The Enlightenment: Ideas and Principles
The Enlightenment: An Intellectual Movement
The Enlightenment was a philosophical movement that originated and developed in Europe (particularly France) during the 18th century. It was perceived that everything old was framed in an atmosphere of darkness and decay, and that the new ideology brought “lights,” illuminating the world. This perception was partly exaggerated, because 18th-century European thought did not emerge from darkness, but was a gradual product of changes in European societies over many centuries. The closest historical precedent to the Enlightenment was the Renaissance, which also broke with the medieval past and experienced a rebirth into modernity.
Key Ideas and Principles of the Enlightenment
- Empiricism: Enlightenment thinkers relied on experiments to understand the world and achieve progress.
- Criticism: The enlightened sought to subject all prior knowledge to rational criticism.
- Desire for Knowledge: The enlightened felt a strong desire to understand the world around them, to enlighten it (hence the name Enlightenment), and to publicize what they had learned. This explains the emergence of one of the great projects of the era, the French Encyclopedia.
- Utopianism: It was believed that the application of reason to all aspects of human life would steadily improve society, leading to unlimited economic and cultural progress.
- Progress and Happiness: The enlightened aspired to achieve happiness in this world as a priority.
- Reformism: The enlightened aimed to modernize society through slow reforms to be carried out by kings and governments of an absolutist character.
Enlightenment philosophers sought truth and relied on scientific reason to explain the reality of the world in which they lived. The Enlightenment represents a system of thought produced by intellectuals in an atmosphere of autonomy and freedom of individual reason, where each person was instructed to seek scientific truth. It was primarily an educational program aimed at raising the cultural level of society and improving the situation for those wishing to cultivate reason and escape ignorance.
Specific Features of the Enlightenment
Several key concepts characterized the Enlightenment:
- Nature: A love of nature and a desire to discover, through the application of reason and observation, the laws that govern it. Nature was seen as guiding the lives of men and all objects in the universe. According to Newton, “nature is seen as a machine designed by God and governed by the laws established by Him.” Therefore, man should not contradict these laws but seek to discover, through reason, how they operate. This was important for the enlightened because as long as people continued to believe that God directed the universe through universal laws, education would remain in the hands of the clergy, hindering the progress of science.
- Education: Through proper education, humanity could be modified, and its nature improved.
- Reason: An unwavering faith in the power of human reason. During the Enlightenment, it was believed that the judicious use of reason would lead to unlimited progress. Reason was used to study the operation of the laws of nature; therefore, anything rational was considered good, and anything that did not conform to reason was wrong. If man wanted to achieve progress, the only way was to discover the laws of nature and act accordingly, setting aside the irrational.
- Equality: If all men come from the same nature and all possess the ability to reason, then all men are equal in the light of reason, with equal rights that must be respected.
- Freedom: In political, religious, economic, and intellectual matters.
- Deism: Deism held that religion’s calendar had its foundation in God, and that the soul cannot be known by human reason, as they correspond to the metaphysical (abstract) and cannot be perceived through the senses. It recognizes God as the author of nature, who reveals Himself to men through reason.
- Secular Morality: Morality is independent of religion, since men are governed by morals not only because God commands them to be so, but because reason requires respect for the rights of others.