Seeing the World Through Ramist Eyes: The Richardsonian Ramism of Thomas Hooker and Samuel Stone

Abstract

Using as examples the writings of Thomas Hooker and Samuel Stone, founding ministers of the First Church of Hartford, Connecticut, this article shows how influential thinkers in early seventeenth-century England and New England saw the world around them through the filters of the Ramist philosophy of Alexander Richardson. It argues that Richardsonian Ramism produced theology and preaching that was less "biblical" and more "Calvinist" than has been conventionally thought.

Untitled

“…His task was to show how the influential New England Puritan philosophers of the early 17 th century perceived the world around them. He explains how this perception was influenced by the Ramist philosophy of Alexander Richardson (Tipson, 2013). There is a certain belief that Puritan thinkers were hostile to natural philosophy.…”