Catholicism, and ‘Spainishness’ was quite a common theme in Elizabethan England – a theme to which we will return in our analysis of Thomas Middleton’s A Game at Chess. Rhodes argues that the ‘Papists’ push the hard work onto the common man, reserving the nobility on the back rank, writing, “Your pelting paune you thrust before / to make the way to worke your feate: / Your knights and rookes you haue in store: / your Queene and Bishop keepe their seat.”^[14] Rhodes thereby uses the gameboard position of the queen and bishop to portray Spain and the Roman church – queen and bishop – as being unwilling to be bothered to rise to action, relying instead too heavily on the common man. Such language also fits well in post-reformation England, in which distrust of the Pope was flourishing, as well as contempt for one of the Roman church’s greatest allies – Catholic Spain.

Nicholas Breton’s “The Chesse Play” first appeared in Richard Stapleton’s poetic compilation The Phoenix Nest in 1593. Breton’s poem extols the virtues of the offices represented by the pieces, teaching the reader the particular moves of each piece. For example, he describes the bishop’s diagonal movement in line 27 of the following passage, saying,

“[26] The Bishop he is wittie braine /

[27] That chooseth Crossest pathes to pace. /

[28] And evermore he pries with paine, /

[29] To see who seekes him most disgrace: /

[30] Such straglers when he findes astraie, /

[31] He takes them up, and throwes awaie.”^[15]

Breton’s poem continues the trend in which an author uses the play of chess to explicitly describe the church as subservient to the crown. Although Breton’s relatively short poem discusses the bishop only sparingly, he uses one phrase that showcases an understanding of the bishop as being in the service of civil power, describing the bishops in lines 46-47 by saying, “The Bishops, prudence; prieng still, / Which way to worke his masters will.”^[16]

Increased Allegorization of the Chess Bishop During the Seventeenth Century

Moving to the seventeenth century, Thomas Middleton’s A Game at Chess serves as an excellent bridge between the literary and the political in determining historical understandings contemporary to Middleton’s time. T.S. Eliot would later describe the 1624 play as “a perfect piece of literary-political art.”^[17] He furthermore described Middleton as being second only to Shakespeare.^[18] Middleton used chess as an allegorical setting to tell the struggle of two houses – white and black, representing respectively the houses of England’s James I and Spain’s Philip IV. During performances and within the printed text of the play, no names are given for the characters; rather, they are simply referred to as chessmen, with monikers like “White King,” “Black Knight’s Pawn,” or “Black Jesting Pawn.” Playgoers, however, were well aware of the identities, as attested by the following incidents occurring within days of the play’s first showing: “[The play] provoked action by the King, the Earl of Pembroke, and the Privy Council, which not only closed down the play but (for a while) closed down all the London theatres, fined the King’s Men, ordered a manhunt for Middleton, interrogated his son, and eventually jailed the author in the Fleet Prison.” These conflicts arose because of English laws that prohibited the public portrayal of a living monarch; Middleton’s play was transparent enough so as to not hide the true identities behind the satirical characters onstage.^[19]

Whereas Breton only played at using chess as an allegorical backdrop for a contrast of civil and ecclesiastical power, Middleton’s techniques of allegorization are not only more numerous but also more easily identified. Although Middleton’s play concerns itself primarily with kings, plenty of dialogue and action serve to communicate notions of the imbalance of power between king and bishop, and therefore between the secular and the sacred. Of greatest significance is that the bishops are generally portrayed in a negative light, especially in relation to their service of the state. Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino provide the following descriptions for the bishops and their respective pawns. There are (1) the White King’s Bishop, also called “The Fat Bishop of Spalato,” described as a “gluttonous, lecherous, greedy, polemical author,” a “former Catholic, recently converted to the Protestant cause,” and “played by the acting company’s leading clown;” (2) the White King’s Bishop’s Pawn, also described as “fat;” (3) the Black Queen’s Bishop, who is the “Father General of the Society of Jesus, ecclesiastical superior of all Jesuits,” a group maligned throughout the play; and (4) and the Black Queen’s Bishop’s Pawn – “a lecherous Jesuit priest in England; confessor to the Black Knight, Black Knight’s Pawn, Black Queen’s Pawn, and White Queen’s Pawn (whom he wishes to seduce).” The only two ecclesiastical characters portrayed in any type of positive light are the White Queen’s Bishop, also known as the “Bishop of Canterbury,” who is a “religious leader of the White House” and “an ardent Protestant;” as well as the White Queen’s Bishop’s Pawn, described as the “Gelded Pawn,” who is “a Protestant minister; formerly betrothed to the White Queen’s Pawn, before he was castrated by his rival (the Black Knight’s Pawn Gelder).”^[20]

