Samuel Johnson was a critic, poet, and essayist, and the author of one of the most influential English dictionaries in history. As one of the finest minds eighteenth-century England, Johnson was in the centre of debates around the place of Christianity in the moral life of the nation, and the role of faith in a post-Enlightenment world.

Dr Kirsten Herlin of the University of Austin joins Christy, Joe, and LaRae, to discuss Samuel Johnson's life and faith, as well as his engagement with an increasingly secular intellectual culture. How did Johnson deal with his personal struggles of doubt and weakness? Did the humanism of the English Enlightenment necessarily mean a decline in spirituality? How does Johnson's moral influence come through in Jane Austen and other English writers?

Producers: Matthew and LaRae Cherukara

Music by Leon Riskin

Follow us @overtones.thinktank