Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment

Tyler Frazier









Instructor Ackerman
History 102
Honor Code: I hereby attest that I have abided by the CCBC Honor Code

















The Scientific Revolution and The Enlightenment are closely related, without the
advances found in the Scientific Revolution, The Enlightenment would not have happened.
Before These revolutions people were not informed and only listened to the words or their
leaders and the Church. Those ideas first came under fire in 1543 when Copernicus released the
Helio-Centric model, stating that the Earth rotated around the Sun. This went against the thought
that was promoted by Aristotle and the Church that the Earth was the Center of the Universe and
everything revolved around it. This ground breaking idea of questioning the Church gave rise to
Neoplatonism and the following of the Hermetic Doctrine which say that all matter contained the
divine spirit, which humans out to seek to understand. With the ideas of Neoplatonism being
accepted on a larger scale people began to question not only the Church but their government
and the current system they were living in. Moving off the work of thinkers like Copernicus,
Isaac Newton published his book Principia which again undermined the Churchs teachings.
Newton explained that the universe is infinite and has no center. Newton proved that the universe
consisted of matter and nothing else. Along with advancements in Astronomy and Physics,
Medical advancements were coming out due to the work of scientist like Paracelus and Andreas
Vesalius. A firm believer in the Hermetic Doctrine Paracelus opposed medical orthodoxy, he
taught healers to find cure in nature as opposed to only libraries. Paracelus findings were
adopted by many practitioners and eventually greatly influence the study of Chemistry. In 1543
Vesalius wrote On the Fabric of the Human Body, which was the first comprehensive textbook
detailing the human anatomy challenge old assumptions about human anatomy which influenced
the way scholars pursued anatomical research. Although there were numerous advancements in
science many people were not aware of them, however the Government took notice and in
France and England began to further publish those ideas and assist scientists in their work to the
point of providing them with laboratories and subsidies to pursue their work. To further inform
the public Writers like Joseph Addison published The Spectator which promoted science to the
public, Addisons goal being to bring Philosophy out of the closets of libraries, schools, and
colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea tables and coffee houses
The growing wealth of information, the popularization of science, and the importance of
free thought began the first stages The Enlightenment. The idea of schooling of children in the
upper as well as the middle class allowed science to be known not just by the intellectual few but
by the public as a whole. Promotion of free thought and critical thinking caused the peoples
questioning of not only the Churchs teaching but Religion as a whole. Thinkers like Pierre
Bayle and David Hume headed Skepticism in the 17
th
and 18
th
century. In the 1697 Bayle wrote
Historical and Critical Dictionary which listed religious views and beliefs and showed how they
did not stand up in the face of critical thinking. In David Humes An Essay Concerning Human
Understanding he wrote that nothing not even the existence of god or our own existence can be
known for sure. Writers like Voltaire and Baron de Montesquieu wrote many books against the
French government, Voltaire in particular wrote in admiration of the English Parliament and the
need for such a system in France. Writers as well as scientists began to question and even battle
the Church. Under the editorship of Denis Diderot the first Encyclopedia was published, this
Encyclopedia was formed by the combined information from philosophes, the book filled with
Enlightenment ideas was heavily censored by the Church and government. During the
Enlightenment things such as Salon meeting and bookstores began to become a societal norm,
Salon meetings were gatherings of well-educated individuals where they were allowed to discuss
and to some point influence politics and economics. Bookstore allowed people to read books
which contained Enlightenment ideas further allowing the public to educate themselves.
Out of all the thinkers in the Enlightenment however possibly the most influential
of them was Voltaire. Born Franois-Marie d'Arouet, he was the son on a French aristocrat;
however this did not stop him from speaking out against the aristocracy and the French royalty
later in life. His early works criticizing the aristocracy did not garner good responses from the
establishment. Accusations of defamation by high ranking aristocrats caused him to flee to
England in 1726 which further spurred his dislike of the French Government. While in England
he immersed himself in the culture and began associating with other notable figures such as
Jonathan Swift, and Samuel Clarke. Swift the author of works such as a Modest Proposal and
Gullivers Travels had an influence on Voltaire showing the mix of satire as well as political
critique. His time spent with Newtonians such as Clarke caused him to take on science as well as
philosophy.
In 1729 Voltaire was granted permission to return to Paris but was banned from the
Royal Court in Versailles. After the death of his Father, Voltaire received a large inheritance
which allowed him to pursue a career in writing without having to worry about financial
restraints. Continuing that work he Published Lettres Philosophiques in 1733. One of the main
points of this work was how it compared the British parliament to the French Government and its
flaws. That combined with the fact his work was published without the permission of royal
censors caused controversy and a call for his imprisonment. As a result of the backlash caused
from his work Voltaire was forced to Flee to Cirey to avoid imprisonment. This caused Voltaire