All four negatively portrayed ecclesiastical officers have ties to the Roman Catholic Church. It is the so-called Fat Bishop, however, who is worst of all. He is distinguished in his villainy in his refusal to support his king as well as the betrayal of his king in the service of another. T.H. Howard-Hill notes that it is not only the Fat Bishop’s gluttony and lust that cast him as the villain; what must also be kept in mind is that his actions are “in the service of Spain,” making him a “turncoat.”^[21] Furthermore, there would be no surprise that the Fat Bishop was such a popular character among playgoers. “A Game at Chess shows that Middleton disliked Spaniards and Jesuits, but the feeling was common among patriotic Englishmen of all kinds, and was not confined exclusively to Puritans.”^[22] That Middleton wrote of James I is especially important for the ability of the play of chess to illustrate a power structure that was finding footing in the century following the English Reformation – a new type of caesaropapism.^[23] The British Kingdom is truly the only country since the Byzantine empire in which such a melding of church and state was sustained in a major European nation, and under James, this system would flourish.

In 1643 – only one year after the beginning of the English Civil War – William Cartwright wrote his political treatise “A Game at Chesse: A metaphoricall discourse shewing the present estate of this Kingdome.” Cartwright clarifies his purpose from the beginning by saying, “my intention being onely at the expression of this Kingdomes affaires, which fitly may be Allegorically described by the battaile of the Chesse.”^[24] Cartwright uses the play of chess to allegorize the English Civil War, with white representing pro-parliament forces – whom he describes as “the Ensigne and Badge of innocence” and “raised for the security and safety of the Common-wealth” – against the opposing royalists represented by black, or, as Cartwright calls them, the “Army of Malignants.” Regarding the individual pieces, Cartwright places the king above all others and includes the bishops among the king’s “counsellors” and “assistants.”^[25] Although he represents bishops on both sides of the board, he speaks positively only of the white, pro-parliament bishops – “the religious and untainted Clergie.”^[26]

Though Cartwright speaks of the white bishops as serving the purposes of the white king only abstractly, he speaks more directly concerning the service of the black bishops to the black king. In the concluding sentence of his treatise, Cartwright speaks of prerequisites for an end to the war. Among these prerequisites are: “If His Highnesse [King Charles I] would please to put the residue of His blacke Bishops into the same bag where their fellowes are . . .”^[27] This refers to the bag in which players would discard captured pieces. Thus, Cartwright is making three claims with this symbolism: (1) by speaking of the bishops’ residue, he is saying that the bishops have been metaphorically “captured” and that they are no longer viable for play; (2) by calling upon the king to put the bishops back in their bag, he claims that they are still on the table of play and their presence is still recognized; and (3) he recognizes that the king has the ultimate authority over the bishops, being able to command them where to go.

In contrast to other chess treatises analyzed here, Cartwright’s treatise is much more nuanced concerning the relationship between civil and ecclesiastical power. Whereas Middleton’s play presented the white and black pieces as symbolizing opposing kingdoms, Cartwright’s treatise shows a conflict between differing styles of government. The White King represents no literal king, but rather an abstract form of parliamentary government. Although the White King is figurative of an idea, Cartwright indicates that the Black Pieces are figurative of actual people, saying, “First, the blacke Army at Chesse, signifies justly and aptly his Majesties . . .”^[28]  Therefore, due to the white side’s representation of pro-parliamentary forces, Cartwright’s inclusion of the bishop among the white “king’s” counselors places the ecclesiastical within a shared realm of influence – a position virtually never explicitly communicated through the play of chess in the English language.

