Philosophies and Ideologies 1450 to 1750 - AP World History: Modern

Humanism was the defining school of thought of the Renaissance. This school of thought's emphasis on the individual and the power of people helps to explain the other artistic and academic accomplishments of the era. None of the other movements listed deal with the mentality of Renaissance Europe. Existentialism was developed in the 19th and 20th centuries. Pragmatism, stoicism, and mysticism are all ancient philosophies developed well before humanism.

The Divine Right of Kings was used a justification of Monarchy for centuries in Europe after the widespread acceptance of Christianity.

Peace, prosperity, and growing Western influence caused the samurai class, increasingly tasked with bureaucracy rather than war fighting, to face an existential crisis; one of the ways samurai dealt with the changing world was by reaching into the past for inspiration.

Although much of the samurai class became disillusioned with life in the Shogunate, there was no tradition of voyaging outside of Japan to ply their martial trade on the Asian mainland.

Many segments of 18th century Japanese society regarded Christianity as threatening to Japanese social mores and political structures.

During the Shogunate, the emperor of Japan lacked political power; he lived a hermitic life sealed away from all but lofty court rituals by the Shogun.

In 18th century Japan there was no large-scale movement for a national, democratic government.

The humanist artists and scholars of the Renaissance era put a great deal of emphasis and importance upon education. Perhaps the best-known and most influential of these groundbreaking scholars were Francisco Petrarch (aka “the father of humanism”), Dante Alighieri (the author of “The Divine Comedy”), and Giovanni Boccaccio (the author of the “Decameron”). Together with the other humanist scholars of their age, these men saw education as the proper means through which young men became well-rounded, nobly accomplished, and civically responsible members of society. The educational traditions of the medieval era were seen as far too focused on religious dogma, often at the expense of rational objectivity. Out of these shared values evolved the “studia humantiatis,” or the educational blueprint used by most humanist scholars to teach their students. This “studia” has often been described as the first liberal arts program, because it emphasized the disciplined and in-depth study of such subjects as history and politics, rhetoric, grammar, poetry, ethics, philosophy, and poetry. It was believed that through the study of such topics, students would gain both wisdom and the eloquence to properly express such wisdom, so that they might, in the future, pass these teachings down to the next generation. Many of the lessons on these topics derived from re-discovered classical – especially ancient Greek and Roman – manuscripts.

Contrary to popular belief, the revival of and renewed appreciation for classical ideology was not a phenomenon that occurred only during the Renaissance. In fact, many eras throughout Western European history were witness to this craze for classicalism, including the preceding days of the ninth, twelfth, and fourteenth centuries, from Paris to Chartres and beyond. However, the renewed pursuit of classical sources and the revival of interest in the study of antiquity during the Renaissance was indeed quite unique, for a variety of interdependent reasons. From the beginning, Renaissance scholars decided to abandon the medieval method of study, which relied upon the collation, comparison, and summarizing of sources, in favor of much in-depth explorations. In keeping with this new approach, humanist students also focused less on religious matters, shunning the teachings of past theologians in favor of classical interpretations (such as those of Plato and Ptolemy) and choosing to study a wide variety of subjects. In order to facilitate such an aggressive educational campaign, humanists began in earnest to seek out undiscovered or under-utilized caches of classical manuscripts; their recovery efforts were much more successful than those of past generations. Renaissance scholarship was also notably dominated by secular individuals, rather than religious figures, which in turn helped to cultivate a more open, expansive, and even questioning educational culture. These humanistic learners often quite openly challenged traditional teachings, especially those of the Church and medieval theologians, subjecting such writings to strict standards of scholarship.

The Renaissance was a pan-European phenomenon triggered by a rediscovery of classical knowledge during the Crusades. The artistic accomplishments of the Renaissance in Italy are an important part of that phenomenon, but they do not accurately describe it on their own. The Renaissance is also not to be confused with the Middle Ages, the Reformation, or the Scientific Revolution.