to be seen as an intellectual outlaw.
During this period there were many academic debates over the ideas of Newton, Voltaire
took this as an opportunity to cause debate and further the ideas of Newton. In 1738 Elements de
la Philosophie de Newton was published, aimed at helping the generally uneducated French
commoners to understand the ideas of Newton as well as a way to form a stronger opposition to
the then Cartesian establishment which he believed was preventing the French from
enlightenment in the realm of science. For this time period Voltaire wholly dedicated himself to
fighting the Cartesian establishment and defending Newton and is own views. His works during
this time only further fueled the debate going on in France over rise of Newtonian ideas. In 1745
he published an extended version of Elements de la Philosophie de Newton in which he also
argued for Newtonian ideas on Metaphysics. By 1750 the French establishment had almost
completely rejected Cartesian ideas and began embracing Newtonian thought.
`After this Voltaire purchased a Chateau in Ferney which would become his permanent
residence. It is at this point where Voltaire began to write against what he saw as the two biggest
problems facing society, fanaticism and superstition. When Encyclopedie was published in 1751
it became the center of controversy in academia, Voltaire saw this as a call to action. He worked
alongside other in this project and wrote numerous articles that would be featured in it. When
Encylopedie was banned in France in 1759 Voltaire dedicated himself to speaking out against
those who fought to ban the book. This aligned Voltaire with other philosophes who wanted to
work towards Political and Intellectual change, one main point of them being removal of the
Jesuits who were seen as enemies on the Enlightenment due to their efforts in banning
Enlightenment work. It was during this time that Voltaire published Dictionnaire Philosphique
which consisted of his articles in Encyclopedie as well as numerous new entries on similar
subjects.
Voltaires entire life was dedicated to the spread of Truth and Critical thinking among the
people of not only France but all of Europe. His works promoted the Enlightenment and its ideas
to the masses by his style of writing and the way the he could blend satire and intellectual stances
to cause people to think about problems that plagued their society. Voltaire works were crucial in
important ideas such as the acceptance of Newtonian thought in France, Critiques of Superstition
and irrational thought, and the idea of defining Freedom and Liberty.
The Influence that these thinkers and their ideas have had on society today is
immeasurable, causing the Enlightenment to be possibly the most important period in human
history. Before the Enlightenment, societies were generally uneducated and ruled by a monarch
and a central nobility, ideas like liberty and self-sovereignty were unheard of and the people
didnt think anything of it. But through the works of thinkers like Hobbes, Locke, and many
others, the scales slowly began to tip in favor of liberty as people turned away from tyranny.
During this same time Thinkers like Voltaire and Newton promoted science in a world
dominated by superstition and lacking in science and critical thought.
Beginning with Hobbes, he wrote on the ideas such as Natural equality of man, individual
rights, and the idea of a Social Contract. Hobbes wrote in favor of the idea of a Monarchy for the
reason that for people to be secure they must forfeit certain rights to a central authority. This idea
was different because before people were to obey government based on ones divine right to rule,
but now people would begin to think about the reasons of the government and the rights that they
gave up. Hobbes wrote on the Social contract, that people in order to live in a civil society chose
to give up certain liberties to a sovereign authority, and that abuses of power by that government
cannot be resisted because in giving power to that ruler, they are the author of his decisions. This
treatise detailed the ideas of benefits of a government as well as the fact that under all
government people must choose to give up certain rights for certain securities.
The idea of a social contract led to many of the works of John Locke, who differed from
Hobbes in that he was opposed to the idea of absolute monarchy. Locke wrote that people are
born with three inalienable rights, the right to Life, Liberty, and Property. He wrote that
government was the result of decisions made by the people acting in a collective capacity and
that the sole purpose of a government is to protect peoples right to Life, Liberty, and Property.
Further moving away from the ideas of Hobbes, Locke wrote that if a Government did not
protect those rights it was the peoples right to overthrow it.
These writings by Locke led to the spread of ideas like consent of the governed in the
actions on their leaders, which at the time a revolutionary idea. People now saw that government
was for protecting peoples liberties where before it would endlessly violate them. As people
began to see the inherent flaws in their government they would see that the previously ruling
Royalty and Nobility were not the only possibility and certainly not the most favorable. Lockes
work would show that people could and should have a say in their government and that a
democratic system would benefit them far more.
These ideas were not only significant during the Enlightenment but they affect the way
government works today. The works of Locke were crucial in the founding of Modern
Democracy where people have a say in what their rulers do. These works influenced others later
on causing formation of the United States that formed a government based strongly upon these
principles. Without the works of people like Locke there may not have been democracy and
freedom as we know it today, which is one of the many reasons that the Enlightenment is
possibly the most significant period in history.

