The Enlightenment
The Enlightenment is mankind‘s final coming of age, the emancipation of the human consciousness from an immature state of ignorance and error.
-Immanuel Kant
The Enlightenment usually refers to a period between the early 18th century and the French Revolution in1789, in which new thougts were emerging . The Age of
Enlightenment (or Age of Reason) was an elite cultural movement of intellectuals in 18th century Europe that sought to use the power of reason in order to reform society and advance knowledge. It promoted intellectual interchange and opposed intolerance and abuses in Church and state.
Evolution
The enlightenment originated in England in 17th century，it was sparked by philosophers such as John Locke (1632-1704), mathematician Newton (1643-1727) and others. The Enlightenment flourished in late 18th century. The enlightenment met its climax in France. After that, it extended to Germany, the Netherland and North America. 1. Feudalism suppressed the bourgeois political rights, so they carry out anti-feudal and antichurch propaganda ideologically, to prepare for the struggle for power.
2.
With the Capitalist economic development, the bourgeoisie‘s economic strength surges ， so they required their own interests ideologically.
3. ① The Renaissance and religious reform promoted the people's ideological emancipation;
② With the development of modern science, rationalism, as an asset Anti-feudal class provides the ideological and theoretical weapon.
Representative figures Denis Diderot
He was a French philosopher, art critic, and writer. He was a prominent person during the Enlightenment and is best known for serving as co-founder and chief editor of the Encyclopedie.
Encyclopedie
The first Encyclopedia is considered to be the pinnacle of the Enlightenment period. It was compiled by Denis Diderot in 1751-1772.
Voltaire
He was famous for his wit and for his advocacy of civil liberties , including freedom of religion, free trade, and separation of church and state. Voltaire was a prolific writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poetry, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and more than 2,000 books and pamphlets.
He was an outspoken supporter of social reform, despite strict censorship laws and harsh penalties for those who broke them. As a satirical polemicist , he frequently made use of his works to criticize intolerance, religious dogma and the French institutions of his day. His most famous work is Candide.
Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a philosopher, writer, and composer. His political philosophy heavily influenced the Fench Revolution,as well as the overall development of modern political,sociological,and educational thought.
The Industrial Revolution in Great Britain
The ground was prepared by the voyages of discovery from Western Europe in the 15th and 16th cent., which led to a vast influx of precious metals from the New World, raising prices, stimulating industry, and fostering a money economy. Expansion of trade and the money economy stimulated the development of new institutions of finance and credit (see commercial revolution). In the 17th cent. the Dutch were in the forefront financially, but with the establishment (1694) of the Bank of England, their supremacy was effectively challenged. Capitalism appeared on a large scale, and a new type of commercial entrepreneur developed from the old class of merchant adventurers. Many machines were already known, and there were sizable factories using them, but these were the exceptions rather than the rule. Wood was the only fuel, water and wind the power of these early factories. As the 18th cent. began, an expanding and wealthier population demanded more and better goods. In the productive process, coal came to replace wood. Early-model steam engines were introduced to drain water and raise coal from the mines. The crucial development of the Industrial Revolution was the use of steam for power, and the greatly improved engine (1769) of James Watt marked the high point in this development. Cotton textiles was the key industry early in the Industrial Revolution. John Kay's fly shuttle (1733), James Hargreaves's spinning jenny (patented 1770), Richard Arkwright's water frame (1769), Samuel Crompton's mule (1779), which combined the features of the jenny and the frame, and Edmund Cartwright's power loom (patented 1783) facilitated a tremendous increase in output. The presence of large quantities of coal and iron in close proximity in Britain was a decisive factor in its rapid industrial growth. The use of coke in iron production had far-reaching effects. The coal mines from the early 1700s had become paramount in importance, and the Black Country appeared in England at the same time that Lancashire and Yorkshire were being transformed into the greatest textile centers of the world. Factories and industrial towns sprang up. Canals and roads were built, and the advent of the railroad and the steamship widened the market for manufactured goods. The Bessemer process made a gigantic contribution, for it was largely responsible for the extension of the use of steam and steel that were the two chief features of industry in the middle of the 19th cent. Chemical innovations and, most important of all, perhaps, machines for making machines
played an important part in the vast changes. The Industrial Revolution did not in fact end in Britain in the mid-1800s. New periods came in with electricity and the gasoline engine. By 1850, however, the transformation wrought by the revolution was accomplished, in that industry had become a dominant factor in the nation's life.
启蒙运动(英文版)