Thomas Hobbes was one of the seventeenth century’s most influential political philosophers and a devoted advocate of the Scientific Revolution. Hobbes had a quite negative (even condemnatory) view of human nature, which leaps off the pages of his most famous work, Leviathan. In Leviathan, Hobbes, lays out his case for absolute monarchy, the best possible governmental system – or so Hobbes alleged. According to him, humans are by nature inherently selfish, destructively chaotic, and incurably violent creatures (more animalistic than humanistic). This human condition couldn’t be cured or overcome and so, without adequate control and supervision, humans quickly descend into outright bloody confrontation. The best possible cure for this affliction? An absolute monarch, whose strict control, iron grip on every piece of economic and social machinery, and complete monopoly on the use of force could compel obedience, security, and order amongst people. Any other form of government, Hobbes warned, wouldn’t be strong enough to keep the peace and before too long, violence and chaos would again break out. The best ruler, in Hobbes’ view, was the strongest, most ruthless, most absolute, one who could command, and claim, unquestioning obedience.

Seventeenth century political philosopher John Locke disagreed with his contemporary Thomas Hobbes in basically every way possible. While Hobbes was a staunch defender of absolute monarchy, Locke vehemently championed a system of limited government. According to Locke, any proper government (aka a limited one) existed for one fundamental purpose: the protection of private property. Humans, in Locke’s view, were innately free, rational, and decent individuals who only needed government to play a mediatory role in their lives. In order to ensure optimal living conditions, therefore, humans would enter into a consensual social contract, in which they handed over a bit of their natural freedoms to a leader who in turn promised to protect their belongings, mediate disputes, and otherwise safeguard their lives. Locke took his ideas one step further – in a truly revolutionary claim, he asserted that just governments were predicated on trust between the people and their leader. If this trust was violated (perhaps by the leader’s failure to protect property or his attempt to become a tyrant), the people were fully justified – and even morally obligated – to rise up in rebellion and overthrow their current ruler. This last idea was truly shocking and it would reverberate through history more dramatically and influentially than any other of Locke’s many brilliant ideas.

Blaise Pascal was a seventeenth century French scientist, mathematician, and philosopher whose commitment to the rigors and principles of the Scientific Revolution was unwavering. A wealthy man, Pascal voluntarily rid himself of all his luxurious possessions and properties in order to pursue an unencumbered life pursuing scientific research and rational thought. Inspired by the current climate of clashes between religious thinkers and proponents of science, Pascal decided to embark on an ambitious project: he would attempt to reconcile faith and science and prove that their coexistence was possible. While Pascal never fully achieved this goal, his work Pensees (French for “Thoughts”) is truly a marvel of logical reasoning. Pascal singled out both religious zealots and avowed atheists, whom he assailed as being equally mentally closed off to the possibility that either side was correct. Instead, Pascal urged, any truly rational individual, should fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, embracing the possibility of a deity while also acknowledging the unknowability of the existence of a divine being. He was especially critical of scientists, whom he believed were far too optimistic and even deluded by their new knowledge. His final verdict was that religion seems to be a mentally positive influence on humanity and so should therefore be respected and protected.

The philosophy of Deism is rested in the belief in a “watchmaker God.” That is to say, a God that created the universe with a set of unbreakable natural laws and then sat back and no longer interfered in day-to-day affairs. It was widely embraced by enlightenment thinkers like Thomas Jefferson. It first emerged during the Scientific Revolution in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

The term “Westphalian Sovereignty” refers to the terms of the Peace of Westphalia which brought to an end the hostilities of the Thirty Years’ War. The Thirty Years’ War was one of the bloodiest and most brutal wars in European history. It was a complicated war with many phases and shifting alliances. It was primarily fought as a rivalry between Catholicism and Protestantism, and as a conflict between secular and religious authority. The term “Westphalian Sovereignty” is used to describe the principle of international law which states that each nation has exclusive sovereignty over its own territory and its own domestic affairs. This is a key concept in European international relations that, due to the spread of European nation-state construction, prevails around the world to this day.

