THE EUROPEAN ENLIGHTENMENT (Mid 1600s to Late 1700s) Copyright © 2002 by Miles H. Hodges. All Rights Reserved. |
Religious Fatigue It is impossible to overstress the importance of two factors that played heavily in the lives of Westerners by the year 1650. One of these was a growing sense of relativism about revealed or divine truth. Watching Protestants and Catholics slaughter each other in the name of revealed truth did nothing beneficial for cause of either "revealed truth" in the long run. Instead it tended to scatter the seeds of religious skepticism around the land. Hugo Grotius It also stirred a new spirit of openness or tolerance about matters of Truth, a broad-mindedness about inquiry concerning Truth. Thus in the early 1600s did the war-weary jurist Hugo Grotius appeal to the reasonableness of his fellow Europeans to live by a spirit of equity rather than fanaticism. Thomas Hobbes This religious fatigue also had the effect of developing a political viewpoint that was both cynical and utilitarian (much in the vein of Machiavelli). Thomas Hobbes called for an all powerful sovereign (the "Leviathan") who would serve the interests of the larger political community (i.e., England) by holding it tightly together under his sovereign authority--in order to curb the kind of human wantonness experienced in the Wars of Religion. For Hobbes such powerful rule was not to be founded on the ancient rule of "divine rights" of monarchs--but on the basis of the needs, even rights, of the community to be served by such an all-powerful ruler. In justifying this utilitarian approach to state-building, he used "natural" theory or logic rather than scripture or tradition, putting forth the first efforts to establish a modern "political science." (His arguments were not greeted warmly by the English monarchy, which found "divine rights" as the foundation of its power much more to its liking!) For More Information on Hobbes The Secular-Scientific Mindset The second factor playing very big on the development of Western culture in those days was the growing interest in the immediate world around us--the physical, secular world. Somehow there was a growing sense that it was not a mere transient place--merely a staging area for eternal life. Rather--it had value, great value, in and of itself. True, this kind of thinking had its roots as far back as the 1300s, with its love of physical beauty found in the human form and the natural world around us; and it developed rapidly in the 1400s during the Renaissance in Italy and Northern Europe with the rise of the spirit of entrepreneurship and the accumulation of personal fortunes. But what is particularly notable about this intellectual movement of the 1600s was how our interest in the world around us came to have a value in and of itself--apart from how it might help us in our relationship with God. Not that this implied a diminished regard for God. It's just that a new mindset was growing up--that could consider the study of anything apart from some implicit religious significance. Francis Bacon When we think of the rise of this new scientific mindset, the English philosopher Francis Bacon comes easily to mind. He is often considered the first expounder of the "scientific" method of arriving at Truth. Bacon rejected the Aristotelian scholastic tradition of inductive over deductive reasoning. He also proposed that science and theology were two separate enterprises because of two different systems of proof required by each: direct observation and divine revelation. (Yet--to Bacon, theology still remained the primary enterprise of the two!) |
THE RISE OF THE SECULARIST MOOD IN NORTHERN EUROPE (Early to Mid 1600s) |
Despite the concern about the cruelty of the religious debate between Protestantism
and Catholicism, none of these new free-thinkers had any desire to disestablish
the larger matter of the Christian faith and its general world-view. But ultimately,
what they would discover in their free-wheeling inquiry into their newly
expanding universe would throw the whole moral-intellectual-spiritual paradigm
of the West into further confusion. The earliest upheaval came in a new view about the heavens and the earth. But this story goes back well before 1600. Let's therefore go back a bit and see how things evolved. Since time immemorial it had been assumed that the earth was the fixed center of the universe--and that the "heavenlies" (sun, moon and stars) circled the earth--in accordance with divine law. True--there were "fluctuations" in the heavenly movements of these supposedly divine and thus "perfect" celestial bodies. But these fluctuations ("imperfections") had been accounted for in numerous sub-theories that seemed to preserve intact the original doctrine. But these sub-theories were so complicated that it made for an almost incomprehensible vision of the precise movements of the heavens. The "Copernican Revolution" In the mid 1500s Nicholas Copernicus had come up with an alternative theory: the sun, not the earth is the center of the universe. His purpose--so his publisher states--was not to challenge the obvious truth of the earth's centrality to the universe--but rather to make "astrological" calculations (for the purpose of fortune-telling) less complicated. His heliocentric (sun-centered) theory was simply to be viewed as a hypothetical system designed to simplify astrology. He did not intend to posit this theory as a new theory of Truth or Reality. It was simply a device of convenience. This anyway is what his publisher wrote in the preface, possibly to protect Copernicus. Whether Copernicus himself thought his theories were mere matters of convenience is much less certain. Tycho Brahe At the turn of that century (late 1500s/early 1600s) Tycho Brahe made an enormous contribution to the growing field of inquiry about the universe and the place of our world in it. He was astrologer and mathematician for the Holy Roman Emperor. In pursuit of astrology, he carefully collected observations about the movement of the heavens. Though these were not intended at the time to serve the interest of science, they would prove very useful for later advances in the rising science of astronomy (studying the planets and stars in order to acquire knowledge of their movements in and of themselves--quite apart from their "fortune-telling" qualities). Galileo Galilei But in the early 1600s--during the height of the Protestant-Catholic wars--the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei announced that from his study of the stars, direct observations had demonstrated that Copernicus' theory was not just a matter of intellectual convenience, but was in fact also the Truth. Indeed, the sun--not the earth--was the center of things. The clear implication here was that both tradition and Scripture--hitherto considered the bedrock of all truth--seemed to be very wrong on their placement of the earth at the center of the universal scheme of things. This was indeed disturbing to the religious sensitivities of the times. Galileo operated out of Padua with a telescope--making many unprecedented observations of the heavens beyond the fact of the earth's loss of central position in the scheme of things. He observed the pock-marked surface of the moon and the solar flares of the sun--discounting the ancient Greek religious doctrine that these heavenly bodies were the epitome of perfection (actual Platonic Ideals or Forms). He also observed the moons of Jupiter in their regular orbit as together they all moved about the sun--giving rise to an explanation of how our moon could be similarly