Age of Enlightenment

Quick Facts: Who was Age of Enlightenment?

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Age of Enlightenment

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A European intellectual movement emphasizing reason, science, and individual rights.

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Origins & Early Life

The Age of Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason or simply the Enlightenment, was a period of intellectual and cultural flourishing in Europe and Western civilization, emerging in the late 17th century in Western and Central Europe. It reached its peak in the 18th century as its ideas spread more widely across Europe and into the European colonies in the Americas and Oceania. Characterized by an emphasis on reason, empirical evidence, and the scientific method, the Enlightenment promoted ideals of individual liberty, religious tolerance, progress, and natural rights. Its thinkers advocated for constitutional government, the separation of church and state, and the application of rational principles to social and political reform. The Enlightenment emerged from and built upon the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, which had established new methods of empirical inquiry through the work of figures such as Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, Francis Bacon, Pierre Gassendi, Christiaan Huygens, and Isaac Newton.

Career & Major Achievements

Philosophical foundations were laid by thinkers including René Descartes, Thomas Hobbes, Baruch Spinoza, and John Locke, whose ideas about reason, natural rights, and empirical knowledge became central to Enlightenment thought. The dating of the period of the beginning of the Enlightenment can be attributed to the publication of Descartes' Discourse on the Method in 1637, with his method of systematically disbelieving everything unless there was a well-founded reason for accepting it, and featuring his dictum, Cogito, ergo sum ('I think, therefore I am'). Others cite the publication of Newton's Principia Mathematica (1687) as the culmination of the Scientific Revolution and the beginning of the Enlightenment. European historians traditionally dated its beginning with the death of Louis XIV of France in 1715 and its end with the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789. Many historians now date the end of the Enlightenment as the start of the 19th century, with the latest proposed year being the death of Immanuel Kant in 1804.

Enduring Legacy & Impact

The movement was characterized by the widespread circulation of ideas through new institutions: scientific academies, literary salons, coffeehouses, Masonic lodges, and an expanding print culture of books, journals, and pamphlets. The ideas of the Enlightenment undermined the authority of the monarchy and religious officials and paved the way for the political revolutions of the 18th and 19th centuries. A variety of 19th-century movements, including liberalism, socialism, and neoclassicism, trace their intellectual heritage to the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment was marked by an increasing awareness of the relationship between the mind and the everyday media of the world, and by an emphasis on the scientific method and reductionism, along with increased questioning of religious dogma—an attitude captured by Kant's essay Answering the Question: What Is Enlightenment?, where the phrase sapere aude ('dare to know') can be found. The central doctrines of the Enlightenment were individual liberty, representative government, the rule of law, and religious freedom, in contrast to an absolute monarchy or single party state and the religious persecution of faiths other than those formally established and often controlled outright by the State.

Chronological Milestones & Life Events

1. 1637: 1637 Milestone — The dating of the period of the beginning of the Enlightenment can be attributed to the publication of Descartes' Discourse on the Method in 1637, with his method of systematically disbelieving everything unless there was a well-founded reason for accepting it, and featuring his dictum, Cogito, ergo sum ('I think, therefore I am').
2. 1687: 1687 Milestone — Others cite the publication of Newton's Principia Mathematica (1687) as the culmination of the Scientific Revolution and the beginning of the Enlightenment.
3. 1715: 1715 Milestone — European historians traditionally dated its beginning with the death of Louis XIV of France in 1715 and its end with the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789.
4. 1804: 1804 Milestone — Many historians now date the end of the Enlightenment as the start of the 19th century, with the latest proposed year being the death of Immanuel Kant in 1804.

Notable Quotes by Age of Enlightenment

“Sapere aude! Dare to know!”

Historical Fact-Check Quiz: Age of Enlightenment

True or False: “The Enlightenment's focus on empirical evidence was entirely separate from the preceding Scientific Revolution.”

Answer (FALSE ❌): The Enlightenment emerged directly from and built upon the methods of empirical inquiry established during the Scientific Revolution.

Contemporary Figures & Related Historical Timelines

• Ben Jonson — Historical peer (Died in 1637) (1637): Master dramatist of the English Renaissance, known for satire and comedy of humours.
• Dieterich Buxtehude — Historical peer (Born in 1637) (1637): Master of the North German Organ School, profoundly influencing J.S. Bach.
• Balthasar Neumann — Historical peer (Born in 1687) (1687): Master architect of the High Baroque period in Central Europe.
• Charles Cotton — Historical peer (Died in 1687) (1687): English poet and writer, known for Montaigne translations and The Compleat Angler.
• Antoine Galland — Historical peer (Died in 1715) (1715): Pioneering French orientalist, renowned for translating One Thousand and One Nights.
• Claude Adrien Helvétius — Historical peer (Born in 1715) (1715): Influential French philosopher known for his work on human nature and education.
• Arabanoo — Historical peer (Died in 1789) (1789): Eora man forcibly taken by British colonists, becoming a key figure in early interactions.
• Augustin-Louis Cauchy — Historical peer (Born in 1789) (1789): Pioneered real and complex analysis, fundamentally shaping modern mathematics.
• 8th Dalai Lama — Historical peer (Died in 1804) (1804): Spiritual leader of Tibet, recognized as the 8th Dalai Lama.
• Aleksey Khomyakov — Historical peer (Born in 1804) (1804): Founding theoretician of the Slavophile movement in Russian philosophy.

Frequently Asked Questions about Age of Enlightenment