The Enlightenment

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Deism

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The term is used chiefly of an intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries that accepted the existence of a creator on the basis of reason but rejected belief in a supernatural deity who interacts with humankind

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John Locke, 'Two Treaties of Civil Government Essay Concerning Human Understanding'

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Locke’s most famous work of political philosophy began as a reply to Filmer’s defense of the idea of the divine right of kings and ended up becoming a defense of natural rights, especially property rights, and of government limited to protecting those rights.

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Tabula Rasa

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an absence of preconceived ideas or predetermined goals

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Philosophes

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The philosophes (French for philosophers) were the intellectuals of the 18th century Enlightenment. Few were primarily philosophers; rather,philosophes were public intellectuals who applied reason to the study of many areas of learning, including philosophy, history, science, politics, economics, and social issues.

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Voltaire

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He was an outspoken supporter of social reform (including the defense of civil liberties, freedom of religion and free trade), despite the strict censorship laws and harsh penalties of the period, and made use of his satirical works to criticize Catholic dogma and the French institutions of his day

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"ecracsez l'infame"

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Voltaire -- who was a deist, not an atheist -- got so pissed at religious authorities that he began to sign his letters “Ecrasez l’Infame” (let us crush the infamous), referring to the Church of Rome

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Baron de Montesquieu, 'Spirit of Laws'

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This treatise presented numerous theories - among the most important was respect for the role of history and climate in shaping a nation's political structure.

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Checks and Balances

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counterbalancing influences by which an organization or system is regulated, typically those ensuring that political power is not concentrated in the hands of individuals or groups.

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Jean-Jacques Rousseau 'Social Contract'

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Rousseau theorized about the best way to establish a political community in the face of the problems of commercial society

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General Will

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In political philosophy, the general wil is the will of the people as a whole. The term was made famous by 18th-century French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

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"noble savage"

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a representative of primitive humankind as idealized in Romantic literature, symbolizing the innate goodness of humanity when free from the corrupting influence of civilization.

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Denis Diderot, 'The Encyclopedia'

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The Encyclopédie, conceived as a compendium of all available knowledge, challenged the authority of the Roman Catholic Church and of the aristocratic government, both of whom tried to suppress it.

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Francois Quesnay

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François Quesnay was the leading figure of the Physiocrats, generally considered to be the first school of economic thinking.

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Physiocrats

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The name “Physiocrat” derives from the Greek words phýsis, meaning “nature,” and kràtos, meaning “power.

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Adam Smith, 'Wealth of Nations'

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Literary piece of work authored by Adam Smith in 1776, which is considered one of the first written publications in the field of economics.

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Salon Movement

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The French salon, a product of The Enlightenment in the early 18th century, was a key institution in which women played a central role. Salons provided a place for women and men to congregate for intellectual discourse

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Madame de Geoffrin

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Madame Geoffrin played host to many of the most influential Philosophes and Encyclopédistes of her time

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Madame de Stael

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French-Swiss woman of letters, political propagandist, and conversationalist, who epitomized the European culture of her time, bridging the history of ideas from Neoclassicism to Romanticism. She also gained fame by maintaining a salon for leading intellectuals.

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Mary Wollstonecraft

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Then along came passionate, bold Mary Wollstonecraft who caused a sensation by writing A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). She declared that both women and men were human beings endowed with inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. She called for women to become educated

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Baron Paul d'Holbach

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Paul-Henri Thiry, Baron d'Holbach was a philosopher, translator, and prominent social figure of the French Enlightenment. In his philosophical writings Holbach developed a deterministic and materialistic metaphysics which grounded his polemics against organized religion and his ethical and political theory.

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David Hume

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Hume observes that while we may perceive two events that seem to occur in conjunction, there is no way for us to know the nature of their connection. Based on this observation, Hume argues against the very concept of causation, or cause and effect.

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Jean de Condorcet

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a French philosopher, mathematician, and early political scientist whose Condorcet methodin voting tally selects the candidate who would beat each of the other candidates in a run-off election

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Immanuel Kant

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His works, especially those on Epistemology, Metaphysics and Ethics, such as his masterworks the "Critique of Pure Reason" and the "Critique of Practical Reason", achieved a complete paradigm shift and moved philosophy beyond the debate between the Rationalists and Empiricists which had dominated the Age of Reason and the early Age of Enlightenment, and indeed to combine those two apparently contradictory doctrines.

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Classical liberalism

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Classical liberalism is a political ideology that values the freedom of individuals — including the freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and markets — as well as limited government

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German Pietism

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influential religious reform movement that began among German Lutherans in the 17th century. It emphasized personal faith against the main Lutheran church's perceived stress on doctrine and theology over Christian living

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Methodism

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Methodism, or the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity which derive their inspiration from the life and teachings of John Wesley

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John Wesley

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an Anglican minister and theologian who, with his brotherCharles Wesley and fellow cleric George Whitefield, is credited with the foundation of the evangelical movement known as Methodism. His work and writings also played a leading role in the development of the Holiness movement and Pentecostalism.

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Jasenism

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a Christian movement of the 17th and 18th centuries, based on Jansen's writings and characterized by moral rigor and asceticism.