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LiteraturaThe age of Reason and Revolution: The Enlightenment.The Enlightenment sometimes referred to as the Age of Reason which took place in the eighteenth century in Western Europe, England and the American colonies. This century is commonly characterized as a period of intellectual brilliance. It was a time during which there was a belief that common sense could discover the natural laws which govern society and the arts. England in the 18th c. had: trade flourished, an empire was growing, two rivals: Holland and France, there was no more trouble between King and Parliament. The middle class was established. The enlightenment was a celebration of ideas about what human mid was capable of. Many of the enlightened ideas were political. Intellectuals began to consider the possibility that freedom and democracy were the fundamental rights of all people. Egalitarianism meant the promise of fair treatment for all people, regardless of background. Citizens began to see themselves on the same level as their leaders. SOCIETY AND RELIGIONThe condition of England: A persons position was fairly well defined by birth, and the distinction of class was the accepted order of things. The gulf between the rich and the poor in Britain created a country of two nations. Good taste and elegance were found among the upper class but, in contrast to all this lavish life, the lower class lived in squalor, ignorance and was coarse in manners. Death was also the accepted order of things. One in three English children died before the age of twenty one, and the average life span was only twenty nine. After 1750 the population grew rapidly. Sanitation and medical care began to improve. The consumption of chocolate sugar and tea became a national habit and coffee houses became centers of news, fashion and politics. Heavy drinking such as gin and rum was basically common in lower classes. Gambling became a national pastime so the society was called one vast casino. Public executions were also common, serving as spectacles. Political society: Powerful families could control their electorate with ease. It meant that politics was personal because the members knew one another and had common background and interests. The basic unit of government continued to be parish in which elected officials were under the supervision of the justice of the peace.The professions: Army commissions were brought. Independence of political thought could ruin a promising career in the church or in the army. Bishops, university chancellor, admirals, captains and politicians.Education: The poor could not afford an education and the state provided none for them. Primary education for the sons of shopkeepers and artisans which provided moral instruction for youth.one result of the increased literacy was the demand for more books and periodicals. Young gentlemen attending there were frivolous and did little but socialize. Scholarship waned. No examination.Conditions of the poor: The poor accepted their living. Gin drinking became a mania since it provided a temporary escape from their desperate conditions but ruining their health or committing a crime was some consequences. Condition of the Church: The Age of Reason reached into religion in form of Deism. Deists didnt believe in supernatural powers, basing its natural religion on human reason rather than revelation, reason was enthroned. Wesleyan Movement: the spiritual wasteland was restored to life by Methodism. Methodism is movement of Protestant Christianity which is focused on Bible study and a methodical approach to scriptures and Christian living. Methodists were those who wanted to revitalize religion. Results: John Wesley opposed John Wilkes, the American Revolution and Catholic emancipation. His preaching awakened the Anglican Church and revitalized its spiritual life. Methodism gave meaning and a new self-respect to thousands of the working class.Arts and sciences: the Age of Enlightenment was curious about nature and interested in scientific discoveries. The Augustan Age: It was a period of Roman history when the Augustus ruled and the Roman Empire enjoyed great power, prosperity and stability. The classics continued to serve as the basis of upper class education. A new and larger public was created by the introduction of periodicals.Joseph Addison: popular essayist and commented upon all matters of social life.Daniel Defoe: he is the father of modern periodical. He had things to say to the public and he said them as clearly as he could. He was capable of irony. Ex: Robinson Crusoe. Alexander Pope: A Catholic, elegant in his work. Being classical, he accepted the world as it was. His works were critical, and satirical. Ex: Essay on criticism; the first major poem. It is written in a type of rhyming verse called heroic couples, which covers a good criticism and advice and represents many of the chief literary ideals of Popes age. This is a testament to his belief that the imitation of the ancients is the ultimate standards for taste. Essay on man: hence the tendency to repeat the sema effects over and over, using the heroic couplet, to exploit the same rhythms, hence that petrifaction of