Poetry and Scepticism in the Wake of the Austrian Enlightenment: Blumauer, Grillparzer, Lenau
2004; Modern Humanities Research Association; Volume: 12; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/aus.2004.0039
ISSN2222-4262
Autores ResumoPoetry and Scepticism in the Wake of theAustrian Enlightenment: Blumauer, Grillparzer, Lenau RITCHIE ROBERTSON StJohn's College,Oxford I The Austrian Enlightenment did not intend to promote religious scepticism. Its ill-fated leader, Joseph II, convincingly professed himself as loyal to the Church as was his mother Maria Theresia.1 The measures which brought him intoconflict with theChurch, and inducedPope Pius VI to take the unprecedented step of visiting Vienna in person to remonstrate with him, were economic and political rather than doctrinal. They included the dissolution of the contemplative monastic orders, the attempt to subject ecclesiastical appointments to state control and, most famously, the series of Edicts of Toleration which removed the restrictions on religious worship, occupations and education that had previously affected Lutherans, Calvinists, Greek Orthodox and Jews. But toleration did not mean pluralism. Joseph had no intention of weakening the dominance of the Catholic Church in his Empire. He did, however, seek toweaken the Baroque piety that found expression in elaborate ceremonies, Mariolatry, Corpus Christi processions, pilgrimages and barnstorming sermons, and to promote instead the simple, orderly and rational devotion advocated especially by the Jansenists. Most of the intellectuals who supported Josephinism were broadly sympa thetic to thisReform Catholicism. The Professor ofJurisprudence at Vienna, JohannValentin Eybel,whose pamphletWas istder Pabst? [Whatis the Pope?] aroused great attention in the year of the Pope's visit, describes himself as 'der vern?nftige und wohl unterwiesene Christ' [the rational and well instructed Christian], equally distant from the enthusiast or 'Schw?rmer', superstitiously awestruck by the Pope, and from the freethinker or 'Freygeist' who subjects the Pope's mitre and saints' legends to shallow mockery.2 The 1 See Maria Theresia und Joseph II. Ihre Conespondenz, ed. by A. von Arneth (Vienna, 1867), pp. 151-52, and the discussion in Derek Beales, Joseph II, vol. 1: In theShadow of Ma?a Theresa 1J4.1-1J80 (Cambridge, 1987), p. 469. For Beales's most recent thoughts on this subject, see his Prosper?ty and Plunder. European Catholic Monasteries in theAge ofRevolution, 1650-1813 (Cambridge, 2003), chapter 8. 2 Anon. [Johann Valentin Eybel], Was ist der Pabst? (Vienna, 1782), p. 6. 18 Poetryand Scepticism: Blumauer,Grillparzer, L?nau Josephinist poets associated with the Wienerischer Musenalmanach similarly espoused a middle-of-the-road Christianity. The freethinking denounced by Eybel ('dieses Unkraut schie?t auch bey uns auf [these weeds flourish here too])3 is also rebuked by Johann Baptist Alxinger in 'Der Freygeist', a poem recommending virtue and religion as antidotes to scepticism. The poetry of Alxinger and his fellows alternates between quiet cheerfulness ('Heiterkeit') and quiet melancholy, accepting the world in either mood as providentially ordered for the best.4 It becomes forceful, however, in the polemical anti clericalism that was an essential part of Josephinism. Alxinger's religion is Josephinist in its praise of toleration and its hostility towards the papacy's pretensions to political and intellectual authority, as well as tomonasticism; the latter institution is said towithdraw able-bodied men and women from work and motherhood, encouraging pederasty and reserving unfortunate young women 'f?rs Serail von Gottes Sohn' [for the seraglio of God's son].5 In 'Der Priester Gottes' [God's Priest], Alxinger warns that, though priests no longer burn heretics or instigate wars, they still exercise covert influence and denounce the truth from the pulpit ? but that is because they know their days are numbered: Recht so! denn hat bey einer Nation Aufkl?rung ihre Fakel aufgesteckt, Da st?rzt seinG?tzentempel krachend ein.6 [Quite right! for once Enlightenment has lither torch in any nation, its idolatrous temple will come crashing down.] There ismuch more violent polemic, and little serenity, in the work of Aloys Blumauer, a leading Josephinist poet. Educated by Jesuits, and briefly a member of the Society of Jesus before its suspension in 1773, in the early 1780s he became aMason and was employed as official censor. He was also a journalist, who edited theWienerischerMusenalmanach together with Johann Franz Ratschky from 1781 to 1792, and single-handed in 1793-94; from 1782 to 1784 he also edited theWiener Realzeitung, a major organ of liberalism; and from1784to 1787 he edited the Journal fiirFreymaurer issuedby the...
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