Essay en critiek, Groote figuren

72 GROOTE FIGUREN

DE RENAISSANCE I

Michelet, Gebhart (fijn en grondig kenner van Italiaansche Middeleeuwen en Italiaansche cultuurontwikkeling), Thode, Burckhardt, George Voigt, Fester, Symonds, Walter Pater, Konrad Burdach, verbonden reeds het begrip, het woord, de voorstelling Renaissance aan de figuur van Sint Franciscus.

Walter Pater schrijft in zijn boek ״The Renaissance. Studies in art and poetry: ״The subjects of the following studies are taken from the history of the ״Renaissance," and touch what I think the chief points in that complex, many-sided movement. I have explained in the first of them what I understand by the word, giving it a much wilder scope than was intended by those who originally used it to denote that revival of classical antiquity in the fifteenth century which was only one of many results of a general excitement and enlightening of the human mind, but of which the great aim and achievements of what, as Christian art, is often falsely opposed tot the Renaissance, were another result".

Söderhjelm acht het beroemde boek van Pater overschat en zijn kenschetsing van het Renaissance-begrip al te willekeurig.

Ygl. mede: ״Ausdehnung des Begriffs Renaissance" in Burckhardt's ״Die Kult. d. Ren. in It.".

Konrad Burdach geeft in zijn studie: ״Sinn und ITr-sprung der Worte Renaissance und Reformation", in zijn bundel: ״Reformation, Renaissance, Humanismus"