language; poetic diction (there were deist ideas in this essay since man accepted the idea of God as a pure rational concept and rejected miracles. Religion was reduced to reason)Jonathan Swift: a great humorist and a satirist. He is capable of pure fun. He is skillful in verse as well as in prose. In his Modest Proposal he ironically suggested that famine in Ireland could be eased by cannibalism, and that that starving children should be used as food. Another is Gullivers Travels.In art, the spirit of the period was classical: social conventions are more important than individual convictions, reason is more important than emotion, form is more important than content. The opposite was Romanticism: we associate it with the individual rebelling against society, against accepted good taste and good manners. The Romantic is concerned with himself, highly emotional and impatient of the restrictions which a stable society demands. The steam engine brought 2 outcomes: the expansion of the city and depopulation of the countryside. But people were in favor of nature. There was a dissociation of sensibility in literature: hard expression, the healthy human soul exhibits a balance between intellect, emotion and body. There is a time for reason, deep feeling. During the Renaissance, Shakespeare did the opposite. In his sonnets, thought, feelings and physical passion could be listened at the same time. PROSE WAS MORE IMPORTANT THAN VERSE.Poetry: The literary revolt against the classical traditions and an aristocratic way of life has begun.Gray was a transitional poet, essentially classic in form but novel in his treatment of beauty and sorrow. Burns dealt with human topics as love, drinking and married life.The economic revolution: 3 revolutions occurred in the 18th century, in agriculture, industry and transportation.Agricultural: the new methods of farming brought prosperity by landlords to experiment in agricultural production. Enclosures: the open field system was destroyed. Land was valued, and redistributed among those entitled to receive portions. The enclosures brought many more acres under cultivation, and the new farms permitted individuals farmers to improve their crops and breed cattle without wasting their efforts. Enclosures brought efficiency and wealth to landlords and independent farms.Achievement: Tull improved seed planting and yield with his invention of the horse drill which dropped the seeds in rows instead of the former method of broadcast. He also experimented with a four course rotation of crops to eliminate the waste of fallow land. Effects: the combination of new methods helped to feed a larger population. However, enclosure had an adverse effect on the lesser tenants who, losing their free fuel and pasturage, could no longer compete.Industrial: the substitution of horse power for man power, the factory for the home workshop and the city for the village. With this changes came wealthy for the factory owner and misery for the worker in the factory own. Inventions: developments in technology, and in methods of industrial organization. Textiles: the increased demand for domestic cottons could not be met by the old domestic system of putting out orders to homes. The transfer of work from home to the factory quickly made England the world leader in the production of cotton goods. The problem of removing water from coal mines led to the use of the steam engine. Factories could now operate in larger cities away from rivers. Result: the printing material was available to the general public. Transportation: travel conditions were bad. The pack horse not only was slow and expensive but also was the only way in which goods could be moved until the first canal was completed in the 1761. As a result, the cost of coal was reduced and new markets were opened. Results: the increase in industrial output and the cheapness of manufactured goods increased national wealth.The Modest ProposalThe essay is an ironically attempt to "find out a fair, cheap, and easy Method" for converting the starving children of Ireland into "useful members of the Commonwealth." These poor children, predominantly Catholics are living in squalor because their families are too poor to keep them fed and clothed. His proposal, in effect, is to fatten up these undernourished children and feed them to Ireland's rich land-owners. Poor children could be sold into a meat market at the age of one. Thus combat overpopulation and unemployment. The author offers statistical support and gives specific data about the number of children to be sold, their weight and price. He suggests some recipes for preparing this new meat. He also says that the practice of selling and eating children will have positive effects on family morality: husbands will treat their wives with more respect. His conclusion is that the implementation of this project will do more to solve Ireland's complex social, political, and economic problems than any other measure that has been proposed. The principles breeders of the nation are the catholics. Children are suggested to be sold when they are infants because at the age of 6 they can become thieves. The idea of eating teens is rejected because they become tough.