Material and Providential Economies in Montaigne's Essais

Abstract

Economic matters are not removed from spiritual concerns in the early modern world, in which Michel de Montaigne's Essais emerged. The rich semantic history of the term economy condenses this adjacency between the spiritual and the material. In spite of its skepticism surrounding providential thinking, Montaigne's text does contend with the question of Divine Providence, a doctrine central to both Catholic and Protestant theology in the sixteenth century. In conclusion, the management of subjective inclinations, the ordering of devotional practices as well as the administration of an empire, central topics of the chapters from Michel de Montaigne's Essais considered in this chapter, echo the ancient notion of oikonomia. Inversely, generosity, trust, and faithfulness deployed among friends and within religious communities appear in alignment with, and under the favor of, a providential order.