Conclusion

The play of chess provided English writers in the late middle ages and early modern period a rich symbolism to convey history. The first usages of and references to ‘bishop’ in English in the context of chess were usually only in the context of translation from other works, with only passing references to any symbolism for historical events; this includes the aforementioned sermon from John of Wales and Rowbothum’s translation of Damiano. Once chess documents written in English first began to appear, the allegorization of history began to increase. During this period, four major authors emerged: Rhodes, Breton, Middleton, and Cartwright. The former two writers concerned themselves primarily with the play of the chess game in itself, with the balance of ecclesiastical and civil power serving more to communicate the rules of the game. In other words, the politics that surrounded the authors were primarily, though not exclusively, servile to the game. We see here an example of the workaday world’s reality being commandeered to explain the rules of play. Thus, the historical reality of a world in which the state overrules the church acts as a natural linguistic conductor for explaining the rules of chess.

In contrast, Breton and Middleton – the poet and the playwright – had much more to say about the workaday world through the play of chess. Finally, with those documents appearing between the beginning of the English Civil War and the end of the Interregnum, only one speaks with depth to the flow of history – Cartwright. Although Middleton perhaps penned the chess document that was the most masterful in its literary form, Cartwright’s treatise was the closest to being proper history; in contrast to Middleton’s play in which the characters go unnamed and the symbolism is a bit vague, Cartwright provides his reader with both allegory as well as keys to interpretation. By the time of Cartwright, the language of chess was cemented enough to act as a firm foundation for communicating the relationship between the sacred and the secular in the day-to-day world.

Let us conclude by explicitly exploring the relationship between play and apologetics. First, we consider the way in which the play of chess provides yet another example of man’s desire to explore an immaterial world – one in which the imagination is allowed to roam within a space marked by borders much more porous than those found in the workaday world. As demonstrated in the chess documents analyzed above, games may act as linguistic tools or metaphors for communicating something not as easily captured within relatively more literal speech, bringing didactic force upon the so-called “real” world. Therefore, the immaterial and imaginative world of play offers an otherwise unavailable framework upon which man may hang knowledge. Alison Milbank, professor of theology at the University of Nottingham,  offers a similar sentiment when she says, “. . . the imagination is a philosophical tool that helps us reason by providing an epistemology, a way of knowing, that is inherently religious. For, in apologetics, we do not just want to convince people of the rationality of what we believe . . . we want to make them understand in a participatory way.”^[29] Second, let us consider the implications of a world in which the church takes her marching orders from the state. This matter is larger than a question of temporal power; more importantly, the struggle between ecclesiastical and civil powers – as represented by the chess bishop and the chess king – signifies a deeper matter of the heart’s affections, as Augustine famously notes: “Accordingly, two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly by the love of self, even to the contempt of God: the heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self.”^[30] Finally, we conclude by considering Hans-Georg’s Gadamer’s masterful thoughts on play, in which he says, “Play has a special relation to what is serious . . . play itself contains its own, even sacred, seriousness.”^[31] Indeed, play unlocks a space in which man can ponder the world as it might be. Within the game of chess – a game in which the chess king would seem to hold infinite value over the chess bishop – even a bishop, or a pawn for that matter, may bring down a king. The relationship between the chess bishop and the chess king arises out of, and may be commandeered to model, actual power structures between the civil and ecclesiastical authorities. And yet, the nature of play allows man to explore the possibility of change within his workaday world. In his discussion of celebration as the core of leisure, Josef Pieper speaks of “man’s affirmation of the universe and his experiencing the world in an aspect other than its everyday one.”^[32] Therefore, games like chess are able to represent the world as it is, while simultaneously offering the player leeway for reshaping his world according to his own wishes, thereby reflecting the creative properties of the Imago Dei.

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Citation Information

James L. Underwood, “Kings Over Bishops: The Play of Chess in Late Medieval and Early Modern England as a Representation of the Relationship Between the Sacred and the Secular,” An Unexpected Journal: Leisure 6, no. 3. (Fall 2023), 245-264.

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Endnotes

^[1] James Schall, On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs: Teaching, Writing, Playing, Believing, Lecturing, Philosophizing, Singing, Dancing (Wilmington: ISI Books, 2012), 106.

^[2] Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, trans. G.E.M. Anscombe, 3rd ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1958), 15.

^[3] Though no official “score” is kept during a game of chess, pieces are often assigned points to help newer players learn the pieces’ relative value to one another, with values usually assigned such that the pawn is worth 1 point, the bishop and knight worth 3 points, the rook worth 5 points, and the queen worth 9 points. The king is often considered to be of infinite value as the checkmate of this piece is the objective of the game.

^[4] Everett Ferguson, Church History, vol. 1: From Christ to Pre-Reformation: The Rise and Growth of the Church in Its Cultural, Intellectual, and Political Context (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), 411.

