Pope, Spinoza, and the Limits of Thought: (Re)Thinking An Essay on Man.

In this article I (re)think An Essay on Man with respect to the history of philosophy, by reading Pope's poem comparatively with Spinoza's Ethics , a method suggested by Jean-Pierre de Crousaz's contemporary critiques of the Essay , which accused Pope of Spinozism. I also consider the Essay in the light of Fredric Jameson's assertion that there exist perennial problems that "philosophy," "theory," indeed "thinking" itself cannot solve, but which must continue to be posed anyway, not set aside or abandoned. I thus suggest a new approach to the Essay , focused on several such problems, which have often vexed previous criticism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]