Vitalist religion equated knowing nature’s secrets with knowing God’s works

Evidence

These ideas were set within a vitalistic philosophical framework which presupposed that nature was active, filled with God, and therefore good. Gerrard Winstanley wrote, “To know the secrets of nature is to know the works of God … how the spirit or power of wisdom and life, causing motion or growth, dwells within and governs both the several bodies of the stars and planets in the heavens above; and the several bodies of the earth below, as grass, plants, fishes, beasts, birds, and mankind.” An early Ranter belief held that “every creature is God, every creature that hath life and breath being an efflux from God, and shall return into God again, be swallowed up in him as a drop is in the ocean.” — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 529

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Animist vitalism functioned as an ethic restraining exploitation of nature — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 158; Vitalism’s monistic worldview inherently restrains the exploitation of nature — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 933; Vital force moves up a hierarchy of values culminating in God as Creator — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 241 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Vital force moves up a hierarchy of values culminating in God as Creator #expands (0.80) — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 241
• Animist vitalism functioned as an ethic restraining exploitation of nature #expands (0.75) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 158
• Vitalism’s monistic worldview inherently restrains the exploitation of nature #expands (0.75) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 933
• Treating nature as a vegetable made it both manageable and non-atheistic #expands (0.75) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 906