^[5]  Mortimer J. Adler, ed., Great Books of the Western World, vol. 38, Gibbon: II, 2nd ed. (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2003), 41.

^[6] Nancy Marie Brown, Ivory Vikings: The Mystery of the Most Famous Chessmen in the World and the Woman who Made Them (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2015), 65.

^[7] Ibid., 66.

^[8] John Vidmar, The Catholic Church Through the Ages: A History, 2nd ed. (New York: Paulist Press, 2014), 212.

^[9] Ibid., 213.

^[10] Kenneth Carleton, Bishops and Reform in the English Church, 1520-1559 (Boydell & Brewer, 2001), 25.

^[11] “Bishop,” The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, vol. 1 (Oxford: University Press, 1971), 220.

^[12] Ross Pincent, “The Various Editions of Damiano,” The British Chess Magazine 26, no. 1 (1906), 426.

^[13] James Rowbothum, The pleasaunt and vvittie playe of the cheasts renewed with instructions both to learne it easely, and to play it well. Lately translated out of Italian into French: and now set furth in Englishe (London: Roulande Hall, 1562), Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership, University of Michigan  https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A19788.0001.001/1:5?rgn=div1;view=fulltext

^[14] John Rhodes., The countrie mans comfort. Or Religious recreations fitte for all well disposed persons, (London: John Jackson, 1593), Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership, University of Michigan https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A10687.0001.001?view=toc.

^[15] Richard Stapleton, ed., The Phoenix Nest (London: John Jackson, 1593), Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership, University of Michigan https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=eebo;idno=A11254.0001.001. This marks the second time in which we see the bishop’s diagonal movement used as a way to communicate the spiritual officer’s dishonest methods.

^[16] Ibid.

^[17] Frank Kermode, ed., Selected Prose of T.S. Eliot, (New York: Harcourt, 1975), 192.

^[18] T.S.Eliot, “Thomas Middleton,” The Times Literary Supplement, June 30, 1927, 445-446.

^[19] Gary Taylor and John Lavagnino, eds., Thomas Middleton: The Collected Works, (Oxford: University Press, 2007), 1773.

^[20] Ibid., 1830-1831.

^[21] T.H. Howard-Hill, Middleton’s “Vulgar Pasquin”: Essays on A Game at Chess (Newark: University Press, 1995), 56.

^[22] N.W. Bawcutt, “Was Thomas Middleton a Puritan Dramatist,” The Modern Language Review 94 no. 4 (Oct. 1999), Academic OneFile, n.p.

^[23] “Caesaropapism” is typically employed to describe a specific movement in church history in which the Byzantine emperors exercised tremendous influence over the Eastern Church. See Kenneth Scott LaTourette, A History of Christianity, vol. 1 (New York: Harper & Row, 1975), 283. We commandeer that same language here to reflect the magnitude to which the English crown would similarly, though not to the same degree, exert power over the English Church. The play of chess, as it is played in the English-speaking world, cannot be divorced from this Caesaropapism. If play acts as a linguistic tool for communicating the secular world’s behavioral and cognitive expectations, as we argue in our thesis, then the play of chess necessarily communicates a subservience of the sacred to the secular. This is true even on a completely subconscious or merely noumenal level, whether the player recognizes the apologetic implications.

^[24] William Cartwright, “A Game at Chesse: A metaphoricall discourse shewing the present estate of this Kingdome” (London: Thomas Johnson, 1643), English Books Online Text Creation Partnership, University of Michigan,  https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A85672.0001.001/1:2?rgn=div1;view=fulltext, 3.

^[25] Ibid., 4.

^[26] Ibid., 6.

^[27] Ibid., 8.

^[28] Ibid., 4.

^[29] Alison Milbank, “Apologetics and the Imagination,” Imaginative Apologetics: Theology, Philosophy, and the Catholic Tradition, ed. Andrew Davison (London: SCM, 2011), 32.

^[30] Mortimer J. Adler, ed., Great Books of the Western World, vol. 16, Augustine, 2nd ed. (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2003), 456.

^[31] Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G. Marshall (London: Bloomsbury, 2013), 107.

^[32] Josef Pieper, Leisure: The Basis of Culture; The Philosophical Act, trans. Alexander Dru (San Francisco: Ignatius, 2009), 65.