held in orbit around the earth as it makes its way around the sun. Also his telescope revealed considerable mass on the part of some of the heavenly bodies (the planets) which had appeared to the naked eye only as points of light in the sky, demonstrating their existence as substantial material entities: neighbors of the earth. But oddly, even under the powerful scrutiny of the telescope, other lights in the heavens (the stars) still remained as only points of light--giving indication that their distance from our earth must be vastly greater than had been previously imagined! However, because he built his sun-centered theory on the notion of circular paths of the planets around the sun (the paths are in fact elliptical, not circular) his calculations were flawed--a fact that many were quick to jump on as proof of the basic falseness of his theory. Johannes Kepler The work of Galileo was soon (also early 1600s) backed up by further studies by Johannes Kepler, who hypothesized elliptical paths made by the planets as they move about the sun and who thus cleared away the unresolved details of Galileo's (or Copernicus's) heliocentric theory. The simplicity and accuracy of Kepler's theory was too compelling to be put aside by any religious authority: He was too obviously giving accurate description to a physical reality--and not just a "useful" theory for making astrological calculations. |
THE "DETHRONEMENT" OF THE EARTH (Early 1600s) |
The Mechanization/Materialization of the Soul: Descartes Galileo's and Kepler's work coincided in its timing almost exactly with the work of another early 17th century figure: René Descartes. In some ways Descartes was a medieval rationalist--who believed (in keeping with Plato) that all things in the world around us are merely "extensions" of some variety of mathematical or geometric abstractions. The underlying truth about our world "out there" was discoverable really only through careful mathematical meditations on that world--which could be done at home or in one's closet. But in any case, what he came up with in his musings was the idea that the world "out there" was essentially a mechanical device that worked according to fixed rules of motion. Events occurred as the result of impacts among the various material bodies that are in constant motion within this "machine." The machine itself is devoid of soul or vitality of its own. It simply responds to the "laws" of motion in a mathematical way. But that left the question of the human soul and will--and the divine soul and will. Where do we fit in? Are we merely elements of this mechanical/material world? Is God merely an element of the mechanical/material world? To Descartes the answer was clearly a "no" to both questions. But in affirming our own vitality--and God's--Descartes was forced to separate the human soul (and God's) from that soul-less mechanical/material creation "out there." Fine. Bu how then were we connected to that world--except as removed observers? Where was our ancient sense of unity with all creation? Where in fact did that leave us in relation to God--and to each other? Those questions were never adequately answered. The human soul seemed to be left cut adrift by what was considered a very compelling philosophical statement--one which swept powerfully through the philosophical circles of Europe in those days. The Refinement of the Mechanistic/Materialistic Vision of Life In the meanwhile the work of studying the physical structure and behavior of the physical world around us continued to move ahead--especially in England which led the way in the new "empirical" or scientific study of our world. It was the age of mechanical clocks, precision telescopes and sextants, mechanical war-machines, and other such useful instruments. It was the age in which reduced the movement of the heavenlies to a precise mathematical formulation. It was the age which began to look at life as a precise "natural" composite of various material elements--physical and chemical. It was an age which was thrilled by the idea of unlocking all the mysteries of "natural" life by bringing such life (seen more and more in mechanical/materialist terms) under precise intellectual formulation. It was an age of heady "natural philosophy" and "natural philosophers" (the name given to the scientists of the 17th century). In 1660 the Royal Society was founded--bringing this new breed of "natural-philosophers" together to encourage each other in their work. Isaac Newton In the latter part of the 1600s one of these English naturalists, Isaac Newton, picked up on Descartes' theories of motion and completed the mechanistic vision of the universe that Descartes had laid out. In Newton's Principia (1687) he so thoroughly pulled the mechanistic/materialistic vision together that it became the single most important foundation piece for the modern world-view. He "demonstrated" that all things within the universe are made up of minute bits of matter which are held together in their shape and movement through the force of natural attraction or gravity (the gravitational attraction of two bodies is equal to the product of their mass divided by the square of the distance between them). This theory appeared to explain quite fully everything from the movement of the planets through the skies, to the movements of the tides, to the velocity of falling objects--and more. Just as importantly--the completeness of the theory left no possibility of seeing creation as a "living" thing. Creation was without life of its own; it was instead mere "matter" responding mechanically to a set of fixed mathematical laws. Newton depicted God in such a way that God actually lost "personality" and the realm of sovereign action. God was left a role in nature largely as "First Mover" or original architect of this mechanistic universe, with no further significant intervention in life. God became identified with the eternity or infinity of the universe. Deism was being born. John Locke Very shortly after Newton's Principia was published, another Englishman, John Locke, published his Essay on Human Understanding (1690). Locke brought the human mind into this mechanical world by positing a theory of knowledge in which the mind at birth is simply a blank receptacle, possessing no "innate" ideas. Over the years the mind has data added to it from the outside world. This comes in the form of "sensations" that strike this blank mind through the sensory devices of sight, hearing, feeling, taste, and smell. These data in turn are developed into full ideas by the mechanism of the mind, which sifts this imported information in the search for the agreement or disagreement of two thoughts or idea. From this mental process develops a well articulated vision of the world around us--and its causes and effects. As far as "moral" ideas were concerned, Locke felt that prudence and long-term self-interest would serve the rational mind as the determiner of human action. This theory of human knowledge stood in strong distinction to the traditional understanding that the mind possessed fully--even at birth--a vast store of innate understanding that was vitally a part of its soul quality. The old theory accounted for "learning" by seeing the task not one of inserting information from the outside (as per Locke--and almost every Western educator since), but instead one of drawing out (thus the ancient word "education" which means "draw out") the wealth of innate understanding already present in the human soul. One didn't make discoveries about things "out there." A person made discoveries about things already located deep down inside oneself. Though Locke's theory could offer no hard evidence that what he hypothesized was indeed true--the time was ripe for such a theory. "Science" was rapidly stripping life of the sense of "soul" or "sacredness" to it. The wars of religion had also helped immeasurably. So Locke's theory "made sense." That was all that was needed to leave a lasting impression on the rapidly shifting world-view of the West. |
