ABSTRACT
The claim that scriptural writing allowed Mildmay a complex authority runs counter to what has been a common way of reading early modern women's religious prose. The confident authority that Mildmay assumes problematizes the assumptions about what was deemed acceptable for an early modern woman. The source, Mildmay insists, is God, whose words "come into" her heart. But, deflecting any assertion of new revelation, Mildmay emphasizes the affective and experiential qualities of these divine "pledges". Mildmay primarily construes the writing subject in religious terms that have no necessary relationship to gender. Her meditations are the result of a godly education centered on Scripture. In her commitment to intensive reading, Scripture collation, and a typological understanding of biblical narrative, Mildmay's use of Scripture matches the central practices of early modern lay readers. While Mildmay is not using the sorts of "navigational aids" that Peter Stallybrass discusses, there is another intriguing possibility to explain her familiarity with Scripture.
