Irving Babbitt was the architect of New Humanism. He was also T.S. Eliot's mentor at Harvard. But in 1928, the newly Anglican Eliot's essay criticizing his old mentor's humanistic project was published, which provoked a terse, and sharp, rebuke from Babbitt. What is the relationship between traditional religion and humanistic learning? Can humanism provide society with the standards needed for democratic life? In this episode, we take a look at Babbitt's and Eliot's writings on the subject.
T.S. Eliot's The Humanism of Irving Babbitt: https://muse.jhu.edu/document/374
T.S. Eliot's Second Thoughts About Humanism: https://muse.jhu.edu/document/408
Irving Babbitt's Democracy and Leadership: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780913966556
Jay Parini's Irving Babbitt Revisited: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3856831
The Davenant Institute's Reforming Classical Education: https://davenantinstitute.org/reforming-classical-education
T.S. Eliot's Little Gidding: http://www.columbia.edu/itc/history/winter/w3206/edit/tseliotlittlegidding.html
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Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com