Age of Enlightenment

• Age of Enlightenment

  • One of the biggest influences on the Classical Period
  • a philosophical movement that had its roots in France in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.
  • Somewhat a reaction to the Church’s infallibility in past centuries, the movement brought into question the authority of the Church to dictate beliefs, in turn emphasizing the ability of the human mind to solve problems and come to conclusions, based on experience and careful observation.
  • The movement was a largely secular one, valuing personal faith and practical morality over the dictates of the Church.
• Core Beliefs of Age of Enlightenment

  • reason
  • nature
  • progress.
• philosophes

  • the French thinkers Voltaire, Montesquieu, and Rousseau as proponents
• Age of Enlightenment

  • The movement was a largely secular one, valuing personal faith and practical morality over the dictates of the Church.
  • the movement gave centrality to the notion that all individuals possess rights, and the state’s main duty was to improve the human condition.