Chapter 17 Multiple Choice

Question 1

In The Spirit of the Laws, Montesquieu argued that the best political system in a modern society is one where

a. the legislature exercises absolute and unlimited power.
b. the king exercises absolute and unlimited power.
c. power is divided between the three branches of government.
d. the nobility is uninvolved.
e. all government resources are focused on military power.

Answer 1

c.

Question 2

The recognized capital of the Enlightenment was

a. Geneva.
b. Berlin.
c. London.
d. Vienna.
e. Paris.

Answer 2

e.

Question 3

A key new type of enlightened writing fueling skepticism about the “truths” of Christianity and European society was

a. psychological autobiography.
b. travel reports and comparative studies of old and new world cultures.
c. ribald stories of peasant ignorance.
d. aristocratic joke books showing the bad humor of supposed social elites.
e. scientific treatises based upon philosophical induction.

Answer 3

b.

Question 4

The leader of the Physiocrats and their advocacy of natural economic laws was

a. Denis Diderot.
b. Adam Smith.
c. Francois Quesnay.
d. Cesare Beccaria.
e. David Hume.

Answer 4

c.

Question 5

Voltaire was best known for his criticism of

a. the German monarchical system.
b. the separation of church and state.
c. religious intolerance
d. Plato and the Greeks.
e. Chinese civilization.

Answer 5

c.

Question 6

An early female philosophe who published a translation of Newton’s Principia and who was the mistress of Voltaire was

a. Mary Wollstonecraft.
b. Marie Antoinette.
c. Mary Astell.
d. Catherine the Great.
e. the Marquise du Chatelet

Answer 6

e.

Question 7

Deism is the belief that

a. religion is fairy tales to frighten the superstitious.
b. if God exists, he has no interest in the world.
c. God created the universe but does not actively run it
d. a transcendent spirit controls every event.
e. praying matters.

Answer 7

c.

Question 8

The purpose of Diderot’s encyclopedia, according to him, was to

a. get the uneducated masses to respect authority.
b. usher in God’s kingdom on earth.
c. dispute the claims of science.
d. exacerbate the hedonism of his peers.
e. change the general way of thinking.

Answer 8

e.

Question 9

The belief in natural laws underlying all areas of human life led to

a. scientific theism.
b. an abandonment of the scientific method.
c. intellectual stagnation.
d. the formation of several agnostic religious movements.
e. the social sciences.

Answer 9

e.

Question 10

Diderot’s most famous contribution to the Enlightenment’s battle against religious fanaticism, intolerance, and prudery was his

a. great play “Is Rome Burning?”
b. 28-volume Encyclopedia compiling articles by many influential philosophes.
c. autobiography published in French.
d. biography of Newton, “the greatest European.”
e. unconditional support for enlightened despotism.

Answer 10

b.

Question 11

Adam Smith believed that government

a. should not interfere in people’s economic decisions.
b. set prices across the board to maintain stability.
c. should encourage people to share and help each other.
d. has a responsibility to the people to manage the economy.
e. is not necessary and should be eliminated entirely.

Answer 11

a.

Question 12

The author of The Progress of the Human Mind and who became a victim of the French Revolution was

a. Condorcet.
b. Holbach.
c. Quesnay.
d. Arouet.
e. Danton.

Answer 12

a.

Question 13

Who said that individuals “will forced to be free”?

a. Baron Paul d’Holbach
b. Jean-Jacques Rousseau
c. Denis Diderot
d. Francois Quesnay
e. Voltaire

Answer 13

b.

Question 14

Montesquieu’s Persian Letters

a. expressed his admiration of Islam and the East.
b. was a translation of a great literary work from ancient Persia.
c. was a method that allowed him to criticize the Catholic Church and the French monarchy.
d. was first written Latin but later translated into French.
e. was published first in Italy.

Answer 14

c.

Question 15

For Rousseau, the “general will” was

a. a meaningless abstraction and impediment to reason.
b. derived from the law of supply and demand.
c. a license to do as one pleased.
d. a social consensus to which the individual must bow.
e. identical to Locke’s social contract.

Answer 15

d.

Question 16

For Rousseau, what was the source of inequality and the chief cause of crimes?

a. divine right monarchy
b. marriage
c. religion
d. ignoring the “general will”
e. private property

Answer 16

e.

Question 17

Rousseau’s influential novel, Emile, deals with these key Enlightenment themes:

a. proper child rearing and human education
b. the best roles for women in making modern society
c. the necessity of church marriage and reform of church teaching on this sacrament
d. the abolition of the pope’s restrictions on religious practices and the content of sermons
e. the evils of child abuse.

Answer 17

a.

Question 18

Salons were

a. literary-minded gatherings where advanced ideas were discussed.
b. luxurious carriages designed for long trips in the country.
c. another name for bordellos.
d. taverns in the poor districts where riots often started.
e. lavish parties at court where nobles were entertained.

Answer 18

a.

Question 19

The strongest statement and vindication of women’s rights during the Enlightenment was made by

a. Mary Wollstonecraft.
b. Beatrice Williams.
c. Mary Astell.
d. Princess Amelia of Austria.
e. Maria Cavendish.

Answer 19

a.

Question 20

The Rococo artistic style of the eighteenth century was

a. confined to France.
b. expressed in the architectural works of Baron d’Holbach.
c. evident in the masterpieces of Balthasar Neumann.
d. characterized by strict geometric patterns and an emphasis on power.
e. more severe and mathematical than the Baroque.

Answer 20

c.

