PURITANISM AND THE ENLIGHTENMENT

What were the essential features of Puritanism?

What factors contributed to the outbreak of the English civil war?

What were the goals of the English Enlightenment?

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS

King James I rules 1603-1625

King James dies and is replaced by his son Charles I – who believes in the Divine Right of Kings

Fights with parliament and dissolves is in 1626,

1628, and 1640

Charles I does not allow the Catholics or Puritans to practice their religion

Parliament passes the Act of Toleration (religious)

1642-English Civil War begins

Prior to the Enlightenment(Review)

Fought between the Royalists and the Puritan Roundheads

Catholics tend to resettle in France and Italy; Puritans in Holland, and then Massachusetts colony

Charles the I beheaded in 1649 and monarchy abolished

Puritans led by Oliver Cromwell

Cromwell becomes Lord Protector of England-strict Puritan

English Civil War

Closed theatres Banned dancing Banned celebration

of Christmas Puritanism was a

radical form of Calvinism- wanted to eradicated the doctrines and rites that were retained by Catholicism

Punishment for public swearing was a fine that varied according to social rank from 3-20 shillings.

Coffee houses became very popular

British slave trade grew a great deal

Oliver Cromwell

A Puritan who valued civil liberties and defended their beliefs

He argued in Aeropagiticia that “he who destroys a good book, ills reason itself, kills the image of God , as it were in the eye”

Believed that the loss of a book was greater than the loss of a life for the book lives on as a distillation of human intellect.

Went blind at the age of 44

John Milton

Begins with Charles II restored to the throne in 1660

John Dryden named England’s first poet laureate.

Theory of gravitation

Development of the microscope

Publication of the Dictionary

The Enlightenment

1650- Taj Mahal completed

1660- Charles II crowned

1661- Louis XIV begins the Palace at Versailles

1665- plague ravages London, killing 1/3 of the population

1666- Great Fire of London- lasted 4 days

13,200 homes destroyed

4 river bridges Newgate and

several other prisons destroyed

What was happening during this period?

1685- Charles II dies and James II crowned

1682- La Salle claims Louisiana for France

1683- Ottoman Turks besiege Vienna

1697 – Ashanti Empire formed in Africa

James II time period

1688- James II – a Catholic – deposed, and William III and Mary II accede to the throne.

Mary was Jame’s Protestant daughter and consort to the Dutch Prince William of Orange

1707= The Act of the Union establishes the state of Great Britain, composed of England and Scotland. Wales had been a part of England since the mid 1500s.

The Glorious Revolution

604- original built- ransacked by Vikings 962- more elaborated version erected 1087-1310- work underway in the grand

Norman style- destroyed in the Great Fire 1710- Wren designed the one we see today Cost- 2 million pounds

Sir Christopher Wren and St. Paul’s Cathedral

1714- Ruling house of Hanover founded by George I

1742-George Handel’s Messiah first performed

1746- defeat of Culloden Moor ends Jacobite Rebellion

1750-London is the largest city in Europe

1752- Britain adopts the Gregorian calendar

1756- Seven Year’s War begins in Europe

1757- Victory at Plassey begins British rule of India

1759-Voltaire completes Candide

1762- Catherine II becomes ruler of Russia

More history of the period

1775- American Revolution begins

More History of the period

1667- Milton – Paradise Lost

1678- Bunyan – Pilgrim’s Progress

1668- Samuel Pepys diary

1711- The Spectator first published

1714 – Pope- The Rape of the Lock – (mock epic)

1719- Defoe – Robinson Crusoe

1726 – Swift – Gulliver’s Travels

1729- Swift – A Modest Proposal

1755 – Samuel Johnson publishes A Dictionary of the English Language

Authors and their Works

18TH CENTURY Diests believe that God manifests himself not through the Bible or supernatural forces, but through the grandeur of his creation. Therefore, the way to know God is to use reason and observation, to study the laws that govern the physical universe. This way of thinking led to a creative outburst of scientific inquiry and intellectual freedom that was unprecedented in the Western world.

NEOCLASSICISM

Francis Bacon – astronomer Robert Boyle – chemist Edmund Halley – astronomer Isaac Newton- physics, math, and

astronomy Admiration of the ancient Greeks and

classics

Scientific Inquiry

The thinkers of the English Enlightenment helped to shape the ideals of the American Revolution and the U.S. Government. John Locke’s theory of natural rights is a key element in the Declaration of Independence. Thomas Hobbes influenced the writers of the Federalist Papers, a series of articles supporting ratification of the U.S. Constitution.

Why It Matters

Laid the foundation for a modern worldview based on rationalism and secularism. Widespread use of the scientific method.

Rights of the individual paved the way for the rise of democracy in the 1800s and 1900s.

Pilgrim leader William Bradford advocated the use of a plain style that became an enduring influence on American literature.

Why it Matters, cont.

John Milton’s Satan in Paradise Lost is an archetypal rebel who influenced such characters as the monster in Frankenstein and Captain Ahab in Moby Dick.

Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels has added several words to the English language, such as Lillipution (tiny) and Yahoo (crude person).

Why it matters, page 3