The Enlightenment: A Sourcebook and Reader

Front Cover
Paul Hyland, Olga Gomez, Francesca Greensides
Psychology Press, 2003 - History - 467 pages

The Enlightenment brings together the work of major Enlightenment thinkers such as Hobbes, Rousseau, Diderot and Kant, to illustrate the full importance and achievements of this period in history. Extracts are gathered thematically into sections on such aspects of the Enlightenment as:

  • political theory
  • religion and belief
  • art and nature.

All essays are introduced, and a final section on 'critical reflections' provides a selection of modern critical opinions on the period by writers including Foucault, Habermas, and Lyotard.

Containing illustrations from the work of artists such as Hogarth and Gainsborough, a chronology of the Enlightenment, and a detailed bibliography, The Enlightenment is a rich source of information and inspiration for all those studying this great period of change.

From inside the book

Contents

Thomas Hobbes Leviathan 1651
8
Alexander Pope An Essay on Man 173334
14
Denis Diderot Colour of the Inhabitants and Wretched Condition
26
The search for knowledge
33
Religion and belief
59
The natural world
91
Science and invention
122
Political rights and responsibilities
148
Gender and society
233
Art architecture and nature
259
Europeans and the wider world
296
Radicalism and revolution
328
Autobiographical reflections
352
Modern critical reflections
377
Chronology
413
Further reading
419

The development of civil society
176
Moral principles and punishments
209

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