THE MECHANIZATION OF LIFE (1600s) |
The second part of the 17th century belonged to France, under the rule of Louis XIV,
the "Sun King." During his long and powerful reign (1643-1715) he brought
the French Catholic church under his control; forced the French aristocracy
to surround him at his magnificent palace at Versailles, where he could keep
close tabs on their doings; drove the Protestants (300,000 Huguenots) from France--eliminating
France's best source of middle-class industrial skill in the process;
and built up a grand display of royal splendor in palaces and military organizations
(and in wars which used them), which left the French people gasping
under the tax load. He justified his heavy-handed rule along philosophical lines not unlike that which Hobbes had earlier called for: the need of the people to come under an "enlightened" Leviathan, an absolute or "despotic" father-figure who would rule the people with an iron fist for their own best interests. Louis was careful to pay close attention to all the discussions of enlightenment thinking, sponsoring scientific research (especially when it could be beneficial to his military ambitions) and giving the appearance of being an earnest contributor to the new thinking coming out of the emerging scientific age. This was what the ideal of "enlightened despotism" was supposed to be all about. But it came at a great social price to France, leaving that country after his death in 1715 in a state of economic and intellectual dependency on the massive French monarchical system--which it was unlikely that any personality less than Louis XIV's could sustain. Indeed, the French state began to slide into economic disarray shortly after him, leading to the entire collapse of the French state in the late 1780s. The Jesuits in France By the time of Louis XIV (late 1600s) the Jesuits had lost much of their original spiritual character and had become a quite thoroughly political organization. They not only linked themselves with Catholic kings who promised support of the Catholic cause, but they became closely involved in the political intrigue not only aimed against Protestants but also directed to the rise and fall of particular monarchs. They were politically astute--and dangerous to work with. Louis XIV used them to help drive the Huguenots out of France--though he was also cautious with them because of his "Gallican" policy of bringing the church in France directly under his own political supervision. |
"ENLIGHTENED DESPOTISM" (Mid 1600s to Early 1700s) |
Despite the rapid secularization of Western culture, most philosophers were not willing
to give up on the all-important idea of God--not yet. It was too soon
to make an abrupt departure from the traditional world-view in which a providential
God was all-important to the Western sense of order, predictability, security,
hope. Indeed, Newton thought of himself as being religiously quite devout. His theory of the universe--so he thought--was intended as a powerful tribute to the Grand Architect who designed such a wonderfully complex yet beautiful creation. However the observation was unavoidable that, having created such a masterful work, the Grand Architect was really no longer necessary to the functioning of creation. Indeed, the view was inescapable that, from the time of creation eons ago, creation had been completely self-running according to God's own laws of nature. It did not need further "intervention" from God. Truly, since that time, God had been entirely redundant to the workings of the universe. In fact, from this standpoint one would have to say that there was no need to hear further from God--for God to be involved in the course of the world's affairs. Accordingly there was also no need to pray to him--even to acknowledge him really--though few were yet willing to jump to this next step in their line of logic. Thus the feeling was growing among the "enlightened" philosophers that those that continued to insist on the life of piety were self-deluded--and possibly dangerous. Still fresh were the memories of the great slaughter undertaken in the name of Protestant and Catholic piety. So the Enlightenment was not a matter of just leaving religion alone--and going on without it. This matter of religion too had to be addressed. Now the intention of the Enlightenment philosophers was not to destroy Christianity, but to take its "best" features, particularly the high moral-ethical character of Jesus, and focus in on that instead. The rest, the miracle stories and the divine "revelations," all that could be/should be carefully removed from Christianity. Thus the West saw the publication of a mass of works at the end of the 1600s in the order of John Ray's The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of Creation (1691); Locke's The Reasonableness of Christianity (1695); and John Toland's Christianity Not Mysterious (1696). But by the 1720s and 1730s, the Deist voice was now become one of intense criticism of traditional Christianity. Take for instance the work of Matthew Tindal, Christianity as Old as the Creation (1730) -- which became something of the official Deist "Bible" in his time. Here Tindal laid out the argument that all that was valuable in Christianity was that which universal reason alone would hold true. All else (i.e., revelation) was superstition -- the most evil form of subjugation of the human mind. Or consider the work of Thomas Woolston, an English Deist. In his Discourse on the Miracles of Our Savior, he debunked the miracle stories of Jesus and the resurrection accounts in Scripture--on the basis of rationalist arguments. These were not just voices "outside" the church. In fact they were essentially voices "inside" the church, clamoring for its "enlightenment." Even the English Archbishop Tillotson joined in the chorus of those calling for a "natural religion," a Christianity brought up-to-date with enlightenment thinking. |
"NATURAL" RELIGION or DEISM (Late 1600s to Early 1700s) |
Christianity Under Fire So it was that even by the early 1700s the Western Christian world saw itself faced with an issue bigger than even the persistent animosity between Protestantism and Catholicism. What was at issue was the question: is Christianity truly an "inspired" religion--its great Truths "revealed" by God through the prophets, and through Jesus, and subsequently through the saints of the Church? Is Christianity a religion designed to bring people to live in humble submission to the historical or continuing and fully active outworking of God's will? Is Christianity a "way" for those seeking to live on eternally (thus also in the "hereafter") in the company of God? Or is Christianity essentially a moral-ethical program--useful for the orderly behavior of the citizens of this world? Is Jesus to be understood most importantly as the Good Teacher who offers outstanding moral-ethical instruction--and a lofty moral example himself--for the benefit of those choosing to live this life in dignity and with compassion? By the mid-1700s the split was obvious--and profound. One the one side of the divide were ranged the "spirituals" or "pietists." On the other side were the "rationalists" or "ethicists." Both claimed to be defending the sole approach to Truth and Order. But their positions were almost mutually exclusive. There was absolutely no common ground that could pull these two "Christian" groups together. |
