Age of Enlightenment

ten years of age, but this was long enough for the ideas that his father studied to stick with him for the rest of his life. Rousseau began writing while he was still living in Geneva with his uncle, he wrote all kinds of works, writing being a divertissement to his regular life. He would submit his writings to contests and brandish them to his companions. Though his father only studied ancient…

The 17th to 18th century was a time of new knowledge and reasoning that greatly affected society to this day. These two centuries were known as the Enlightenment Period or the Age of Reason. There were many people called philosophes or philosophers that believed in using reason, observation, and nature to come up with an unbiased answer. There were many philosophers during this time who believed in different things. Some main beliefs were: the right to govern, the right to education, and…

Each chapter has a theme in which he discusses stages of the Romantic era beginning the role of Jean-Jacques Rousseau as one of the pivotal figures in the turning point of the Age of Enlightenment to the Romantic Era in European intellectual society and concluding with the impact the movement had on more modern day historical movements. He cites Rousseau’s work, La Nouvelle Heloise as a defining and influential piece of literature that…

The eras of enlightenment, romanticism, and realism each bringing a different flavor to the world of literature and drama. A theme that caught my eye is the idea of manipulating people. The three works that I have chosen each show how manipulation can be done in a different manner, ultimately bring these 3 works from different times in line to formulate a central theme. The first work is Tartuffe written in 1664. This work is in the enlightenment era, a time where God was seen as a creator but…

The Rococo and Neoclassical visual arts have come to define the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Each resulted from popular culture, influence, and reform, yet had an impact on one another. The Rococo painter exhibited whimsical scenes, sometimes scandalous, bathed in softer color shades while the neoclassical painter sought to give emphasis to tradition and nationalism. To elucidate these variances, this author will use famed “The Swing” by Jena-Honore Fragonard to contrast against the…

Romanticism was an artistic movement that began after the 18th century in Europe and reached its peak from 1800 to 1850 as people began rejecting social and political norms and rationale of the Enlightenment era and embraced nature as a means of healing themselves spiritually or emotionally. In Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the theme of striving is used to emphasize how people began relying on their own mindset and actions to gain self-fulfillment. This was a common topic in romanticism…

Oftentimes, humans place religion on a pedestal and view religious beings in a positive light. However, the Age of Enlightenment challenged these customs instead of blindly following them. Similarly, in his satirical novella Candide, Voltaire imbeds his belief that religion is superstitious as he constructs specific characters who mock the superficiality and hypocrisy of it. As he highlights the varying philosophies and beliefs of these characters, he advances the plot and shames the world’s…

In the words of Steve Marboli, “Religious dogma creates a perfect fertilizer for the weeds of hypocrisy” (Marboli). During the 1700s, religious intuitions and the oppressive government systems held power. The most influential of all was the Catholic Church, which was considered to be sacred and above in the state authority and importance. However, in Voltaire’s novel, Candide, he uses characters to exploit and depict the prejudice, hypocrisy, and corruption in the religious leaders and…

conceived three fundamental liberal theories - commercial, ideational and republican liberal theories, which were introduced by Andrew Moravcsik. First of all, I would like to start off by briefly introducing Kant as one of the central figures of Enlightenment. Then I will move on to analysis of the Kant’s essay, The Perpetual Peace. Undoubtedly, his manifesto includes many interesting ideas, however, it has been inevitable to select arguments, which are predominantly linked to international…

Philosophers Thomas Hobbes and John Locke were both precursors of The Age of Enlightenment, during which the Scientific Revolution of the 17th century caused a shift in the theories and politics of the thinkers of this time. Unlike the philosophers of the Renaissance, the preceding era, Hobbes and Locke were not influenced by religious interpretations and biblical tenets; instead, akin to the other secular philosophers of The Enlightenment, they were driven by reason and science to understand…