The Age of Enlightenment was an intellectual and philosophical movement during the 17 th and 18 th centuries. From the beginning of the 17th century, people began the debate about who should rule a nation. Absolutism became less common and found an end, which is when Enlightenment philosophers argued for different types of democratic leadership.
It took place mainly in Europe and has its roots in Renaissance humanism. Some of the main values were human happiness, the pursuit of knowledge through reason and proof of our senses.
The central ideas of the Enlightenment lay in the undermining of the authority of the monarchy and the Catholic Church. They paved the way for most political revolutions during the coming 18 th and the 19th century. Liberalism, communism, neoclassicism, they all have roots and adapted ideas from the Enlightenment.
The term "enlightenment"
The very concept of "enlightenment" is the result of the condemnation of the Middle Ages as a dark epoch of superstition and ignorance. During the beginning of the Renaissance (15 th and 16 th centuries), people began to see antiquity as an intellectual and artistic ideal. The Middle Ages were a backward period of decline and modern thinking should shed light on their darkness.
According to Kant's definition, enlightenment is "man's exit from his self-inflicted immaturity", while immaturity is defined as "the inability to use one's mind without the guidance of another". He declared "Sapere aude" ('Dare to be wise' or 'Dare to know') as the motto of the Enlightenment.
The term obviously shows what time stands for. Using light as a metaphor for knowledge as it is used in this context has already been done in ancient Greece. Then it was also used in the Baroque period by famous people such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Johann Heinrich Lambert.
To call this time period, the Enlightenment was introduced in the 20 th century, three centuries later. People used terms like "enlightenment" in the sense of being informed about something in an enlightening way, but they never called the actual period of the Enlightenment below that time.
Historical background
Under 18 th century there were many political and social upheavals. The Thirty Years' War (1618 - 1648) divided Germany, which is obviously a country in central Europe, into 300 individual states. Each of these 300 had their own laws, policies, and even economics.
Furthermore, the Reformation of Martin Luther shared Christianity and the personal faith of the people took place where the church once stood. Not only did their belief system break, but with it also the way people saw the whole world around them. They began to question everything. There was more active rebellion against complaints and exclusion of the underclass through absolutism and the church. People began to see themselves as self-determined individuals with human rights and possible influence on history.
Education and actions against prejudice were means of liberation and the rational thinking of the Enlightenment helped. God-given positions of power were outdated, and individuals became the center of society. The bourgeoisie rose and became more and more independent. Freedom, equality and brotherhood became necessities people no longer wanted to live without. They were even the most important driving forces of the French Revolution (1789-1799). The Føydal government ended, and with it the nobility and the clergy lost their power. The "average" citizen became more important and more self-effective.
Philosophical thinking
The philosophical thinking of the Enlightenment is divided into two main directions. Empiricism and rationalism are the approaches that play the biggest role.
John Locke, the founder of empiricism, was of the opinion that one can only gain knowledge if one combines reason and the perception of their senses. It becomes possible through observations and experiments.
René Descartes was the founder of rationalism. In rationalism, traditional knowledge is not just adapted. Critical thinking and questioning of knowledge and traditional concepts must take place in order to gain knowledge. Believe in the modern motto:"If you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you have always received." It is in rationalism that sensory experiences, experiments and religion are insufficient. Descartes pronounced the Latin proverb "Cogito, ergo sum", which can be translated as "I think, therefore I am". Rational thinking is obviously a necessary action for people to be able to live, otherwise they exist solemnly.
Main concepts
There are a few key ideas from the Enlightenment. Some state that it is 5, some say three, some say 11. However, I have decided to talk about the five that are most outstanding, in my opinion. Yet all the ideas of the rational natural order and the law of nature follow.
- Reason:Reason is a divine force. That is what makes humans human, since they are the only species capable of reason. Besides, it's what destroys intolerance.
- Nature:Everything about nature is good and affordable. The law of nature is what governs the universe.
- Happiness:It is achieved if you live by the law of nature. If you do, you do not have to wait for paradise in heaven, you want it right here on earth.
- Progress:All the ideas of the Enlightenment highlight science and speculation as superior to religion. They greatly influenced the American colonies in the 18 th
- Freedom and freedom:Both are achieved because one has the freedom to actualize oneself.
Important philosophers
There were many important philosophers during the Enlightenment, and although they all had the same ideas at heart, they operationalized them in different ways.
René Descartes
René Descartes was the founder of the method of doubt which further led to the dualistic doctrine of mind and matter. He was often overlooked because so much of his work was interested in the existence of God and the presence of a soul, and both were more of a way of thinking in older philosophers before him. However, he did not take both facts (the existence of a God and the presence of the soul) for granted. Instead, he developed a metaphysical system, which forced all great philosophers up to Kant to answer.