THE COSMOLOGICAL SPLIT WITHIN THE WEST (Early 1700s) |
The experience of 150 years of democratic self-rule We act at times as if America was newly formed as a nation in 1776 by enlightened men who designed from scratch a new democratic America. In fact, those who gathered in Philadelphia in 1776 to claim the rights of Americans to reject tyranny were representing a colonial society that for 150 years had become quite mature in the exercise of the responsibilities of democracy. These leaders needed to invent nothing -- only to defend that which was already deeply ingrained within the American character. Indeed, what broke forth in 1776 was in fact not a "revolution" (meaning dramatic change) but instead a determination to continue their rights, their ways, their character as a distinct people, a nation separated from Europe not ony by thousands of miles of water, but by 150-years of separate cultural and political development. What was changing in 1776 was not America -- but the growing determination of British King George III to bring his distant colonial "subjects" under his grip as their sovereign king and ruler. From his point of view, they had lived too long without proper royal supervision. They set a bad example for others as to the proper place of subjects to their master. Thus with the help of royalists or Tories in the English Parliament (under the direction of Lord North), George III set out to break the spirit of the colonies -- like a trainer does a young, unridden horse. But in doing this, he was coming up against a deeply founded American sense of cultural and political standards which would cause these American colonists instinctively to rise up in anger at the idea of a mere man attempting to be their ultimate judge and master. That dignity belonged to God alone. Over the course of 150 years these Americans, because of such ingrained attitudes towards power, authority, responsibility, etc., had become a breed apart from their European brothers and sisters. And they had no intentions of changing that at all. The Protestant/Puritan Legacy in Yankee America What was this "breed apart"? What was it that the American represented that very early distinguished him from his European counterpart? First of all, it is important to recognize how very difficult it is for us today to understand the mindset of the people that built the foundations of colonial America. We often comment that they came to these shores looking for freedom and prosperity. Certainly these early settlers would have considered freedom and prosperity good things to achieve. But they would not have considered them (as we do today) to be the ultimate goals which brought them to these shores. Perhaps the pirates who flocked to the Caribbean in the quest for plunder and escape from European law and order might have considered freedom and prosperity their "ultimate goals!" But not these early settlers to colonial America -- particularly those settlers who came to "New England." Something caused them to seek to found in America a social order quite different from the pirate dens of the Caribbean -- or even the semi-feudal cultures of Spanish and French America. These were Calvinist Protestants -- people who had "covenanted" or pledged their lives to God to follow His lead in building in the New Promised Land of America a New Israel, a New Jerusalem -- a "City on a Hill" erected to give pure Christian light to the rest of the world. They were prepared to undertake huge sacrifices (attempting settlement in America was well understood to be a very risky matter) in order to follow through faithfully on this covenant, this pledge to God. Indeed, when around half of the members who came to the Plymouth colony died their first winter in America (1620-21), not a single one of those still living abandoned the project when the Mayflower returned to England the next summer. Clearly they were there for the long haul -- even at the cost of their lives. What made these Calvinist Protestants so unique? According to their theological principles, faithful Christians were pledged throughout their lives to follow the Biblical instructions of God -- and God alone. Nothing -- no man, no king, no council -- was to stand between themselves and God in shaping and directing their lives. And this held not just for religious matters -- but for all matters of life (and death). They were looking for freedom, yes: freedom not to have to live under some arbitrary human authority. But the goal of their freedom was not just freedom itself, but a freedom to be able to place themselves under a total dedication, even an "enslavement," to the will of God. Freedom was important as a means to their goal of the discipline of Godly living -- not the goal itself. They expected to live their lives entirely to God's glory, in accordance with the will of the one who made them and who presided over their life as judge and protector. They expected not only their pastors to live exemplary Christian lives -- but each other. All of them, not just the pastors, were seen as being called and ordained by God to take up the work of Christian living -- in their homes, in their workplaces as well as in their places of worship. The high quality of their lives would form a natural witness to the goodness of their God. Their holiness would "glorify God," would point the rest of the world to the holiness of the God who was their Lord and Provider. Thus the carpenter was expected, as part of his own personal Christian witness, to produce Godly work, just as Godly a work as the pastor's. Carpenter and Pastor were both judged by God alike for how they performed in their "vocations," the work they were "called" by God to perform ("vocation" means "calling") -- for whether or not it glorified God. Moreover, as Calvinists, they carried a deep sense of the importance of working closely together in a spirit of harmony and compromise in order to promote the health, strength (and yes, "freedom") of the entire community of which they each individually formed an integral part. God clearly insisted that the good of the whole came before the good of the parts [an idea largely lost sight of in today's age of individualism, even narcissism]. This understanding of the importance of being able to work together as a unit was ultimately what went into making the strength and character of these early American settlements. No den of Caribbean pirates pursuing individual freedom and prosperity on a cut-throat basis could claim that as the source of its strength! The classic example of how these early Calvinist colonists approached life is the Mayflower Compact. The Pilgrims arrived in America in late 1620, only to find that they had landed to the north of the area of "Virginia" that they were originally chartered to settle. Thus they needed to place themselves under a new charter. So before they left the ship for shore, they covenanted with each other, under the authority of the King -- and ultimately, of God -- to work together for the common good as a "civill body politik," to which they promised "all due submission and obedience": In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread sovereign Lord, King James, by the grace of God, of Great Britaine, France, and Ireland king, defender of the faith, etc., having undertaken, for the glory of God, and