Introduction

Cudworth was born in 1617 and died in 1688, thus living through the troubled years of rebellion and restoration in England. It was a time during which the Puritans' Calvinist views attained and then lost dominance. Conflicting philosophies and theologies moved rapidly from the bookshelf to the battlefield, and ecclesiastical and academic positions were given and taken away on doctrinal grounds; never before had public life been so divided by ideology. The concurrent growth of scientific knowledge was proving as unsettling to some thinkers as was Hobbes's powerful secular vision of morals and politics.

Cudworth attended Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and was elected a fellow in 1639. While a student, he came under the influence of Benjamin Whichcote, a leading figure among the opponents of strongly Calvinistic versions of Christianity. Cudworth was sympathetic enough to the Puritans, however, to be appointed by them to the mastership of Clare College and to serve on committees for the Parliament they controlled. Nonetheless, in the sermon he gave at the invitation of Parliament in 1647, Cudworth spoke as a follower of Whichcote's. He argued eloquently against making matters of doctrine and ritual central to the Christian life, defended the independence of standards of good and evil from God's will, and stressed the importance of a moral life that all people could lead regardless of their differences regarding religious doctrines.

After a few years away from Cambridge, Cudworth returned in 1654 as master of Christ's College. He wrote a great deal but hesitated to publish anything.