‘I was Bred a Moderate Presbyterian’

‘I deny nothing but doubt everything’. ¹ Byron’s ardent but uncommitted views on religion have left his allegiance in this matter open to claims by many different groups. Because of the complexity of his thought, its apparent contradictions, its changing nature over time, and the deliberate facetiousness and obliqueness with which he often addressed such topics (and perhaps, too, because of the modern loss of sensitivity to questions of theological detail that to Byron were clear and self-evident), it is surprisingly easy to attach apparently conflicting labels such as ‘Calvinist’, ‘Deist’, Socinian’, ‘(Roman) Catholic’ and even ‘Muslim’ to Byron’s references to religion in his verse and prose.