ABSTRACT This paper reads Herman Melville’s ‘Benito Cereno’ as a response to antebellum anti-Catholic fiction. Focusing on Rosamond Culbertson’s captivity narrative and its editor Samuel B. Smith’s remarks in his magazine The Downfall of Babylon, I argue that through Delano, Melville ventriloquizes the sensationalist argument that because American Catholics were part of a Roman conspiracy to undermine Anglo-American liberties and place the U.S. government under the pope’s control, it was necessary to suppress Catholic religious liberty. Melville uses an ironic narrative structure to probe the blindspots and overconfidence of Delano’s Protestant liberal subjectivity, which reflects Smith’s similar certainty. Smith understood the capacity for participation in a liberal democracy as a trait inhering in Protestant identities. Here, race and religion are entangled; for Smith and Delano, Protestant liberal subjectivity is a peculiarly Anglo-American identity. Liberalism, moreover, is for them a rhetorical tool for justifying the exploitation and marginalisation of minority individuals. Melville interrogates liberalism as a cultural formation meant to justify the exclusion of those who, like Catholics, were thought to be incapable of participating in a liberal democracy. He suggests that readers must develop a detached attitude to better negotiate the challenges of difference in society.

中文翻译：

---

赫尔曼·梅尔维尔（Herman Melville）的《贝尼托·塞雷诺（Benito Cereno）》：罗莎蒙德，耸人听闻的反天主教，宗教自由和自由主义

摘要本文读赫尔曼·梅尔维尔（Herman Melville）的《贝尼托·塞雷诺（Benito Cereno）》是对战前反天主教小说的回应。我着眼于罗莎蒙德·库尔伯森（Crosbertson Culbertson）的被cap叙事及其编辑塞缪尔·B·史密斯（Samuel B. Smith）在他的杂志《巴比伦的覆灭》中的言论，我认为梅尔维尔通过德拉诺提出了耸人听闻的论点，因为美国天主教徒是罗马阴谋破坏英美自由和自由的一部分。将美国政府置于教皇的控制之下，有必要压制天主教的宗教自由。梅尔维尔使用具有讽刺意味的叙事结构来探究德拉诺的新教自由主义主观性的盲点和过度自信，这反映了史密斯的类似确定性。史密斯（Smith）将参与自由民主的能力理解为是新教徒身份的特质。这里，种族和宗教纠缠在一起；对于史密斯和德拉诺来说，新教自由主义的主观性是英裔美国人特有的身份。而且，自由主义对他们而言是一种辩解剥削和边缘化少数人的理由的修辞工具。梅尔维尔（Melville）将自由主义作为一种文化形式进行讯问，旨在证明排斥那些像天主教徒一样无能力参加自由民主制的人。他建议读者必须以独立的态度来更好地应对社会差异的挑战。梅尔维尔（Melville）将自由主义作为一种文化形式进行讯问，旨在证明排斥那些像天主教徒一样无能力参加自由民主制的人。他建议读者必须以独立的态度来更好地应对社会差异的挑战。梅尔维尔（Melville）将自由主义作为一种文化形式进行讯问，旨在证明排斥那些像天主教徒一样无能力参加自由民主制的人。他建议读者必须以独立的态度来更好地应对社会差异的挑战。