Shakespeare A to Z | Fate and Fortune
Most Elizabethans firmly believed that their lives were influenced by supernatural forces. This view was prominent both in the popular culture of the time and in the doctrines of the Church of England.
Elizabethans considered astrology* a legitimate science, believing that fate was tied to the movements of the planets and stars. According to the common PHILOSOPHY of the age, all of nature was bound together in a great “chain of being,” with the consequence that events in the heavens had a profound effect on the earth. Just as plant growth depended on the sun, and tides were...
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