One of our community posted on the subject of the Enlightenment, and the French vs. American Revolutions.
Unfortunately, it reflected the insights presented on American university campuses....overly Liberal, and largely erroneous.
From said post:
" The enlightenment period began in the 1600's and ENDED with the French Revolution, no?
Would there even be a USA without the Enlightenment?
American thinkers such as Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine...all driven by the Enlightenment...Reason over the church...."
1. When historians say modern, they generally men the period beginning with the Enlightenment. In fact, many thinkers were so impressed with the scientific revolution that they began to regard science as the sole source of truth.
a.Positivism: A doctrine contending that sense perceptions are the only admissible basis of human knowledge and precise thought. The system of Auguste Comte designed to supersede theology and metaphysics and depending on a hierarchy of the sciences, beginning with mathematics and culminating in sociology. positivism - definition of positivism by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia.
b. Enlightenment thinkers laid claim to the realm of facts, with many subscribing to a doctrine of materialism, that fundamental reality consisted only of matter .leading to Marxism.
Pearsey, "Saving Leoardo," p.91.
2. So, no, the Enlightenment didn't actually 'end,' and the 'science' associated with it continues today.
But the French Revolution married the Enlightenment science with violence and a hate of religion, which is secularism. And this is a major difference between the French Revolution and the American Revolution.
a. Lets see, the American Revolution had the Minutemen, the ride of Paul Revere, the Continental Congress, the Declaration of Independence and the Liberty Bell. At the end, the American Revolution closed with the motto Annuit Coepis (He [God] has favored our undertakings) on its national seal. The reason our revolution was so different from the violent, homicidal chaos of the French version was the dominant American culture was Anglo-Saxon and Christian. 52 of the 56 signers of the declaration and 50 to 52 of the 55 signers of the Constitution were orthodox Trinitarian Christians. David Limbaugh
Believers in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, or, as they would be known today, an extremist Fundementalist hate group. (Coulter)
b. The French Revolution is identified by the Great Fear, the storming of the Bastille, the food riots, the march on Versailles, the Day of the Daggers, the de-Christianization campaign, the September Massacres, the beheading of Louis XVI, the beheading of Marie Antoinette, the Reign of Terror, then the guillotining of one revolutionary after another, until Robespierre got the national razor. That is, not including various lynchings, assassinations, insurrections .this was the four-year period known as the French Revolution. The excesses, and thousands upon thousands of deaths and mutilations take no back seat to the Russian revolution, or Maos mayhem.
Coulter, "Demonic." ch. 6
3. Prior to the Enlightenment, people rarely considered science to be antagonistic to religion. Most of the major figures who started modern science were devout Christians: Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Boyle, Newton . Subsequent to the Enlightenment, and the rise of modern science, Westerners began to embrace a mechanistic model of the world, and of nature. Remember, by the fourteenth century complex and elaborate mechanical clocks featured marching automated figures, and these clocks and toys served as a lynchpin for the kind of thinking that transferred such workings to a perceived understanding of the animations of living things. Adding to this view, was its consistency with Christianity, in the sense that believers could attribute such workings to an inventor, a designer, a creator.
In other words, there was no necessity for the Enlightenment to result in the anti-religion fervor of the French Revolution, precursor to the secularism we witness today.
a. In 2003, sociologist Rodney Stark identified 52 stars who launched the scientific revolution, and discovered that all but two were devout Christians.(The two skeptics were Edmund Halley and Paracelsus).
Stark, For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery, chapter two.
4. Perhaps the most glaring error in the post was this: " Reason over the church...."
Today, most historians agree that the scientific outlook actually rests on fundamental concepts derived from the biblical view of nature. For example, no other culture, East or West, ancient or modern, came up with the idea of laws in nature. The concept appeared for the first and only time in Europe during the Middle Ages, a period when its culture was thoroughly permeated with biblical assumptions.
Pearsey, Op.Cit., p.106.
a. According to historian Lynn White, the development of technology was inspired by the spiritual egalitarianism of the Bible, which engendered a religious urge to substitute a power machine for a man where the required motion is so severe and monotonous that it seemed unworthy of a child of God. (Lynn White Jr. "What Accelerated Technological Progress in the Western Middle Ages?" in Scientific Change, ed. A. C. Crombie (New York: Basic Books, 1963(pg.272-91)
To review:
1. The Enlightenment is intimately associated with the march of science
2. The view of science was markedly different in the American and French revolutions.
3. The former was based on embrace of religion, the latter with an assault on religion.
4. The result: the former produced the Constitution, the latter: " One of the most advanced, sophisticated nations of the 18th century kills 600,000 citizens- many of its most valuable citizens, plus some 145,000 flee the country..."
