"I mentioned deism only because it seemed relevant to the poem Rogerbob posted, and (I thought) to your comment about a god's (or a belief system's) usefulness. I'm not a deist myself, but deism was definitely significant in New England, and Stevens came from an old New England family."
Julie, Stevens's immediate forbears were from Pennsylvania. He got interested in his family backgrounds late in life, so there may have been a New England connection generations back. Stevens grew up in the Dutch Reformed church.
I have read this thread infrequently. Has Santayana been mentioned? And through Santayana, Lucretius? It's always seemed to me that Stevens's philosophy begins and ends in aesthetics. If it is a philosophy, it's predominantly a personal one--a single artist's way of confronting the world, a church of one.
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