Prayer divided seventeenth-century England. Anglican Conformists such as Lancelot Andrewes and Jeremy Taylor upheld set forms of prayer in the Book of Common Prayer, a book designed to unite the nation in worship. Puritan Reformers and Dissenters such as John Milton and John Bunyan rejected the prayer book and advocated for extemporaneous or free prayer. In 1645, the mainly Puritan Long Parliament proscribed the Book of Common Prayer and dismantled the Anglican Church in the midst of civil war. This led Anglican poets and liturgists to defend their tradition with energy and erudition in print. In 1662, with monarchy restored, the mainly Anglican Cavalier Parliament reinstated the Church and its prayer book to impose religious uniformity. This galvanized English Nonconformity and Dissent and gave rise to a vibrant literary counter-tradition. Addressing this fascinating history, David Gay examines competing claims to spiritual gifts and graces in polemical texts and their influence on prayer and poetry. Amid the contention of differing voices, the disputed connection of poetry and prayer, imagination and religion, emerges as a central tension in early modern literature and culture.

This collection examines the production and recreation of religious ideas and images in different times and locations, achieving a comparative perspective on the transmission of religious influences. The essayists look at contact and conflict between insiders and outsiders, centers and margins, Jews and Christians, Slavs and Greeks, and ancient ritual behaviors and modern television broadcasting, as part of the negotiation of new identity positions, relationships, and accommodations. The book combines the disciplines of literary studies, cultural studies, art history, religion, history, and critical theory, making it an important resource to a range of scholars as well as nonspecialists.

Do you need to know how to write systems, services, and applications using the TinyOS operating system? Learn how to write nesC code and efficient applications with this indispensable guide to TinyOS programming. Detailed examples show you how to write TinyOS code in full, from basic applications right up to new low-level systems and high performance applications. Two leading figures in the development of TinyOS also explain the reasons behind many of the design decisions made and, for the first time, how nesC relates to and differs from other C dialects. Handy features such as a library of software design patterns, programming hints and tips, end-of-chapter exercises, and an appendix summarizing the basic application-level TinyOS APIs make this the ultimate guide to TinyOS for embedded systems programmers, developers, designers, and graduate students.