He was credited with being the novice of the school of rationalism, and asserted the essence of knowledge which could be attained by reason alone.
"If you want to be a true seeker of truth, it is necessary that you at least once in your life doubt, as far as possible, all things." - René Descartes
David Hume
Hume was the founder of the theory of mind. Many of you may have heard of it, since it finds much use in, for example, psychology. His theory has four different parts.
- Reason alone can not be a motive for the will, but acts as a slave to passion.
- Moral distinctions do not come from reason.
- Moral distinctions stem from moral feelings:feelings of approval (praise) and disapproval (guilt) felt by the observer considering a trait or action.
- Some virtues and vices are natural. But others, such as justice, are artificial and must be learned.
"Reason is, and should be, only the slave of passions, and can never pretend to be any other office than to serve and obey them." - David Hume
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes was a strong advocate of the idea of the absolutism of sovereignty. To avoid total chaos, he was of the opinion that people must join social contracts and create a civil society.
One of his most influential tensions is the relationship he saw between the absolute sovereign and society. According to him, sovereign authority is over society and all individuals who belong to this society sacrifice some of their human rights for protection. All power exercised by the authority can not be denied or rejected since the sovereign power of the protector stems from the people surrendering their own sovereign power for the sake of protection.
"The first and fundamental law of nature, which is to seek peace and follow it." - Thomas Hobbes
John Locke
John Locke's most important contribution to the Enlightenment lies in the recognition of the rights and equality of individuals, the critique of arbitrary authority, the champion of religious tolerance and the general empirical and scientific temperament. Also for Locke, individuals form a social contract. People living in a so-called state have the moral obligation to protect each other from all kinds of harm, physical, mental, social and one that pertains to their property.
Without a state body of any kind, the people of these states would fall into violence. This violence stems from fear and lack of trust in the protection systems. A social contract is an agreement that comes naturally. It is in the common interest that the people of a state hand over part of their rights to the state bodies. They receive protection and a peaceful social life provided by law.
The government should be a neutral judge of the law. It has no right to interfere in the lives of individuals, and they should not be of interest to him. Locke thought he should be grateful to the people instead of the other way around. He was the first person in history to suggest that the people have the right to revolution whenever they dislike their government. People should have the power to change it as they see fit.
"The end of the law is not to abolish or restrict, but to preserve and expand freedom. For in all states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom." - John Locke
Immanuel Kant
The center of Immanuel Kant's perspective is the categorical imperative. The people must act in a way that they believe will be fair and just under a universal law. A simpler explanation would be humanity's golden rule:do to others as you want them to do to you.
Kant wants to understand the natural world and, more specifically, the way it makes you feel . In the Critique of Judgment, which he published in 1790, he wondered why people think gardens and pastoral surroundings are beautiful, while mountains, the night sky and darkness generally evoke feelings of danger and fear, which he called "the sublime".
"Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-imposed immaturity. Immaturity is the inability to use one's understanding without the guidance of another. "- Immanuel Kant
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Rousseau was a philosopher, author and composer, whose political influence shaped the progress of the Enlightenment throughout Europe. Unlike many other philosophers, he affirmed the necessity of religion as a concept. According to him, those who are powerful and rich stole the land that belongs to everyone and tricked everyone into accepting them as their rulers.
Individuals, according to Rousseau, should never be chained or forced to relinquish individual rights to a king or a queen. But in complete freedom, it is difficult to find ways to protect everyone's life, liberty and property. Again, the solution was the social contract. Anyone who does not accept everyone's will will be forced to be free, which in this context means being forced to leave society.
"Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Charles Montesquieu
When Montesquieu was born, France was ruled by Louis XIV, an absolute king. He was born into a noble family and was highly educated. According to him, it is the exact opposite of what everyone else thinks would take place:when people are faced with freedom (state of nature), people would be so afraid that they would avoid conflict - even war - at all costs. When one enters a society, "he loses the feeling of his weakness, equality ceases, and then the state of war begins."
The function of governments then was to maintain law and order, and he favored the English system as the best model of government. However, he misinterpreted the British system. He believed the English king was the executive and parliament was the legislative balance of it.
Montesquieu was of the opinion that the best form of government is one in which legislative, executive and judicial power are separated.
Art during the Enlightenment
Art was by no means in focus during the Enlightenment. The art produced during the Enlightenment focused on a search for morality. It was absent from art in earlier eras, but at the same time classical art from Greece and Rome became interesting. Archaeological teams discovered Pompeii and Herculaneum. People drew inspiration from it and revived classical art, which is now called neoclassical art. This can be especially seen in early American art and architecture, which included arches, goddesses and other classical architectural designs.