chapter 18 part 3
DESCRIPTION
Chapter 18 Part 3. The Enlightenment. Women in the Enlightenment. Women played a major role in the Salon Movement Many of the best and brightest of the Enlightenment assembled in salons to discuss major issues of the day - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Chapter 18Part 3
The Enlightenment
Women in the Enlightenment
Women played a major role in the Salon Movement
Many of the best and brightest of the Enlightenment assembled in salons to discuss major issues of the day
Hosted by wealthy women who sometimes took part in discussions AND were patrons as well:
Women in the Enlightenment
Madame de Geoffren: A big patron of Diderot’s Encyclopedia
Louise de Warens: Hostess and patron
Mary Wollestoncraft: (England) promoted political and educational equality for women
Women
The Philosophes favored increased rights and education for women
The Later EnlightenmentLate 18th Century
Became more skeptical
Baron Paul d’Holbach: System of Nature
Argued that humans were like machines Our behavior, beliefs were completely
determined by outside forces Philosophy: Determinism He was an atheist (undermined the
Enlightenment)
David Hume 1711-1776
Also undermined the Enlightenment’s emphasis on Reason
Argued against faith in both natural law AND faith (religious)
Claimed that human ideas were merely the result of sensory experience and so…human reason could not go beyond what was experienced through the senses
Jean de Condorcet 1743-1794
Progress of the Human Mind Identified 9 stages of human
progress that had already occurred and predicted that the 10th stage would bring perfection
His utopian ideas undermined the legitimacy of the Enlightenment
Rousseau
Attacked rationalism and civilization as destroying rather than liberating the individual
The Father of Romantic Movement which celebrated emotion, instinct…nature (but not natural law or reason)
Immanuel Kant 1724-1804
The greatest German philosopher of the Enlightenment
Separated science and morality into two separate branches
Science could describe nature but could not provide a guide for morality (limits to science)
Immanuel Kant
The Categorical Imperative: was an intuitive instinct placed by God in the human conscience
Believed that both ethical sense and aesthetic appreciation in human beings were beyond the knowledge of science
Reason is just a function of the mind having no content in and of itself
Classical Liberalism
The political outgrowth of the Enlightenment
Belief in liberty of the individual and equality before the law BUT NOT DEMOCRACY
“Natural Rights” philosophy played a profound role in the American and French Revolutions
Classical Liberalism
Impact of Locke and Montesquieu was obvious in the American Constitution and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man
Rousseau’s “General Will” influenced the French Revolution after 1791 (the Reign of Terror)
Classical Liberalism
Belief in laissez-faire capitalism (Adam Smith)
Government should not interfere in the economy
Opposite of Mercantilism (Hobbes)
Classical Liberalism
Belief in progress through reason and education
Progress: human dignity and happiness (Declaration of Independence: Pursuit of Happiness)
Classical Liberalism
Religious toleration Freedom of speech and the press Just punishments for crimes Equality before the law
Reaction to Rational Religion
German Pietism: argued for spiritual conversion, personal religious experience…back to faith
Methodism: taught that humans needed spiritual regeneration and that a moral life would demonstrate that one was “Born Again”
Founder: John Wesley
Religious Reaction to the Enlightenment
New Christian groups opposed the Enlightenment
Fear that spirituality was on the decline due to the teaching of secular and deist views
Wanted to recapture spiritual and emotional zeal
Reaction to Rational Religion
Jansenism: (Catholic sect in France who had incorporated predestination into their beliefs…had been persecuted by Louis XIV)
Argued against the idea of an uninvolved and impersonal God
In the U.S.: The Second Great Awakening