The Enlightenment and Revolution 1550 - 1789

World History Chapter 6

The Roots of Modern Science– During the Renaissance and the Reformation, something else

was also happening. The questioning of the church and the role of god and church teaching in society opened up new ways of thinking and viewing the world and the universe.

• The Medieval View– Since the rise of the power of the Vatican (the seat of the

Roman Catholic Church in Rome), all questions of what was true or false came from study of the ancient Romans or Greeks, or from the church.

– Geocentric Theory of the Universe• Aristotle• Ptolemy (Greek mathematician, geometry, philosophy, secret

school?)• The Church taught that the Earth was the centre of the universe,

all other things revolved around it.

• A New Way of Thinking– In the mid 1500’s, some began to question this model– Scientific Revolution

• Test and observation• Navigation, shipbuilding, gunsmiths, printing press

A Revolutionary Model of the Universe• The Heliocentric Theory

– Nicolaus Copernicus• Studied the heavens for 25 years, and reasoned that the sun was the

center of the solar system– Tycho Brahe

• Made many observations and collected data• Johannes Kepler used this data and discovered that not only did that

Earth revolve around the sun, but that the orbits were elliptical, and not circular.

• Galileo's Discoveries– First to use a telescope– Discovered that the moon’s surface was rough and uneven, that

Jupiter had four moons and a spot, and even the sun had spots, challenging the old Aristotle claim that the heavenly bodies were pure and perfect.

– Wrote a book in 1610 The Starry Messenger• Conflict with the Church

– Galileo’s findings challenged not only the Catholics but also the Protestants.

– In 1616, the Church warned Galileo not to defend the ideas of Copernicus.

– Galileo remained silent for many years, then wrote another book, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, showing Ptolemy but favoring Copernicus.

– The Pope summoned Galileo to Inquisition in Rome. Under threat of torture, Galileo signed a confession and repudiated Copernicus.

– The rest of Galileo’s life was in house arrest, but his ideas spread.

Retrograde Motion of the Planets

The Scientific Method– Hypothesis, test, observation

• Bacon and Descartes– Bacon developed the experimental method, empiricism– Descartes developed analytic geometry, linking algebra and geometry– Everything should be doubted until it is proven

• Newton Explains the Laws of Gravity– All objects attract all other objects, gravity– In 1687, wrote The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy – The universe is like a clock, orderly universe

• The Scientific Revolution Spreads– Scientific Instruments

• First microscope• Mercury barometer• Thermometer

– Medicine and the Human Body• Actual study of the human body, instead of animals• First smallpox inoculation by cowpox

– Discoveries in Chemistry• Challenged Aristotle’s idea that there were four elements Fire, Earth, Air,

Water• Boyle ideas of particles, gas theory (Boyle’s Law)

– How temperature, pressure, and volume affect each other

– People begin to use scientific ideas to other human pursuits, society, law, rights and liberties, government.

Two Views on Government• The Enlightenment (The Age of Reason)

– Intellectual movement that promoted Reason and Thought and the power of individuals to solve problems

– Rooted in the Scientific Revolution as philosophers and scholars re-evaluated old beliefs regarding government, religion, economics, and education.

• Hobbes’s Social Contract– Writing in his book Leviathan (1651), the horrors of the English

Civil War convinced Thomas Hobbes that people are naturally selfish and wicked, and without government to restrain them there would be:• “War… of every man against every man.”• Life would be “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”

– To prevent this, people needed to submit to a strong ruler, give up their rights in exchange for life and safety – the Social Contract

• Locke’s Natural Rights– People are naturally free and equal, and can learn from experience

to improve themselves, and have three natural rights: Life, Liberty, Property.

– Governments exist by the consent of the governed to protect these rights.

– If government fails to protect the rights of the people, the people have a right to overthrow it.

The Philosophes Advocate Reason• Philosophes (French philosophers) believed people could use reason and logic in all

aspects of life.– Reason – Truth can be found through reason and logic– Nature – That which is natural is good and reasonable– Happiness – Happiness can be found on Earth, not just in the afterlife– Progress – Society and Humanity can improve– Liberty – called for the liberties won in the Glorious Revolution and Bill of Rights (England)

• Voltaire Combats Intolerance– Using a pen name, published more than 70 books, mostly satires– Targeted the clergy, the aristocracy, and the government– Used pen as a deadly weapon against intolerance, prejudice, and superstition– “I do not agree with a word you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

• Montesquieu and the Separation of Powers– Devoted to the study of political liberty.– Political stability could be achieved with the separation of powers

• Rousseau: Champion of Freedom– “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”– The only good government was one freely formed by the people and guided by the general

will, a democracy– Wrote The Social Contract in 1762, differing from Hobbes in that while Hobbes called for a

contract between citizens and government, Rousseau called for a free association among individuals, with no titles of nobility.

• Beccaria Promotes Criminal Justice– Argued that justice should be about social order, not about punishment or revenge.– Criticized torture, irregular proceedings, cruel punishments, arbitrary punishments, capital

punishment– Greatest good for greatest number

Women and the Enlightenment• Mary Astell 1694 A Serious Proposal for the

Ladies, educations for girls, argued for equality in marriage:– “If absolute soveriegnty be not necessary in a

state, how comes it to be so in a family? …if all men are born free, how is it that all women are born slaves?”

• Mary Wollenstonecraft 1792 A Vindication of the Rights of Women, challenged Rousseau that women’s education should not be inferior to men’s, rather, that women also needed education to be virtuous and useful, and that women should enter men’s professions.

• Emilie du Chatelet, aristocrat trained as a mathematician and physicist, translated Newton’s work from Latin to French, inspiring scientific interest in France.

