Abstract

The literary and musical arts provide a wealth of descriptions, expressions, and simulations of love. Philosophy provides abstract analyses of love. Humanistic verification uses the depictions of love in the literary arts to test the validity of the philosophical analyses. This article explores this process by relating Thomas Aquinas’ account of love to popular culture in the form of the lyrics of rock songs of the 1960s and to high culture in the form of William Shakespeare’s “All’s Well That Ends Well,” “Antony and Cleopatra,” “Romeo and Juliet,” and “The Taming of the Shrew.” More precisely, in his “Summa Theologiae,” Aquinas distinguishes eight aspects of love—melting, commonalities, bonding, ecstasis, zeal, joy, sorrow, and fervor. If these are indeed aspects of love, then descriptions and/or expressions of them should be common in popular and high culture. The result of this humanistic verification in this case is that Aquinas’ eight characteristics are common in both popular and high culture. However, his account is incomplete because it fails to see that anger, jealousy, and gratitude are also common attributes of love.