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The main object of this study is to vindicate Spenser of the implied charge of pedantry in one of the most brilliant of his episodes. His Odyssean voyage during the last decade and more among the pages of scholarly journals has left him cast now on the shores of simple Lucretian materialism, now in the bog of abstruse Neo-Platonism. He has even been observed steering a consciously charted course between opposing rocks of dilemma, to say nothing of having sought refuge and instruction among the pre-Socratic Greeks. It is hoped that he may be returned to native English shores. Should the conclusions of this article be epitomized in the statement that Spenser was a second-rate philosopher, that he was a popularizer of already popularized material, no great loss is suffered. His metaphysical poetry may still be read, its simple and direct message gathered, and its charm enjoyed without a ruinous gloss ranging from Empedocles to the refiners of Platonism. Another advantage of simplifying the doctrines of a poet who meant them to be simple and direct is that, when considered in the light of Spenser's naïvete, they lack that inconsistency and puzzling quality so often discerned by commentators. So viewed, the Garden of Adonis, besides losing its character as a technical history of philosophy, may perhaps be regarded no longer as a catalogue of fallacies.
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