The theorisation of the will is as abundant within Renaissance England’s theology and philosophy as it is in the imaginative literature of the period. Yet, even with the key role that this concept plays in the period’s epistemologies there seems to be little space in recent academic criticism for the function and merit of the will in Renaissance culture. My paper seeks to address this critical gap by demonstrating the profundity and abundance of the conceptualisation of the will by focusing on the English morality tradition. This paper demonstrates how the didactic purview of Francis Merbury’s interlude The Marriage of Wit and Science (1570) is concerned with an interrogation and conceptualisation of the will. Focusing on the polysemic manifestation and dubious operation of the will within this interlude provides an intriguing critical focus by which we may reassess how the human subject is being conceptualised within the English Renaissance.

—Douglas Clark, University of Strathclyde