one of another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civill body politik, for our better ordering and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enacte, constitute, and frame such just and equall laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete and convenient for the generall good of the Colonie unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cap-Codd, the 11 of November, in the year of our sovereign lord, King James, of of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifte-fourth. Anno Dom. 1620. [from William Bradford's Historie of Plimouth Plantation.] True, not all who came to American shores as settlers came with this devout Calvinist Protestant intent. But they were soon forced by those around them to either submit to the prevailing Protestant climate -- or move on. There was no room for misfits in an environment where the margin separating life-giving success from deadly failure was very small. Virginia and the Southern and Middle Colonies This had been a problem a few years earlier (1607) in the original Virginia settlement at Jamestown. Those who came were indeed looking for something closer to what the Caribbean pirates wanted: personal freedom and wealth. Most of the (entirely male) settlers posed as "aristocrats," come to America to stake out land claims or to find gold such that should establish them as rich and landed gentry. They would not debase their social status by performing manual labor. As a consequence they almost starved to death -- until their self-appointed governor John Smith established the rule: no work -- no food. John Smith soon left Virginia and was replaced by a Puritan governor, who put his Puritan principles of Godly social organization into practice in Virginia. It helped establish this struggling colony -- through the worst of the years of hardship. To be sure, Virginia -- unlike "Yankee" New England to the North -- eventually abandoned Puritan ways and took up the manner of aristocratic England at the first opportunity, including the incorporation of slavery in order to work the huge tobacco plantations that lined the shores of the tidewater rivers along Virginia's Eastern shores. This would leave unresolved until the American civil war in 1861-65 a deep divide among American cultures -- a divide ultimately resolved by the devastating victory of Yankee Calvinist culture over Southern Aristocratic culture. But not all -- or even most -- of the settlers who came to Virginia and the other colonies outside of New England followed this "aristocratic" pattern. The Virginia uplands and Shennandoah valley were settled by Presbyterian Scots-Irish who shared with the Puritans of New England a similar Calvinist outlook on life and society. So also the Carolinas and Middle colonies were settled by devout, hard-working Calvinist Presbyterians -- as well as Quakers and Mennonites who held similar views on life and society. Even the Catholics who settled Maryland soon came under the same type of thinking. European absolutism, modeled by the French monarchy -- and mimicked by every other European monarch, including the British King George III -- was something that had no hold over the American colonists. And they liked it that way. The Enlightenment -- and the Great Awakening -- in America As those 150 years went along, Americans however settled in and became more "comfortable" (Indians, Spaniards and Frenchmen however still offering moments of intense discomfiture!). Also the "high-minded" ideas of the European Enlightenment made their way to the colonies, to a people increasingly in love with the "reasonableness" of their comfort. Consequently, much of the pious Calvinism of the early colonists tended to diminish into a secular worldliness. For others, intent on preserving cherished religious traditions, this Calvinism hardened into a religious formalism that made God not the source of grace and wonder in their lives, but the tough, ultimate judge of their many human accomplishments. By the early 1700s pastors were complaining about absenteeism at Sunday morning worship -- or often about the drunkenness (rum was a well-beloved drink in the colonies) of those who did attend. For a nation once disciplined by the exacting demands of faith and labor to hold life together, things began to get slack. Then, without warning a strange phenomenon swept through the colonies. A religious revival of Christian first-century Pentecostal proportions caught up America from North to South, hitting an emotional peak in the early 1740s. Nothing like this had ever been experienced before in anyone's memory, even historical memory. No one was expecting it, much less planning and engineering it. It just rose up and seized America. The "Great Awakening" brought out hundreds of thousands of common people who were looking for spiritual and emotional relief from the coldness of the new "scientific" vision -- and also the cold rationalism of the Old Calvinists. They came from miles around, by horse, by wagon, by foot, and stood for hours, entranced by the message of judgment and hope carried by itinerant preachers. At first local churches hosted these "revivals." But soon the crowds vastly outstripped the abilities of churches to house the attendees. Thousands gathered in open fields; even Philadelphia drew some 20 thousand at one of the gatherings. Not all Christians were enamored with the Great Awakening. The event brought the dismay and disgust of some who saw it as a major step backward into the Dark Ages of pre-rational or emotional Christianity. These were not anti-Christian secularists who held this position (for all Westerners still considered themselves Christian). These were "good" Christians who opposed the revival. For instance, there was Charles Chauncey, pastor of the First Church of Boston and leader of the "Old Lights." He was a rationalist-humanist, fervently opposed to both the Calvinist view of human depravity and the emotional "enthusiasm" of the Great Awakening. Despite such opposition, it brought forth prominent "national" leaders, a common "national" experience, and a renewed sense the nation's divine election by God. There were a number of key figures who took hold of the reigns of this event, and who directed it back and forth through the colonies. Thus John and Charles Wesley stepped forward in the midst of this Great Awakening -- to create the hugely popular and lasting Methodist movement (subsequently, "church") throughout America (and England); thus the Calvinist revivalists George Whitfield, Jonathan Edwards and Gilbert Tennent came to prominence in American life -- not as Virginians, or Pennsylvanians, or New Englanders, but as "Americans." This event not only reminded all American colonists that they shared a common destiny but it restored to the people the sense that they were a nation blessed not by just good fortune but by a loving, caring and sovereign God. This was a God that George III was going to have to depose if he were ever going to get the colonists to look to him as their absolute sovereign. With the "Great Awakening," this was less likely than ever to happen. Tensions with England America was a nation, trying to exist within a Western Civilization in which monarchy, not nationhood, was considered the legitimate basis of all political order. European monarchs were like huge landowners, holding territory here and there -- including the people and livestock who dwelled and labored on those lands. The doctrines of "divine rights of Kings" and "royal absolutism" -- promoted most grandly by the French King Louis XIV (ruled France: 1643-1715) whom all kings tried to imitate -- made these royal "landlords" feel responsible to no one but themselves. What they chose to do with their lands and people was their business, and no one else's (except perhaps God, whom these kings claimed gave them such total authority over the lives of those who lived on their God-given land). All public affairs of the times were considered to be essentially royal matters. All government, all armies, all commerce, even all religion, were considered matters entirely subject to royal whims and desires. Thus Louis XIV was reputed to have said: "I am the State" -- and ruled France under the principle: one king, one law, one faith. Consequently if there were "international" issues that arose in Europe in those days, they were essentially matters among kings -- and kings (and their hired armies and bureaucrats) alone. Wars (as well as alliances) were common among kings as they jockeyed with each other for expanding land holdings and for the right of inheritance of these land holdings. The 1700s seemed to produce a string of wars over gained and lost colonies in America and Asia -- and over conflicts among kings as to which of them possessed the strongest case for the right of succession to ownership of this or that European territory. Lands changed hands regularly both in Europe and abroad. So did royal fortunes. This personal game of kings was expensive -- for all of them. Royal treasures were drained down and faced even the possibilities of bankruptcy (a situation which arose when rich bankers would no longer grant loans to kings in need of money to wage another war). New or increased taxes on their subjects were always a possibility -- but one which was tricky and potentially catastrophic. But at times there was no other course left to kings if they were going to stay in the game. This was the situation facing George III in the 1770s. He had tangled with the French and Spanish during the Seven Years War (1756-1763) and though he had improved this position (meaning increased land holding in Asia and America) it had come at a huge drain on his royal treasury. Part of the benefit of his "win" included the removal of troublesome French authority in America and the pacification of their Indian allies. To the colonists, this was indeed a blessing. King George consequently assumed that the colonists should therefore shoulder part of the burden of his military expenses in the form of new taxes. These taxes were neither heavy nor illogical. But George did not ask the colonies to devise their own tax sources themselves, which they certainly would have done. Rather, from his lofty position in England he simply imposed them on the Americans. Not only did this this violate every standard of English law, but it rankled the sensitivities of American. Their complaints were loud enough to be heard clearly in England. The Steps toward War But in the face of such resistance the King became all the more determined to break the American spirit. And thus began the battle of wills between King (and his Tory supporters in the English Parliament) and the American colonists. From the simple matter of the right of taxation, the situation soon devolved to the issue of political sovereignty, with the King determined to show them who ruled. When Boston misbehaved by throwing away taxable tea, he shut down the port, intending to break Boston's economic back. This merely unified the colonies which sensed that all Americans would soon share a similar fate at the hand of their increasingly autocratic king. The king also tried to break the American will by forcing the colonists to house his mercenary soldiers in their homes -- and made it clear to them that they would have no grounds for appeal for any grievances which arose from this unpleasant set of circumstances. Consequently the anger and the potential for violence between King and Colonies began to mount. In 1774 representatives from all the Colonies gathered in Philadelphia for a Continental Congress to voice their concern that the King's "Intolerable Acts" implied not only the loss of precious liberties but also the disdain of their rights as Englishmen because they were "merely colonists." The King responded by sending even more troops to occupy the Colonies. By 1775 a full-scale shooting war broke out between colonial militias and the British regulars posted to America. This prompted them in that same year to gather a second Continental Congress in Philadelphia, to organize themselves politically, economically and militarily for the long battle ahead. The following year (1776), as the war for independence heated up, this Continental Congress boldly stated the American case for total independence from England: When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by the Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes, and accordingly, all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while eveils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and ususrpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, its is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of the Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to expunge their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of the unremitting injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this let fact be submitted to a candid world. [Thus follows a long list of despotic acts of the King -- and a recounting of the failed efforts of the Colonies to get a sympathetic hearing from either King or British brothers on these injustices. ] We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. The War for Independence Of course there was a huge chasm between declaring the American nation's independence -- and succeeding in having it established in fact. Initially the American militias gained some key victories through swift, limited actions. But as more British troops arrived in America it was going to become much more difficult for the Americans to achieve additional victories. A poorly timed and poorly supported attempt was made to draw the Canadian colonies in on the American side. It ended in disaster for the Americans. On the other hand, the Boston resistance to the British proved to be so fierce that the British decided to reposition their military in New York City, a bastion of Tory (pro-monarchist) sentiment. As the British arrived there in huge numbers, Washington barely escaped from the city with his much smaller army -- to take refuge in the hills around Philadelphia. Americans badly needed a victory to shore up a rapidly sagging morale. Washington thus decided to strike British outposts in New Jersey in the dead of winter, embarrassing the British and forcing them to retreat from the central colonies back to New York. The next year (1777) the Americans foiled an attempt by the British to capture the heart of upstate New York, originally designed to isolate New England from the rest of the colonies. At Saratoga an entire British army was forced to surrender, thus not only blocking the British plan but impressing the French King so much that he decided to join in the war on the side of the Americans. This critical support for the American cause obviously came not because the French king loved the American cause so much (he didn't) but because it offered him hopefully the opportunity to recoup territory in America lost in some of the earlier "king games." Even the chance to merely embarrass his monarchical rival would be a pleasure for the King. Apparently the French king had not thought through the implications of helping