Good versus evil trumps Catholics versus Protestants

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The Faerie Queene written by Edmund Spencer is a strongly religious work, however it’s religion is not based on Catholicism but rather Protestantism. These two religions tend to but-heads quite frequently throughout history as they do not see eye-to-eye. This poses an interesting aspect as the Spencer incorporates many of his protestant beliefs into “Faerie Queene”  but the poem still managed to be popular to readers of all faiths. Spencer does spend an extensive amount of time bashing the Catholic Church, but he still makes it apparent that an overall evil haunts humanity in the very essence of simple sin. For example, the dragon that Redcrosse defeats at the end of Book I is a great representation of such basic existence of evil. The spiritual part of man’s existence and good versus evil are the themes that prevail as opposed to Spencer solely proclaiming Protestantism. This is how Spencer captures the hearts of such a broad audience without having to have an argument over religious differences. Another example lies within Book I when Spencer writes

“Therewith she [Errour] spewed out of her filthy maw
A floud of poyson horrible and blacke,
Full of great lumpes of flesh and gobbets raw...
Her voit full of bookes and papers was,
With loathly frogs and toades...”

Here, Spencer is creating a political and theological bias as he has the monster send out papers; like Catholic papal and tracts. He claims his Protestantism over Catholicism by stating Protestant truths over falsehoods and issues in the Catholic faith based on his allegorical treatment of holiness. The frogs are images of deceiving spirits based on the book of Revelation in the Christian Bible. These frogs further identify the evil of heresy within Catholicism. Also in Book 5 Spencer writes:

Where griesly Night, with visage deadly sad,
That Phoebus chearefull face durst never view,
And in a foule blacke pitchie face durst never vew,
She findes forth comming from her darkesome mew,
Where she all day did hide her hated hew"

This is one of the many sections where Spencer proclaims an overall theme of good versus evil. He uses negative terms to describe the goddess of Night in this particular case, and it is significant that Spencer plays on the theme of blindness because night provides an opportunity to hide truth. This theme of an overall good versus evil is what ultimately makes this poem such a broad success.