The French philosopher and political thinker Baron de Montesquieu is most famous for his development of the idea of “separation of powers” in government. According to Montesquieu and his seminal text Spirit of the Laws, the best way to ensure against tyranny government is to maintain separate branches of government, each with their own particular area of authority and each able to check the power of the others. This theory is enshrined in the constitutions of many modern democracies, including the United States.

Thomas Hobbes is often contrasted with John Locke. Locke had a very positive outlook on human nature and an inclusive concept of politics and government, whereas Hobbes had a very negative outlook on human nature and an authoritarian concept of politics and government. Thomas Hobbes’ most famous work is The Leviathan (1651), in which he argues for the necessity of authoritarianism in governance. It is worth noting that Hobbes also laid much of the groundwork for later explorations of the rights of man, limits of the law, and consent of the governed. But, it is for his pessimistic and negative statement that Hobbes is most frequently remembered - “\[Mankind, in a state of nature, lives in a constant state of war\] . . . and worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”

John Locke would have agreed with all of these statements except the notion that mankind, when living in a state of nature, is barbaric and brutish. This is an idea that is credited to Thomas Hobbes. Hobbes and Locke are often contrasted against one another, Locke the prototypical liberal, Hobbes the prototypical conservative. And indeed there is much truth in this comparison. Locke believed that mankind existed peacefully in a state of nature, whereas Hobbes believed that mankind was wicked and brutish in a state of nature and that the role of government was to protect mankind from the worst excesses of its own nature. Hobbes believed an authoritarian government was vital to keep society from spiraling into chaos and bloodshed.

The concept of Divine Right of Kings is most closely associated with the Sun King, Louis XIV. Louis XIV is famous for his declaration “I am the state!” The Divine Right of Kings was a prevailing political philosophy in Europe during much of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. It essentially states that the king is not answerable to parliament, the people, or the aristocracy. Instead the king draws his legitimacy from God.

Deism is associated with the Scientific Revolution because it attempted to explain how God could co-exist with the newly-discovered laws of science. The idea of a watchmaker fits most closely with those requirements, because it embraces the idea that world was created by a higher power but rejects the idea of divine intervention after creation.

The humanist philosophy of studying the classics, celebrating human achievement, and focusing on individuality touched nearly every aspect of Renaissance art and literature. Shakespeare expressed interest in the classics by frequently using them as settings and subjects for his plays, while both Michelangelo and Hans Holbein created paintings that shared the classical love of the human form. Erasmus and Thomas More infused their humanist writings with Christianity, often using satire to raise questions about morality and human nature. However, Henry VIII's Act of Supremacy had little to do with humanism, as it was largely a political move.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau was famous for his theory that society must obey the general will of the people, an idea which would later become highly influential on the French Revolution; however, many other Enlightenment philosophers presented ideas about how society should be run: Montesquieu and Voltaire argued for separation of powers and religious toleration, respectively, while Thomas Hobbes believed that men are innately bad and must be ruled by a powerful leader called a Leviathan. John Locke took a different stance, arguing that the mind was a blank slate, or tabula rasa, at birth, and men are innately good.

The Prince was written by the Italian philosopher and political theorist Niccolo Machiavelli in the sixteenth century. It is widely acclaimed as one of the leading works on political theory in human history. In The Prince, Machiavelli advises a theoretical prince on the best ways to govern and ensure the continuation of his power.

René Descartes advocated very strongly for systematic doubt and dualism in his seminal philosophical work Meditations on First Philosophy, so that would be the best choice. Aristotle and Aquinas were great thinkers, but they lived far before Dualism was a commonly discussed intellectual topic. Voltaire was also a French philosopher, but he was generally concerned with ethical and political philosophy, not epistemology. Lastly Karl Popper was a philosopher of science in the 20th century, so he lived far after Dualism was a popular topic of discourse.