Chapter 18 Outline

1. A World of Progress and Reason
1. The enlightenment grew out of the Scientific Revolution of the 1500s and 1600s, with its amazing discoveries by thinkers like Copernicus and Newton.
2. Scientific success created confidence in the power of reason, and if people used reason to find laws that governed the physical world, they could apply the scientific knowledge through reason and solve every social, political, and economical problem.
3. Through using scientific knowledge and use of reason, enlightenment thinkers thought that they could achieve a heaven here on earth.
2. Two Views of the Social Contract
1. In the 1600s, two English thinkers named Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, created ideas that would be used for future enlightenment.
2. Thomas Hobbes thought that people were naturally cruel, greedy, and selfish; he thought that if people were not placed under strict rules, there would be major chaos.
3. John Locke thought that all people had natural rights, which included life, liberty, and property.
3. Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Laws
1. In France in the 1700s, an early and influential thinker named Baron de Montesquieu discussed topics that would later open the doors for future debates.
2. In 1748, Montesquieu published “The Spirit of the Laws” which discussed governments throughout history and wrote admiringly at Britain’s limited monarchy (but in fact, he misunderstood the British system).
3. 40 years later Montesquieu published another book that discussed separation of powers into three separate branches; the legislature, executive, and judicial.
4. The World of Philosophes
1.