Outside of the Political realm, the Enlightenment also saw a spread in the idea of Science,
specifically the rise on Newtonian ideas. Before Newton, there was nothing written on concepts
such as universal gravitation and the laws on motion. And people still followed antiquated and
largely incorrect ideas based of Aristotelian teachings promoted by the Church. These
Newtonian ideas were based completely on fact and mathematical equations to back them up,
moving them further away from the church whose teaching were based on faith more often than
fact. His work Pricipia brought together the works of those before him such as Galileo and
Kepler and proved their theories and expanded on them to define forces in nature such as
Gravity. One problem though was that Newtons works were written in a way that only those
who were already educated could grasp, this temporarily stunted the spread and possibility of
understanding those ideas to the general public.
Those ideas however were then picked up by Voltaire who wrote on the story of Newton
and the apple falling from the tree. Voltaires works on promoting Newtonian thought allowed
the masses to learn about these ideas, instead of being only accessible or understandable to the
educated minority who consisted of the upper class and nobility. With Voltaires work people
saw for themselves the advances in science thus leading to less people listening to what the
church taught them and instead trusting those ideas that were backed by undeniable fact. This
again was critical in the Enlightenment because it marked another step away from superstition
and blind faith and toward logic and reasoning.
Though Newtons works had an impact on many people during the Enlightenment, his
works kept significance far beyond that. To this day we refer back to Newtons works, whether
it is using Calculus which can apply to a broad spectrum of things ranging from Economics to
Engineering, or Astronomy which if not for Newton would not the significance that it does
today. His works proved to not only influence people in his time period but those who came after
him.
The Enlightenment affected almost everything as we know it today. From the study of
Science to our Government, ideas formed during The Enlightenment made those possible.
Thinkers during those times were crucial in how we live our lives today, had there not been
Enlightenment, people may still live under Monarchies and the Church may be the Central
Authority on science. The Enlightenment was the most significant point in human history
because it marked the end of people answering to their rulers and those in power and marked the
beginning of people having a say in their government and its actions. It began the end of people
relying on faith and the Church for answers their world, and instead relying on facts and science
to answer those questions. And that is why The Enlightenment was the most important period in
our History.








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