144
D
uring the Renaissance,
Europe had evolved into
a collection of separate
nation states, having previously
been a continent unified under the
control of the Church. As power
devolved to separate countries,
distinctive national cultures formed,
which were most obvious in arts
and literature, but could also be
seen in the philosophical styles that
emerged during the 17th century.
During the Age of Reason there
was a very clear difference between
the rationalism of continental
Europe and the empiricism of
British philosophers, and in the
18th century philosophy continued
to center on France and Britain, as
the Enlightenment period unfolded.
Old values and feudal systems
crumbled as the new nations
founded on trade gave rise to a
growing urban middle-class with
unprecedented prosperity. The
richest nations, such as Britain,
France, Spain, Portugal, and the
Netherlands, established colonies
and empires around the world.France and Britain
Philosophy increasingly focused on
social and political issues, also along
national lines. In Britain, where a
revolution had already come and
gone, empiricism reached a peak
in the works of David Hume, while
the new utilitarianism dominated
political philosophy. This evolved
alongside the Industrial Revolution
that had started in the 1730s, as
thinkers such as John Stuart Mill
refined the utilitarianism of Jeremy
Bentham and helped to establish
both a liberal democracy and a
framework for modern civil rights.The situation in France, however,
was less stable. The rationalism
of René Descartes gave way to a
generation of philosophes, radical
political philosophers who were to
popularize the new scientific way
of thinking. They included the
literary satirist Voltaire and the
encyclopedist Denis Diderot, but
the most revolutionary was Jean-
Jacques Rousseau. His vision of a
society governed on the principles
of liberté, egalité, and fraternité
(liberty, equality, and fraternity)
provided the battle cry of the
French Revolution in 1789, and has
inspired radical thinkers ever since.
Rousseau believed that civilization
was a corrupting influence on
people, who are instinctively good,
and it was this part of his thinking
set the tone for Romanticism, the
movement that followed.INTRODUCTION
1751
1759
1776
1780
1762 1781
1763 1789
The American
Declaration of
Independence
is signed.Voltaire publishes Candide,
a novel that satirizes Liebniz’s
notion that “all is for the best in
the best of all possible worlds.”Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s
groundbreaking political
work, The Social Contract,
is published.Immanuel Kant
publishes his Critique
of Pure Reason.The Treaty of Paris
makes Britain the
main colonial power
in North America.The storming of
the Bastille in Paris
marks the start
of the French
Revolution.Volume one of
Denis Diderot’s
Encyclopédie
is published.Jeremy Bentham develops
the theory of utilitarianism
in his Introduction to the
Principles of Morals and
Legislation, eventually
published in 1789.