Age of Reason - Historical Context 2
TASK: Using the passage below complete the 5W's graphic organizer. Fill out as many areas, with as much detail you can, from the text below.
The Enlightenment developed as an extension of the Scientific Revolution. During the Scientific Revolution, Europeans discarded traditional beliefs and began using reason to explain the world around them. While the Scientific Revolution focused on the physical world, the Enlightenment attempted to explain the purpose of government, what was the best economic system, and what natural rights meant to people. The most influential Enlightenment thinkers were Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Voltaire, Baron de Montesquieu, John Smith, and Jean Jacques Rousseau.
The Enlightenment began in Paris, France as an Italian invention of ideas of discussion. The place from which these discussions occurred became known as a salon. In these salons people drank coffee, wine, spirits, and discussed ideas about government and society. Ideas about literature, science, politics, economics, religion, and societal norms and improvements became the talk of the city in which they were located.
Enlightenment ideas helped to stimulate people's sense of individualism, and the basic belief in natural and equal rights. This in turn led to the American Revolution, the French Revolution, and the Latin American Revolutions. These revolutions resulted in governments based upon the ideas of the Enlightenment. This was the birth of the modern republic. Many countries would eventually choose this form of government based upon these Enlightenment ideas.
Elsewhere, a few monarchs retained absolute control of their countries while also enacting reform based on Enlightenment ideas. These monarchs are called Enlightened Despots. In Austria, Maria Teresa and her son Joseph II both introduced reforms based on Enlightenment ideas. They reduced the tax load on the peasants, provided free education, and ended censorship in their empire. In Russia, Catherine the Great introduced similar reforms. She enacted laws for religious toleration and free education, and also sought the advice of nobles and peasants in the running of government. However, these reforms seldom outlived the monarchs who had enacted them.
