Some Economic Aspects to Private Prayer in Shakespeare

Abstract

One of the new subgenres developed around the end of the sixteenth century was advice on composing private prayer. It explored concrete events in daily life, freshly modelling the spiritual opportunities or risks in trade. Less laudably, an economic register was extended to the assurance of prevalency in such prayer. Contrasting positions on bargaining in or with private prayer are explored by Shakespeare in Henry VIII, Measure for Measure, and Henry V.