o it. As Pomponazzi writes in The Immortality of the Soul: ôOne who acts conscientiously, expecting no other reward than virtue, seems to act far more virtuously and purely than he who expects some reward beyond virtue. And he who shuns vice on account of the foulness of vice, not because of the fear of due punishment for vice, seems more to be praised than he who avoids vice on account of the fear of punishment as in the verses: æThe good hate sin from love of virtue, / The evil hate sin from fear of punishmentÆö (Dether 1981). One can see that acting virtuous because of fear of punishment or due to expectation of reward did not cut it in the Renaissance. However, such reasoning also demonstrates an opposition to Christian precepts which basically teach that those who lead virtuous lives will be rewarded by entering the kingdom of Heaven upon death. It also opposed the precept that one should act virtuous in order to escape the punishment of living in eternal Hell.
The rise of the individual in terms of th
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