The Enlightenment Era

-Did other cultures effect society back in Europe and the way they thought about their government?

The Enlightenment is said to have begun in the 1680’s, the same decade that the “Glorious Revolution” occurred, which crowned daughter of James II Mary and her husband Prince William of Orange Monarchs of England. This turning point in English history can be considered part of the Enlightenment due to the switch from an Absolute Monarchy to a Constitutional Monarchy and the passing of the English Bill of Rights in 1689 after William’s ascension to the throne.

The Age of Enlightenment, a movement during the 17th and 18th century started from the Europeans, later moving into American colonies. The point of this movement was for the society to reform on a new base such as emphasizing reason and individualism over tradition. Enlightenment thinkers, Montesquieu, Rousseau, Beccaria, Locke, and Voltaire helped launched this project amongst Europeans. John Locke, for example, criticized absolute monarchy and favored self-government. Voltaire also believed that people should be able to speak their minds without the fear they may be punished. Through these philosophy influence, this eventually leads to European rulers ruling with a sense of equality, democratic governance, and abolition.

The Enlightenment was a period in the eighteenth century where change in philosophy and cultural life took place in Europe. The movement started in France, and spread to Great Britain, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Germany at more or less around the same time, the ideas starting with the most renowned thinkers and philosophers of the time and eventually being shared with the common people. The Enlightenment was a way of thinking that focused on the betterment of humanity by using logic and reason rather than irrationality and superstition. It was a way of thinking that showed skepticism in the face of religion, challenged the inequality between the kings and their people, and tried to establish a sound system of ethics. The ideas behind the

The Enlightenment was an 18th century intellectual and philosophical movement in Europe that eventually spread to Paris and the United States. This movement was a link between the scientific revolution and the cultural and political life. The Enlightenment fostered the belief that one could reform society by discovering rational laws that governed social behavior and were just as scientific as the laws of physics (The Earth and its Peoples, pg. 582). It challenged the traditional notions of truth and authority of the natural world while applying the same methods to the world in regards to human society and behavior. It was free of superstition, ignorance, and gained knowledge by questioning the world and human realm.

The Early Modern Western Enlightenment was an intellectual movement in the 17th and 18th centuries. The objective of the Enlightenment was to create authoritative ethics, and knowledge based on an “enlightened” rationality. The leaders’ that were part of this movement were directing the world towards progress and out of a long period of irrationality, superstition, and tyranny; which began during a historical period called the Dark Ages. Therefore, it provided a framework for the American and French Revolutions, as well as the rise of capitalism and the birth of socialism. Most of the ideas in the 18th century are common laws today; like freedom of speech, freedom of religion and the responsibilities of rulers to their people developed during this time. As well as a huge increase in scientific inquiry.

While some men merely acknowledged the ideas of the Enlightenment Era, there were those who would implement the new form of ideology into breaking away from a tyrant and form their own republic. George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Patrick Henry were a few men who absorbed the philosophy from Old Europe and tweaked it so it would better serve the colonies. For example, the Stamp Act was one of many instances where British Parliament abused their power of the colonies and when John Adams drafted the Braintree Instructions it was one of the first documents to directly reject Parliament’s authority over the thirteen colonies. What makes this even more notable is the language Adams used to argue against it, stating that “We further

The ideas of the enlightenment during the eighteenth century was to promote reason, logic and freedom of thought over dogma, faith or religion, and especially the way government back then was running in Europe. It was revolutionary era because all the philosophers, and other smart thinkers at the time gathered their new opinion or ideas together to shift the way people, politicians or government, and religious figures thought about the rules of life in the universe.

In situations of unbalanced power, people will always revolt and work to change their nation’s order, so that equality will be made. Once revolutions have taken their toll, and brought devastation to the land, the ash becomes a perfect place to cultivate a new system of power. The American and French Revolutions were aided, and created, by the Age of Enlightenment’s ideas of personal rights and freedoms. The new knowledge of the era brought change to people who had constantly been forced to live under the rule of their wicked rulers. They harnessed the progressive concepts, and brought riots across the lands of the unjust states. After the fighting, almost all traces of both governments had vanished, and in it’s place, the people’s government

Americans in the Enlightenment period strongly connected themselves with the classical age in terms of how they approached their art. The Enlightenment period lasted for about 150 years, from approximately 1700 -1850. Throughout this time period many artists took inspiration from the classical age which occurred in ancient Greece and Rome hundreds of years before. We can see examples of this in buildings like The White house and Monticello in America, and Kedleston Hall in England. These three buildings, though located in very different parts of the world, all have a number of aestheticly similar attributes.

The Age of Enlightenment has historically been affiliated with drastic skepticism and revolution in politics, philosophy, science, and communications, amongst other disciplines. In the early eighteenth century, people began to challenge the idea that rulers, spirits, and Catholicism were dominant over other ways of life. Although the Enlightenment primarily prevailed in parts of Europe in countries such as England and France, it was also crucial in determining several aspects of colonial America. The Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, two of the most fundamental documents of American law, are perhaps the crowning achievements of the Enlightenment. Specifically impacted by John Locke, Benedict Spinoza, and Gotthold Ephraim

The Enlightenment was a major changing point in history. Before the enlightenment, people were hard workers. Religious freedom and equality was just a dream, if you threatened the church in any way you were executed immediately. During the seventeenth and eighteenth century, there was a group of famous scientists who studied society. They were known as philosophers, They practiced in a period of time where all problems were faced and dealt with using reason. Some of the items discussed by the philosophers were as followed: freedom of religion, politics, economics, and equality. This period of time was well known as The Enlightenment.

Revolutions may have occurred so rapidly in the 18th and 19th century because, once one was sparked, it lit a fire all over. Time and time again we see in history one nation bringing in change, and then others following. Yes, the Enlightenment opened minds to the idea of change being good, but it was not merely the Enlightenment that caused arousal for Revolution. The Enlightenment is generally thought of as a step further from the church, completely embracing the individual and leaving behind ways of the past. But Revolutions are not pulled through by one individual, they may be started by one loud voice, but it takes many more to fully bring them about. Thus, the Revolutions of the 18th and 19th century were most likely a combination of enlightenment

In his 1784 essay entitled, “Answering the Question: What Is Enlightenment?,” Immanuel Kant, one of the most prominent and influential figures in all of modern philosophy, as well as a key contributor to Enlightenment thinking and ideals, defines enlightenment as “man’s emergence from his self-imposed nonage” (Kant, 1784). According to Kant, one of the primary goals of the Enlightenment was to encourage man to cultivate the courage to use his own knowledge and reason apart from guidance or dependence on another. Recognizing that man seems to be inclined to follow the guiding institutions of the day, namely the Church and the Monarchy, Kant cautions man to not fall subject to these external “perpetual

The Age of Enlightenment was an intellectual and scientific movement which is characterized by its rational and scientific approach to religious, social, political, and economic issues. Enlightenment ideals challenged the way people were taught to think and let them express their criticism of the church, the monarchy or whatever system they saw as unjust. The impact of the enlightenment movement was first seen in 18th century Europe and soon spread to different parts of the world. People who believed in these ideals were called enlightenment thinkers. Enlightenment thinkers were a voice for the masses who felt they were being manipulated by people holding all the power. It also helped the masses realize that they did not need the church or monarchy, and enlightenment thinkers were able to assemble a following to stop people of power taking advantage of those who were not quite as powerful. Enlightenment thinkers gave an outlet to the common citizen who were seeing injustices in their government system.