Utopia

Text by Thomas More, originally written in Latin and first published in 1516. Full title: A fruitful pleasant and witty work of the best state of a public weal and of the new isle called Utopia: written in Latin by the right worthy and famous Sir Thomas More, Knight, and translated into English by Ralph Robynson, sometime Fellow of Corpus Christi College in Oxford.

The constitution of Utopia certainly contradicts the common sense ('publica opinio') of More's age. Utopia tolerates many religions and subsidises priests, but there is no one state religion: the state's basis is essentially secular, and great value is attached to participation in public life, which is the right of every male citizen. Fully to lead the good life is to participate in Utopian politics. The Utopians' assumptions about public life were not, however, widely shared in sixteenth-century England. The concepts of 'politics' as an autonomous area of activity, and of political philosophy as distinct from moral philosophy, scarcely existed.

Sources

Elizabeth M. Nugent. The Thought & Culture of the English Renaissance An Anthology of Tudor Prose. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956.

David Norbrook. Poetry and Politics in the English Renaissance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, year??