NELSON NELSON MODERNHISTORY MODERNHISTORY NELSON MODERNHISTORY THE ENLIGHTENMENT THE Nelson Cengage has developed this series A Globalised World for Australian senior secondary students of Age of Imperialism Modern History. The series includes titles Australia 1918–1950s that encompass the period from the 18th century to the contemporary world and China and Revolution ENLIGHTENMENT they explore the social, cultural and political Civil Rights in the United States of America developments that shape the 21st century. Decolonisation Written by experienced educators and Germany 1918–1945 experts in their fields, each book builds on India a narrative framework to incorporate recent research and historiography, primary and Recognition and Rights of Indigenous Peoples secondary sources, and learning activities. Russia and the Soviet Union These key features combine to support the The American Revolution development of historical knowledge and The Changing World Order understanding and historical skills that will enable students to interpret and reflect on The Enlightenment the experience and developments that have The French Revolution created the world in which they live. The Industrial Revolution The Struggle for Peace in the Middle East United States of America 1917–1945 Women’s Movements The Enlightenment Workers’ Rights An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump was painted in England by Joseph Wright of Derby in 1768. It was one of a number of scenes Wright painted in the 1760s that featured scientific experiments. In this case, the painting shows a scientist undertaking an experiment in which oxygen is drawn from a glass vessel. The experiment worked and the bird that was trapped in the glass vessel lost consciousness through lack of oxygen. This painting, like the others in the ADCOCK series, encapsulates the spirit of the Enlightenment, a movement that encouraged people to understand the world in rational terms rather rely on the irrational. ISBN: 978-0170243988 Joseph Wright of Derby (1734–1797) Joseph Wright was an English painter of portraits and landscapes who rose to prominence during the Enlightenment. MICHAEL ADCOCK Read more about Joseph Wright and the English Enlightenment in Chapter 3. SERIES EDITOR: TONY TAYLOR 9 780170 243988 For learning solutions, visit cengage.com.au enlightenment_sb_43988_cvr_gatefold_finalart.indd 1-4 23/07/14 9:53 AM The public use of one’s reason must always be free, and it alone can bring about enlightenment among men. Eric Hobsbawm Australia • Brazil • Japan • Korea • Mexico • Singapore • Spain • United Kingdom • United States 9780170243988 iii CONTENTS About the series iv Series editor acknowledgements vi Author acknowledgements vii 001 Introduction 103 CHAPTER 4 Responding to the Enlightenment 009 CHAPTER 1 What was the Enlightenment? 129 CHAPTER 5 What were the effects of the Enlightenment? 047 CHAPTER 2 Who were the main thinkers of the Enlightenment in France? 152 Conclusion 075 CHAPTER 3 The Enlightenment beyond France Index 160 9780170243988 ABOUT THE SERIES Using The Enlightenment The Enlightenment has been developed especially for senior secondary students of History and is part of the Nelson Modern History series. Each book in the series is based on the understanding that History is an interpretive study of the past by which you also come to better appreciate the making of the modern world. Developing understandings of the past and present in senior History extends on the skills you learnt in earlier years. As senior students you will use historical skills, including research, evaluation, synthesis, analysis and communication, and the historical concepts, such as evidence, continuity and change, cause and effect, significance, empathy, perspectives and contestability, to understand and interpret societies from the past. The activities and tasks in The Enlightenment have been written to ensure that you develop the skills and attributes you need in senior History subjects. KEY FIGURES AND ORGANISATIONS, KEY TERMS AND CONCEPTS, KEY DOCUMENTS feature brief biographies, profiles, definitions and summaries of key documents as a ready reference for learning and revision. INQUIRY ILLUSTRATED TIMELINE QUESTIONS is a bird’s-eye view of the topic are listed at and summarises the major the start of the developments of the period. chapter. These questions provide a focus for you as you read each chapter. CHAPTER INTRODUCTIONS provide a context to the issues that are addressed. SOURCE STUDIES SIGNIFICANT INDIVIDUALS of visual and text primary sources and are biographical profiles and secondary literature appear frequently through assessments of key historical the text and are combined with questions figures and frequently include and activities to aid your evaluation and questions and activities. interpretation