Schom, Napoleon Bonaparte, p. 253.
Unfortunately, it reflected the insights presented on American university campuses....overly Liberal, and largely erroneous.
From said post:
" The enlightenment period began in the 1600's and ENDED with the French Revolution, no?
Would there even be a USA without the Enlightenment?
American thinkers such as Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine...all driven by the Enlightenment...Reason over the church...."
1. When historians say modern, they generally men the period beginning with the Enlightenment. In fact, many thinkers were so impressed with the scientific revolution that they began to regard science as the sole source of truth.
a.Positivism: A doctrine contending that sense perceptions are the only admissible basis of human knowledge and precise thought. The system of Auguste Comte designed to supersede theology and metaphysics and depending on a hierarchy of the sciences, beginning with mathematics and culminating in sociology. positivism - definition of positivism by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia.
b. Enlightenment thinkers laid claim to the realm of facts, with many subscribing to a doctrine of materialism, that fundamental reality consisted only of matter .leading to Marxism.
Pearsey, "Saving Leoardo," p.91.
2. So, no, the Enlightenment didn't actually 'end,' and the 'science' associated with it continues today.
But the French Revolution married the Enlightenment science with violence and a hate of religion, which is secularism. And this is a major difference between the French Revolution and the American Revolution.
a. Lets see, the American Revolution had the Minutemen, the ride of Paul Revere, the Continental Congress, the Declaration of Independence and the Liberty Bell. At the end, the American Revolution closed with the motto Annuit Coepis (He [God] has favored our undertakings) on its national seal. The reason our revolution was so different from the violent, homicidal chaos of the French version was the dominant American culture was Anglo-Saxon and Christian. 52 of the 56 signers of the declaration and 50 to 52 of the 55 signers of the Constitution were orthodox Trinitarian Christians. David Limbaugh
Believers in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, or, as they would be known today, an extremist Fundementalist hate group. (Coulter)
b. The French Revolution is identified by the Great Fear, the storming of the Bastille, the food riots, the march on Versailles, the Day of the Daggers, the de-Christianization campaign, the September Massacres, the beheading of Louis XVI, the beheading of Marie Antoinette, the Reign of Terror, then the guillotining of one revolutionary after another, until Robespierre got the national razor. That is, not including various lynchings, assassinations, insurrections .this was the four-year period known as the French Revolution. The excesses, and thousands upon thousands of deaths and mutilations take no back seat to the Russian revolution, or Maos mayhem.
Coulter, "Demonic." ch. 6
3. Prior to the Enlightenment, people rarely considered science to be antagonistic to religion. Most of the major figures who started modern science were devout Christians: Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Boyle, Newton . Subsequent to the Enlightenment, and the rise of modern science, Westerners began to embrace a mechanistic model of the world, and of nature. Remember, by the fourteenth century complex and elaborate mechanical clocks featured marching automated figures, and these clocks and toys served as a lynchpin for the kind of thinking that transferred such workings to a perceived understanding of the animations of living things. Adding to this view, was its consistency with Christianity, in the sense that believers could attribute such workings to an inventor, a designer, a creator.
In other words, there was no necessity for the Enlightenment to result in the anti-religion fervor of the French Revolution, precursor to the secularism we witness today.
a. In 2003, sociologist Rodney Stark identified 52 stars who launched the scientific revolution, and discovered that all but two were devout Christians.(The two skeptics were Edmund Halley and Paracelsus).
Stark, For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery, chapter two.
4. Perhaps the most glaring error in the post was this: " Reason over the church...."
Today, most historians agree that the scientific outlook actually rests on fundamental concepts derived from the biblical view of nature. For example, no other culture, East or West, ancient or modern, came up with the idea of laws in nature. The concept appeared for the first and only time in Europe during the Middle Ages, a period when its culture was thoroughly permeated with biblical assumptions.
Pearsey, Op.Cit., p.106.
a. According to historian Lynn White, the development of technology was inspired by the spiritual egalitarianism of the Bible, which engendered a religious urge to substitute a power machine for a man where the required motion is so severe and monotonous that it seemed unworthy of a child of God. (Lynn White Jr. "What Accelerated Technological Progress in the Western Middle Ages?" in Scientific Change, ed. A. C. Crombie (New York: Basic Books, 1963(pg.272-91)
To review:
1. The Enlightenment is intimately associated with the march of science
2. The view of science was markedly different in the American and French revolutions.
3. The former was based on embrace of religion, the latter with an assault on religion.
4. The result: the former produced the Constitution, the latter: " One of the most advanced, sophisticated nations of the 18th century kills 600,000 citizens- many of its most valuable citizens, plus some 145,000 flee the country..."
Schom, Napoleon Bonaparte, p. 253.
