The Literature of Reason and Revolution

​The Age of Reason

and Revolution

Open Ended

Why do we study historical documents?

Open Ended

What is self-evaluation and when is it helpful?

• the Age of Reason

• the Age of Neoclassicism

• the Age of Enlightenment​

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​The eighteenth century in America is known as

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• ​By the end of the 17th Century, new ideas began to emerge and the unshakable faith of the Puritans began to be challenged and questioned.

• ​The Age of Reason, or the Enlightenment, began in Europe with the philosophers and scientists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that called themselves “rationalists.”

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​Some text here about the topic of discussion.

The Age of Reason:

Tinkerers & Experimenters

• ​The belief that human beings can arrive at truth by using reason, rather than by relying on the authority of the past, on religious faith, or on intuition.

• ​The rationalists saw God differently than the Puritans. They believed that God’s special gift to humanity was reason–the ability to think in an ordered and logical manner.

• ​This gift of reason allowed people to discover both scientific and spiritual truth.

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​Rationalism

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​Like the Puritans, the rationalists discovered God through the natural world, but did so in a different way.

Rationalism and God

​Rather than believing that God chose certain individuals to reveal himself to, rationalists believed that God made it possible for all people to discover natural laws through reason.

Poll

Would you consider yourself a Rationalist?

• Yes

• No

• Sort of

• Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727)

• the Universe is not a mystery, but a mechanism operating by a rational formula that can be understood by any intelligent man or woman.​

• ​beginning of modern science

• weakening mans faith in miracles, holy books, and divinity of kings and priests.​

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​Age of Great Discoverers

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Multiple Choice

According to Sir Isaac Newton, who can understand the universe?

• Any true believer in God

• Only those who have a strong faith.

• Any man or woman with intelligence.

• Any man or woman with the ability to wonder.

• Tomas Paine

• encouraged men to believe that "miracles" could be logically explained and to doubt the divinity of Jesus.​

• God found in nature not bible

• Gentle God of natural philosophy replaced Puritans God of Wrath

• Humanitarianism became social ideal.

• Religion became deistic​

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​Age of Great Thinkers

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​Like the Puritans, the rationalists discovered God through the natural world, but did so in a different way.

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Rationalism and God

​Rather than believing that God chose certain individuals to reveal himself to, rationalists believed that God made it possible for all people to discover natural laws through reason.

Multiple Choice

According to Tomas Paine, where can proof of God be found?

• Deism was informal, unorganized religious movement among the upper class and intellectuals.

• Faith without church

• doubted miracles and saints.

• Use reason to explain the universe.​

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​Deism

​belief in the existence of a god or gods, especially belief in one God as creator of the universe, intervening in it and sustaining a personal relation to his creatures (all present God of the Puritans)

Theism

​appeared to have designed the universe according to scientific laws and had then withdrawn from direct intervention in human affairs. Machine (universal clock) created by by God (Clockmaker-cosmic mechanic)

​​Deistic God

Deism: Are People Basically Good?​

• Deists avoided supporting specific religious groups.

• Believed universe was orderly and good.

• Stressed humanity's goodness and the possibility of perfection through the use of reason

• God's vision included the happiness of all individuals; therefore, doing good for others was considered religious work. (charities; prison reform; sympathy for the Indian, the slave, the poor & oppressed.)

• People are basically good and perfectible.

• Since God wants people to be happy, they worship God best by helping other people.

• Human history is marked by progress toward a more perfect existence.

• People arrive at truth by using reason rather than by relying on the authority of the past, on religion, or on non-rational mental processes like intuition.

• ​God created the universe but does not interfere in its workings.

• The world operates according to God’s rules, and through the use of reason we can discover those rules.

The Rationalistic Worldview

Multiple Choice

How can human beings arrive at truth?

• By what our religious leaders say.

• By relying of the authority of the past.

• Through our faith.

• Using reason.

Age of Revolution

How did this impact our government and our literature.

• governments were not based divinity. (God to King to men)

• social contracts protecting natural rights of life, liberty and property​

• if violated by governments then they had right to be overthrown​

• ​Age of Reason led to political change

• Salvation through rebellion, not churches​

• Human mind at birth was a tabula rasa,(blank sheet of paper)-born neither good or bad.

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​John Locke

Multiple Select

According to John Locke, what are the Natural RIghts of all men? (Check all that apply)

• Life

• Liberty

• Happiness

• Prosperity

• Property

Open Ended

When should people disobey or rebel against the government?

​Tomas Paine

• deist -The Age of Reason (book)

• spoke out on the rights of man and woman

• most powerful voice of revolution in America.

• Answer to countries turmoil was not through authority or laws but through man's instincts and common sense.

• Wrote in a forceful style that average man could quickly understand.

• Wrote Common Sense-helped create the national mood that inspired the Declaration of Independence six months later

Multiple Choice

What piece of writing inspired the the American Revolution?

• The Bible

• Treatises of Civil Government

• The Age of Reason

• Common Sense

Benjamin Franklin

• humanist

• concerned for the world and the people in it.

• scientist

• Master of Diplomacy

• Humanitarian

• helped establish hospitals

• schools

• libraries

• believed in human progress and material success.

• Began America's first significant Magazine -General Magazine in 1741