Absolutism & Enlightenment Flashcards
Absolute Monarchy
King and queen had full power over countries
Divine right
A political and religious doctrine of the political legitimacy of a monarchy.
Versailles
King Louis XIV former castle/home
Huguenots
French Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who followed the teachings of theologian John Calvin.
Edict of Nantes
Effectively ended the French Wars of Religion by granting official tolerance to Protestantism
Westernization
The adoption of the practices and culture of Western Europe by societies and countries in other parts of the world,
Louis XIV
The last king of France before the French Revolution
Glorious Revolution
The events that led to the deposition of James II and VII in November 1688.
The English bill of rights
Firmly established the principles of frequent parliaments, free elections and freedom of speech within Parliament
Peter the Great
Tsar of all Russia from 1682, and the first Emperor of all Russia from 1721 until his death in 1725.
The enlightenment
The Enlightenment included a range of ideas centered on the value of human happiness, the pursuit of knowledge obtained by means of reason and the evidence of the senses, and ideals such as natural law, liberty, progress, toleration, fraternity, constitutional government, and separation of church and state.
The spread of Enlightenment
The Enlightenment spread through- out Europe with the help of books, magazines, and word of mouth.
Salons
A place where civilians of all social classes could gather and discuss ideas.
Philosophe/Philosopher
Public intellectuals who applied reason to the study of many areas of learning, including philosophy, history, science, politics, economics and social issues.
Two Treatises of Government
The main idea expressed in John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government is that we can use the idea of a state of nature to justify a proper government.
Censorship
Censorship as a means of controlling communication
Thomas Hobbes
The belief in the king’s right to wield supreme and unchecked power over his subjects.
John Locke
Defended the absolute monarchy
Voltaire
Voltaire wanted France to eventually become a constitutional monarchy, but did not think that was likely, so he proposed that the absolute monarch surround himself with philosophers to help make rational, reasonable decisions.
Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau was one of the most influential thinkers during the Enlightenment in eighteenth century Europe.
Montesquieu
In a direct challenge to this notion of absolutism, Montesquieu proposed that a better legal and political system was one in which power was decentralized and separated into branches of government.
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) was an English writer, philosopher, and advocate of women’s rights.
Vindication of the Rights of Women
In it, Wollstonecraft argues that women should have an education commensurate with their position in society, claiming that women are essential to the nation because they educate its children and because they could be “companions” to their husbands, rather than just wives.
Adam Smith
Smith’s importance, besides founding the discipline of economics itself, was that he applied precisely the same kind of Enlightenment ideas and ideals to market exchange
Natural Rights
Those that are not dependent on the laws or customs of any particular culture or government, and so are universal, fundamental and inalienable
