_The essence of Elizabethan as of other humanisms is the
understanding of man and the definition of the sphere of properly
human activity. The philosophical mind of Shakespeare’s age began
the work of reflection by cleaving the universe along three levels.
On the lowest level is the natural world, which is the plane
of instinct, appetite, animality, lust, the animal passions or
affections; on this level the regulation is by necessary or natural
law. On the middle level is the human world, which is regulated
and, in a sense, created by the will and knowledge of man; working
upon the natural world; but governed by reason, the special human
faculty; and illuminated more or less from the level above. On
the third level is the supernatural world, which is the plane of
spiritual beings, and the home of eternal ideas._
--STUART P. SHERMAN: “ON CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE.”
HUMANISM
AND
AMERICA
_The Pretensions of Science_