Reading humility in early modern England

While humility is not especially valued in modern Western culture, Jennifer Clement argues here, it is central to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century understandings of Christian faith and behavior, and is vital to early modern concepts of the self.

As this study shows, early modern literary engagements with humility link it to self-knowledge through the practice of right reading, and make humility foundational to any proper understanding of human agency.