Unit 4:: The Enlightenment

A Milestone Documents E-text
Table of Contents
Unit 4: The Enlightenment

  You don't have access to this content. Please try to log in with your institution. Sign In

Abstract

The Enlightenment was an eighteenth-century European and American movement to base thought on reason rather than on received authority, particularly religious authority. This was a revolutionary development in Western thought. It drew hope from the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century that major issues could be settled through reason. The scientific project, which to many eighteenth-century minds had culminated in Newtonian physics, exemplified what human reason could accomplish.

Contents