Legacy of the Enlightenment– The Enlightenment challenged

• The divine right of kings• The union of church and state• The existence of unequal social classes

• Belief in Progress– With Galileo and Newton, the doors of scientific

inquiry were thrown open, and scientists made many discoveries in chemistry, physics, biology, mechanics.

– Problems could be solved• A More Secular Outlook

– The Enlightenment also brought about a more secular or non-religious outlook

– While some used these new methods to come closer to God, others believed that science was a work of the devil

– Philosophes criticized the church, superstition and believed in tolerance

• Importance of the Individual– Reason, industry, freedom, nature, democracy

A World of Ideas (6.3)– Philosophes often angered the powerful, like the church and the

government which were illegal to criticize, and many philosophes were jailed and even exiled, but this did not stop the spread of Enlightenment ideas.

– Paris had become the center of culture and society, as well as a leader in intellectual study. Leading women in French society would host salons (social gatherings) to bring together leading philosophers, scientists, writers, artists, and others to discuss ideas.

• Diderot’s Encyclopedia– One such hostess was Marie-Therese Geoffrin, who sponsored

and financed Denis Diderot’s creation of the Encyclopedia in 1751.

– The Encyclopedia contained essays and writings from many Enlightenment thinkers.

– These books angered the Church and the Government who censored Diderot’s work, saying that it undermined royal authority, encouraged a spirit of revolt, and fostered moral corruption, irreligion and unbelief.

– Diderot did not stop printing, and eventually these ideas were discussed in Salons, newspapers, pamphlets, and political songs.

New Artistic Styles• Neoclassical Style Emerges

– The art of the 1600’s and early 1700’s was dominated by the Baroque style, which was characterized by grand, ornate design.

– The influence of the Enlightenment brought about a new simple and elegant style, borrowing heavily from Rome and Greece, called the neoclassical (new classical)

• Changes in Music and Literature– Heavy organ with choral music

• Johann Sebastian Bach• George Friedrich Handel

– Classical, lighter, more elegant• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart• Franz Joseph Haydn• Ludwig van Beethoven

• Writers developed the novel, , lengthy works of prose and fiction– Carefully crafted plots, suspense, drama

• Samuel Richardson’s Pamela• Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones

Enlightenment and the Monarchy– Philosophers often tried to engage the rules of Europe to use Enlightenment ideas in

government, and some did, the Enlightened Despots.– This was less about true belief in Enlightenment ideas and more about effective rule.

• Frederick the Great– Frederick II of Prussia, 1740r – 1786, was committed to reforming Prussia, “the first servant of

the state.”• Granted many religious freedoms• Improved education• Reduced censorship• Reformed justice system, abolished torture

• Joseph II of Austria– Radical reformer, son of Maria Theresa, 1780r – 1790

• Legal reforms, freedom of the press• Freedom of worship for Catholics, Protestants, Jews• Abolished serfdom, ordered that peasants be paid for their work

– Most of his reforms were rescinded after his death• Catherine the Great

– Born a German noble, Catherine II was married to a fool Emperor, and in a civil war, she took his head.

– Catherine, though not born Russian, loved Russia and tried to reform it. She exchanged many letters with philosophers, such as Voltaire, Montesquieu, and Beccaria.

– Using a commission to study the laws of Russia, she made proposals to have religious tolerance, abolish torture and capital punishment. The commission accomplished few of these goals.

– While concerned about the life of serfs, a serf uprising in 1773 was put down brutally, and needing the power of the nobles, she let them have their rule over the serfs.

• Catherine Expands Russia– To get a warm water port, Catherine II attacked the Ottomans twice, finally getting control of the

north Black Sea, and rights to sail through the Bosporus (the narrow channel between Europe and Middle East.)

– A weak Polish king brought Russia, Prussia, and Austria to carve up portions of Poland in 1772, and again later in 1793 and 1795, Poland disappeared for more than a century,

Britain and it’s American Colonies (6.4)

• The British American colonies grew at a tremendous rate, from 250,000 in 1700 to more than 2 million by 1770.

• Each of the thirteen colonies had their own government for nearly 150 years, and a growing sense of identity.

• The 1651 Navigation Act prevented most trade with other countries like France, and had to pay high taxes on non British goods.

• This arrangement prevented the growth of American industry, and kept the American colonies tied to British interests.

Americans Win Independence– The Seven Years War (French and Indian War) cost Great Britain a large amount, and to pay British debts,

parliament proposed a tax on the American colonies.– Only the Irish, women and children were taxed without their consent, and this is what the colonists felt they were

being treated as.• Growing Hostility Leads to War

– Tensions rose over the next few years, as efforts to resolve the situation failed, with the Crown and Parliament seeing the colonists as spoiled children, and the colonists seeing the Crown and Parliament as Despots.• Boston Tea Party 1773• First Continental Congress 1774• Lexington and Concord 1775

• The Influence of the Enlightenment– Colonial leaders used Enlightenment ideas to justify independence.– Thomas Paine, Common Sense– Declaration of Independence 1776, Thomas Jefferson

• Success for the Colonists– 1781 Yorktown, American victory– French aid– Why?

• British did not have the hearts and minds of the colonists• British had long supply lines• Colonists were more motivated• British mistakes

Declaration of Independence• When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve

the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

• We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Americans Create a Republic• A Weak National Government

– The Articles of Confederation• Deliberately weak central government• Unanimous approval meant nothing got done• Trade difficult• Veterans owed back pay

• A New Constitution– Need for a stronger central government led to a new

convention, which created the Constitution 1787– Compromises

• Representation• 3/5 compromise

• The Federal System– Checks and balances

• The Bill of Rights– To get enough colonies to vote for the Constitution,

many demanded a Bill of Rights