of evidence from the past. 9780170243988 v INFORMATION BOXES HISTORIAN BOXES DIAGRAMS AND contain extended discussions of introduce key historians and schools TALKING SOURCES key events, concepts and historical of interpretation as a way of making are used to visually summarise developments. Many also include historiography clearer. complex ideas and events. questions and activities. CHAPTER SUMMARY AND CHAPTER REVIEW ACTIVITIES conclude each chapter. They include a brief precis of the topic, suggestions for further reading, and a range of learning activities that consolidate knowledge and understanding of the chapter’s content. These tasks incorporate a range of historical understandings and skills. THE CONCLUSION summarises the topic and includes a series of activities to consolidate your knowledge of it. More importantly, these final tasks will help you build an understanding and interpretation of this period in history. Beyond this book The Nelson Modern History series includes numerous titles on a range of topics covered in senior History courses around Australia. For further information about the series visit: www.nelsonsecondary.com.au. 9780170243988 The National Gallery, London. Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. The National Gallery, 9780170243988 KEY FIGURES ANTHONY COLLINS BENJAMIN FRANKLIN FRANCIS HUTCHESON (1676–1729) (1706–1790) (1694–1746) A leading thinker of the Freethinking Franklin was both a leading Hutcheson spread the word about the Movement in England, Collins wrote Enlightenment thinker in America and a scientific method of Francis Bacon and A Discourse of Freethinking (1713). leader of the ‘Patriot’, or Revolutionary, Isaac Newton, with their emphasis on Movement, which resulted in the experimentation, direct observation 13 American colonies breaking and evidence. Hutcheson also expressed perfectly the Enlightenment DENIS DIDEROT (1713–1784) away from Britain. As a scientist, he made significant advances in the belief that the main task of reason understanding of electricity; and as an and science is to increase human Diderot was the editor (with Jean inventor, he created many practical wellbeing, famously commenting that le Rond d’Alembert) of the great devices, such as bifocal lenses. their role was to ‘produce the greatest Encyclopaedia (1750–65), but good for the greatest numbers’. was also one of the most diverse writers in French literature. Apart DAVID HUME (1711–1776) from writing treatises, such as IMMANUAL KANT his Supplement to the Voyage of (1724–1804) Bougainville (1772), he proved to be Hume is often regarded as one of a brilliant writer in art criticism (for the greatest thinkers in Western Kant was a leading German philosophe example, his reviews for the Salons: philosophy, and he inspired Adam (see below), best known for his see below) and in avant-garde novels Smith, Immanuel Kant, Jeremy Critique of Pure Reason (1781). (such as Jacques the Fatalist and his Bentham and Charles Darwin. In A Master (1796)). Treatise on Human Nature (1738) he argued that we can apply scientific reasoning to moral and ethical issues. He suggested that we must create a ‘science of man’ that would use scientific reasoning to understand human nature itself. 9780170243988 The Bridgeman Art Library; © Hunterian, University of Glasgow 2014; De Agostini Picture Library/The Bridgeman Art Library; © DHM/The Bridgeman Chicago History Museum, USA/The Bridgeman Art Library; Mary Evans Picture Library 2 the American colonists during their GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ rebellion against British authority. Voltaire (FRANÇOIS- (1646–1716) In 1776, he published Common Marie Arouet) (1694–1778) Sense, which drew upon the political Voltaire enjoyed a long life, wrote theories of John Locke and Jean- numerous works, and effectively Jacques Rousseau to prove that informed public opinion on important it was ‘common sense’ that the political and social issues. After colonies should free themselves visiting England (1726–29), he from British rule, both for reasons of turned to serious political and social principle and for practical reasons. ‘The philosopher’s philosopher’, commentary, criticising France Leibniz was one of the most complex by praising England in his Letters thinkers of the Enlightenment. In the Concerning the English Nation (1733). JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU field of physics, he guessed the nature He had powerful friends, ranging from (1712–1778) of what we now call kinetic energy. He Madame de Pompadour in France to was equally a pioneer in mathematics, Rousseau made his first contribution King Frederick II in Prussia, which and is regarded as one of the great to the French Enlightenment by he visited in 1750–53. He settled in inventors of mathematical logic. He writing