Question 21

Choose the correct relationship between the Rococo artist and his work.

a. Antoine Watteau, Return from Cythera
b. Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Plurality of Worlds
c. Balthasar Neumann, pilgrimage church of the Sitzkrieg Vierzehnheiligen
d. Domenikus Zimmermann, the salon
e. Bernini, Versailles

Answer 21

a.

Question 22

Johann Sebastian Bach

a. was best known for his cantatas and motets.
b. became a close German confidant of Voltaire.
c. produced religious music as a way to worship God.
d. was the major Catholic composer of the seventeenth century.
e. wrote Messiah.

Answer 22

c.

Question 23

European music in the later eighteenth century was well characterized by

a. Haydn and Mozart, who shifted the musical center from Italy and Germany to the Austrian Empire.
b. Handel, the most religiously inspired of the period’s composers.
c. the strictly elitist, aristocratic works of Haydn.
d. the innovative, secular compositions of Bach.
e. the neoclassical works of Wagner.

Answer 23

a.

Question 24

Which eighteenth-century composer was considered most innovative and wrote the opera, The Marriage of Figaro?

a. Bach
b. Handel
c. Haydn
d. Beethoven
e. Mozart

Answer 24

e.

Question 25

Eighteenth-century writers, especially in England, used this new form of literary expression to attack the hypocrisies of the era and provide sentimental entertainment to growing numbers of readers:

a. epic poetry
b. autobiography
c. novels
d. short stories
e. histories of the Middle Ages

Answer 25

c.

Question 26

The English writer who argued in A Serious Proposal to the Ladies that women should become better educated was

a. Anne Stuart.
b. Mary Astell.
c. Mary Wollstonecraft.
d. Jane Austin.
e. Maria Cavendish.

Answer 26

b.

Question 27

The French Rococo painter who portrayed the aristocratic life as refined, sensual, and civilized was

a. Antoine Watteau.
b. Balthasar Neumann.
c. Madame Geoffrin.
d. Rembrandt.
e. Caspar David Friedrich.

Answer 27

a.

Question 28

The growth of reading and publishing in the 18th century was aided and characterized by the development of

a. private tutors.
b. magazines for the general public.
c. compulsory education for the general public.
d. state investments in free books.
e. libraries.

Answer 28

b.

Question 29

High culture in eighteenth-century Europe was characterized by the

a. enormous impact of the publishing industry.
b. decline of French as an international language.
c. decline of the magazine with the rise of the novel.
d. increased dependency of authors on wealthy patrons.
e. complete freedom of the press.

Answer 29

a.

Question 30

The eighteenth century musical composition that has been called one of those rare works that appeal immediately to everyone, and yet is indisputably a masterpiece of the highest order is

a. Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion.
b. Haydn’s The Seasons.
c. Handel’s Messiah.
d. Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro.
e. Wagner’s The Ring cycle.

Answer 30

c.

Question 31

A less brutal approach to justice and punishment in the eighteenth century is associated with

a. Voltaire.
b. Diderot.
c. Montesquieu.
d. Hume.
e. Beccaria.

Answer 31

e.

Question 32

Concerning the European legal system, by the end of the eighteenth century

a. a trend away from imprisonment and toward capital punishment began.
b. corporal and capital punishment were on the decline.
c. criminal punishments became more cruel as violent crimes increased.
d. the death penalty was abolished in western Europe.
e. a and c

Answer 32

b.

Question 33

The punishment of crime in the eighteenth century was often

a. carried out by mobs after the criminals were charged in court.
b. less severe than the crime would merit.
c. the responsibility of the army.
d. public and very gruesome.
e. carried out privately so as not to inflame the general populace.

Answer 33

d.

Question 34

Carnaval was celebrated in the weeks leading up to

a. Christmas.
b. Easter.
c. Lent.
d. Pentecost.
e. All Saints.

Answer 34

c.

Question 35

A cheap and popular alcoholic drink in eighteenth century England was

a. beer.
b. whiskey.
c. wine.
d. porter.
e. gin.

Answer 35

e.

Question 36

Pogroms were

a. parties held to celebrate the amity between Jews and Christians.
b. instances of massacring and looting of Jewish communities.
c. special Jewish holidays practiced only by Sephardim.
d. special Jewish holidays practiced only by Ashkenazim.
e. a sugary delicacy served at the capital in Vienna.

Answer 36

b.

Question 37

In eighteenth-century Europe, churches, both Catholic and Protestant,

a. declined in numbers and influence.
b. still played a major role in social and spiritual areas.
c. was responsible for the dramatic role in literary.
d. had not changed much in two centuries.
e. were legally separated from any state or government connections.

Answer 37

b.

Question 38

The Jews of eighteenth-century Europe

a. were assimilated into French society through the unanimous calls of the philosophes for integration.
b. were most persecuted in France and Poland.
c. were most free in participating in banking and commercial activities in tolerant cities.
d. won the right to publicly practice of their religion in Austria with Joseph II’s Toleration Patent of 1781.
e. were restricted to ghettos in all European states.

Answer 38

c.

Question 39

The religious denomination founded by John Wesley in England to provide a more emotionally fulfilling religious alternative to the Church of England was

a. Unitarianism.
b. Quakerism.
c. Presbyterianism.
d. Lutheranism.
e. Methodism.

Answer 39

e.

Question 40

In reaction to significant elements of rationalism and deism, in what two countries did some ordinary Protestant churchgoers chose new religious movements?

a. Scotland and Ireland.
b. France and Austria.
c. Italy and Spain.
d. Sweden and Poland.
e. England and Germany.

Answer 40

e.