a people rise up in arms against their king. But many of the Frenchmen who came to America to support the cause of a people against their king came to think seriously on these matters. Despite these victories the situation facing the colonists remained very grim. The war was crippling the economy and the American troops were soon short of every essential for victory: food, clothing, ammunition, even a sense of how this thing could eventually come to success. The only thing that seemed to sustain them was the sense that their old covenant with God was still there somehow at work. General Washington indeed spent many hours before God in order to draw strength and inspiration in the face of the stupendous odds seemingly set against the American cause. But Americans knew that this was when the powers of the Almighty (or "Providence" as they typically referred to God) were their most powerful. Well almost all of them did. The Tory impulse among some of the colonials gathered strength over the next couple of years. And even one of the earlier heroes of the American cause, General Benedict Arnold, who had become increasingly disgusted with the petty failures that afflicted the American effort, finally threw his support over to the Tory side -- but was "mysteriously" stopped in time before he could do serious damage to the American effort. Stopped in both the North and in the Middle portions of the colonies, the British then decided in late 1778 to direct their efforts at knocking the Southern colonies out of the War. Initially they were quite successful, taking first Savannah and then Charleston over the next two years. They also terrorized the countryside and encouraged American "Tories" to join them against the American "Continentals." But over the fall and winter of 1780-81 the tide of war began to turn in favor of the Americans Continentals as they harried the larger British and Tory forces with their guerrilla raids. Finally the British army retreated north to Virginia at Yorktown to secure reinforcements. But an incredibly well timed meeting of the French by sea and the Americans by land around Yorktown left the British army cut off and defenseless. In October of 1781 the British commander Cornwallis was forced to surrender to Washington. Though the war would not be officially over until the ink was dry on the Peace Treaty of Paris in 1783, for all practical purposes the Americans had brought the War for Independence to a successful end at Yorktown. The Tories were put out of business -- both in the colonies, and in the British Parliament -- over this miscalculated effort to show the Americans who their sovereign was. Americans knew all along who that was; their "firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence" had once again demonstrated who ruled in the hearts and minds of these incredible Americans. Designing a "New Order" Again, it is necessary to be cautious in depicting the political events of those days as a "revolution." In 1777 a "government" had been quietly put together by the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, based simply on a set of Articles of Confederation. It provided really only for a system of regular consultation and cooperation among the separate colonies (now called "States") -- mostly over the need to provide some kind of mutual defense against England. Such a national "government" was thus quite limited in scope. Actually the "States" expected their old colonial governments simply to carry on as before and provide whatever government the American people needed. These Americans still viewed governance mostly as a matter of personal responsibility before God. Under such a system there was still relatively little need seen for much formal government, such as was associated in their minds with the European monarchical system. But after the War it became quickly very obvious that the Confederation idea needed serious overhauling. Boundary disputes among States, the problems of tariffs and money making commerce among the States difficult, the question of how to raise moneys for on-going American national needs, the need to have a single American voice (and not one for each of the States) in foreign policy, and many other issues finally determined American leaders to gather again in Philadelphia in summer of 1787 to rethink the American union. The issues were tough ones that easily divided rather than united the States. How would they give representation to the States at the national level, equally (pleasing the small states) or by population (pleasing the large states)? How should slaves be included in the population count? Just how much control over foreign trade should the new government possess? Should this government be active or quite restricted in governing life in America? Thus the delegates decided to work behind closed doors to allow themselves to talk frankly. They knew that their work would be effective only in an environment of compromise -- for every one of their decisions was bound to anger some one group or another. In the heat of a very hot Philadelphia summer tempers got equally hot. At one point Benjamin Franklin surprised everyone by asking the group to stop for prayer -- to seek the higher wisdom of God as they faced stalemate in their discussions. And indeed that HIgher Wisdom came to prevail -- as they yielded to each other in a renewed sense of compromise. And out of that Spirit emerged an amazing document, one that has continued to guide this country to this day. It was a document embodying a vision of government that for years others would try to copy -- but few would have the inner nature to follow. It was the product of a culture and spirit that one simply could not call into being because it seemed like such a good idea to inspired leaders. It was the natural by-product of a people who understood that in all things there was an accountability to God that loomed larger than simply their own bright ideas and well-reasoned arguments. It was the natural by-product of a people who were well accustomed to living by God's -- not man's -- judgements. |
REVOLUTION IN AMERICA (Late 1700s) |
Royal Absolutism vs. Middle Class Burghers (Bourgeoisie) As we have seen, Europe had taken a path quite different from America's. With the breakup of the old Catholic feudal order during the Reformation, a number of different groups had been vying for control over events. The most important of these were, on the one hand, a rising group of powerful monarchs or kings -- and on the other hand a rising group of industrial-commercial townsmen or burghers (or French: bourgoisie). Both groups moved forward to command the new monied wealth that was growing up in Europe. Sometimes they worked together as in Elizabethan England (second half of 1500s) because the things they shared in common (a distrust of the landed nobility; a fear of Spain and France) were more important than their differences. But most of the time they found themselves fiercely at odds because they could not agree on which of them had the greater right to effective rule over the land -- as in England of the Stuart kings and Puritan Parliament (mid 1600s). Indeed in England the battle had raged back an forth between the two groups, sometimes the kings, sometimes the Parliamentary representatives of the burghers in dominance, without a clear victor in sight. The rest of Europe looked on in amazement or horror Louis XIV had decided the matter for France when in 1598 he simply revoked the Edict of Nantes which had promised religious freedom to the largely Calvinist French Protestant (Huguenot) burghers. By stripping them of their religious rights he was depriving them of their most cherished personal and social values as Calvinist Huguenots. This action was designed either to crush their independent spirit or to send them packing from France -- which 300,000 of them subsequently chose to do. With their departure Louis had rid himself of the most powerful source of potential opposition to his program of making himself the absolute ruler in the land. He also removed from France the one group that could have eventually shown the rest of the French the art of democratic self-government. Thus Louis XIV left the French with the necessity of learning to live under the rule of absolutist kings -- or of facing sheer anarchy if that absolutism were removed. As Louis intended, after 1598 there were no other options available to the French. For a while the system worked in France. Louis was almost tireless, consumed in detailed governmental work from early morning till late at night. So powerful was his will, his stamina, that he was able to build all French order on his own personal will. And he was able to see real results from all that hard work. France prospered under Louis and indeed became the celebrated cultural center of Europe. But this was also a system that was horribly flawed in concept. Unless the successors to Louis' throne possessed the same dedication and stamina before the task of ruling France, the system would quickly fall apart. And as "fate" would have it, his successors in the 1700s indeed possessed none of his talents for hard work. Very quickly the system which he had so carefully built up began to break down after his death. Darkening Economic Clouds in France The biggest problem facing France -- as every other monarchy of the day -- was money. Louis XIV's ambitious programs both in France and elsewhere, for either war or peace, were very expensive matters. Kings could have invested their money in industrial development -- as the bourgeoisie did. But this would have seemed to involve "labor," which no French nobleman would ever have touched. Some royal income came in from the lands acquired in war -- but by no means enough to offset the huge costs of the wars involved. Thus the only recourse was taxes --levied heavily upon the people of France. But the tax burden was already extremely heavy upon the people. The "Third Estate" of peasants (farmers) and bourgeoisie (townsmen) whose lands, products and services were already taxed fully, could not be expected to come up with any more taxes. The only other source was the huge land wealth of the French church ("First Estate") and the French nobility ("Second Estate") -- which had always been exempt from taxation (the logic being that they provided support for France not in money but in spiritual and military services conducted at their own expense). Indeed even though the church and the nobility made up less than two percent of the population, between them they owned half the land -- none of which was taxed. Louis XV (ruling France from 1715 to 1774) was a weak king who came to the throne with the royal finances already disastrously low. Royal advisors suggested that in addition to tightening up on some of his lavish expenditures, it was time to face the necessity of taxing the church and nobility. Needless to say, both church and nobility strongly resisted this idea. Being a weak-willed individual, Louis XV backed away from every such proposal. Besides, to change the tax laws to include the First and Second Estates, Louis XV would have to get approval from the Estates General -- the French equivalent of the British Parliament. Watching how such a national council in England became the source of attack upon the powers of the English kings, the French king refused to consider such a dangerous step. Indeed, an Estates General had not been called together in France since 1614. But Louis would not cut back on the royal games. He involved France in every major war during his nearly 60-year rule. His palace at Versailles (outside Paris) was the scene of lavish goings-on. All of this came at a huge expense. He taxed the Third Estate every way law could be construed to give him the power to do so -- until the system began to impoverish his people terribly. There simply were no more tax sources for the monarchy -- unless an Estates General would be called and would authorize taxes on the church and nobility. He couldn't borrow any more money from the Paris bankers -- or any other bankers. But he wouldn't call an Estates General. Indeed, as he lay on his deathbed he stated: "after me will come the storm." He was right. The Philosophes and the French Enlightenment Whereas the American Revolution was heavily shaped by a long-standing religious tradition of Calvinist Puritanism, recently revitalized by the Great Awakening -- the French Revolution was shaped by a secular philosophical movement highly critical of France's particular religious and political traditions. France's Catholic traditions infuriated a closely-knit group of (mostly bourgeois) intellectuals who despised the way that this religion not only provided justification for the privileges of the church, nobility and monarchy -- but also undergirded the profound social conservatism of the huge peasant portion (80%) of the French population. Breaking from tradition, these philosophes ('philosophers") were forced to create from scratch an entire cosmology (view of the universe and what causes it to behave as it does) of their own. Together they pieced together a vision of life and society from pure human reason, drawing on what they supposed were undisputable "facts" to create a whole new social theory which they then pressed forward as the model for a better life. A number of them -- such as Voltaire, the leader of the group, and Montesquieu, one of their earliest voices -- had spent time in England (mostly seeking escape from French authority) and observed there a number of political principles that they thought should direct French society. There they also came into close contact with the works of the earlier English thinkers, Newton and Locke, and developed from them the view that society was essentially a machine which could be engineered and directed by educated or "enlightened" leaders (such as themselves), any where, any time. Consequently, they began to put together in their minds and writings a vision of political "utopia." Furthermore, the philosophes expected that just the sheer "reasonableness" of their ideas would be persuasive enough to rally people everywhere in France to the support of their cause of political reform in France. Failure of people to support such "reason" would subsequently be viewed by such "enlightened" leaders as a sign of either intense ignorance or just plain evil on their part. Consequently, the philosophes were creating a mindset which would soon turn France into a blood-bath. This was quite unlike the American sense that such truth and lofty plans belonged to God alone -- and that man, even as he sought God's truth, would have to be quite cautious in his claims to know the mind of God. Furthermore, Americans looked upon government as something that should be restricted to the barest of protective duties. Governance belonged in the hearts of the common people, not in lofty intellectuals' well-laid plans to govern society from above. In this lay the essential difference between the American and French experiences in "revolution." The Collapse of the French Monarchy |
REVOLUTION IN FRANCE (Late 1700s) |
THE "DETHRONEMENT" OF THE EARTH (Early 1600s) |