The Age of EnlightenmentEighteenth-Century Thought

The eighteenth-century sentiment

that economic and political reforms were possible was fostered by

people and ideas of the

Enlightenment.

Enlightenment

• The intellectuals, writers, and critics who championed this reform in the emerging print culture were known as philosophies. The philosophies were interested in greater freedoms and liberties, and they sought rational improvement on many levels of society.

Formative Influences on the Enlightenment

• Isaac Newton’s determined the role of gravitation in relationship between objects enabled other Europeans to realize that much remained to be discovered. His use of empirical support for general laws became an important feature of Enlightenment thought.

Formative Influences Continued..

• John Locke’s view of pyschology--- that all humans begin life as a tabula rasa, or a blank page--- gave enlightenment thinkers grounds for arguing that the human condition could be improved by modifying the surroundings social and political environment.

Continued…• Britain’s domestic

stability, religious toleration, freedom of the press, small army, unregulated domestic life, and the political sovereignty of Parliament all suggested to Enlightenment thinkers that absolutist monarchy might not be the best path.

Continued…• Louis XIV’s heavy taxation,

absolute monarchy, religious persecution, and large standing army were perceived by philosophies as obstacles to reform. Voltaire suggested reforms in his book, Letters on the English, that he believed could improve French life, modeling his theories on the English system. In Candide he attacked war and religious persecution.

Continued…• The emergence of a

print culture during the Enlightenment helped spread the ideas of philosophies like Voltaire. The public became more literate during this era, a process that enabled these printed materials to be more influential in shifting public opinion.

The Encyclopedia• Assembled by Denis Diderot

and Jean le Rond d’Alembert, the Encyclopedia was a major undertaking by Enlightenment thinkers. The book was the product of writing by more than 100 authors, and it survived many attempts at censorship. It included the most advance ideas of the day, secularized learning and was, in part, a plea for freedom of expression.

The Enlightenment and Religion• Many philosophies were

critical of Christianity. Voltaire’s famous slogan “Crush the Infamous Thing,” summed up their general attitude. Philosophies felt that Christianity focused attention on the world to come to the detriment of the present condition. Philosophies also objected to the power structure of the old regime, which gave special rights to the clergy.

Continued...

• Deism, or the belief that religion and reason could be combined, was popular among some of the philosophies, who believed that God must be rational and religion should be so as well. Deists believed that God existed and could be empirically justified in the study of nature.

The Enlightenment and Society• The philosophies, were

concerned with the application of laws of reason to the social condition. The Italian philosophe, Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794) attacked torture and capital punishment in his work On Crimes and Punishments, and he used critical analysis to address the problem of making punishments just and effective.

Continued…• Many philosophies believed that economic

policy could be reformed in a way that was consistent with the operation of natural laws. These reformers, known as physiocrats, believed that mercantilist policies hampered the expansion of trade. Their leaders included Francois Quesnay and Pierre Dupont de Nemours.

• The English economist Adam Smith believed that economic liberty was the foundation for a natural economic system, and he urged that the mercantilist system of England be abolished. Smith believed that individuals should be able to pursue their own economic interests, and he is widely credited with the founder of laissez-faire economic thought and policy, Smith’s four stage theory of human social and economic development enabled Europeans to see themselves dwelling at the highest level of achievement, which served as a major justification for their economic and imperial domination of the world.

Political Thought of the Philosophies

• In his 1748 book, Spirit of the Laws, Baron de Montesquieu held up the British constitution as an example of the wisest model for regulating the power of government. A political conservative, Montesquieu championed the aristocracy in improving French political regime.

Continued…• In The Social Contract (1762),

Jean-Jacques Rousseau envisioned a society in which each individual could maintain personal freedom while participating as a loyal member in a larger community. He saw human beings as enmeshed in social relationships, and he believed that loyalty to the community should be encouraged.

Women in the Thought and Practice of the Enlightenment

• Women helped promote the careers of philosophies by giving them access to their social and political contacts and providing a forum for them to circulate their ideas. Louis XV’s mistress, the marquise de Pompadour, helped the Encyclopedia overcome censorship efforts. Madame de Tencin promoted Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Laws by purchasing it and circulating it among friends. The philosophies were by no means ardent feminists; Mary Wollstonecraft addressed their shortcomings and critiqued Rousseau in A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, in 1792.

Enlightened Absolutism• The phrase, “enlightened absolutism,” refers to the

phenomenon (observed during the last third of the eighteenth century) of several European rulers’ embrace of the reforms set out by the philosophies. Monarchs most closely associated with this phenomenon included Frederick II of Prussia, Joseph II of Austria, and Catherine II of Russia. These monarchs pushed for innovations that would increase their revenue.

For Additional Review

• Consider the contributions to Enlightenment thought of Baruch Spinoza and Moses Mendelsohn.