Description
?This useful study asserts that a knowledge of two theological traditions, one Puritan and the other rationalistic, can help us understand the work of a number of important authors writing between 1798 and 1860. In the first of these two traditions everything that happens reflects God’s will and is therefore just; in the second, God allows people to work out their own destinies. … All of Forrer’s readings are perceptive. … This study … adheres so closely to its stated purpose and works out its conclusion so persuasively that it will be of great interest to anyone concerned with American religion and literature. Indeed, it is the sensitive blending of these two fields that constitutes the book’s greatest achievement. Forrer convinces us that the writers under discussion ewre themselves engaged in a theological debate inextricably linked with the American experience. Useful for graduate students and upper-division undergraduates.?-Choice
