Philosophy: Opening the Mind one Person at a Time

Enlightment philosophers expressed basic principles of the modern view such as the belief that every person posses natural rights that the government should not violate, and the yearning to reform the principles of society based on reasons. While Voltaire supported a conservative ideology on holding onto monarchy and tradition, he pleaded for tolerance and disagreed with religious fanaticism and persecution. At the same time, John Locke believed individuals were born with their natural rights and Jean Jacques Rousseau argued that one person did not have a natural authority over others. Promising a monarchy that avoided religious persecution, freedom of speech, and natural rights, enlightment thinkers influencing the common people to revolt lead to the French Revolution. Although the monarchy was restored, the revolution was successful in giving the common people a voice in their government and the elimination of one absolute power.

Voltaire argued whether wrong or right, citizens should be allowed to believe and think with their own reasons as long as he does not disturb the public order or the monarchy. He believed in the traditional morality of Christians but disagreed with the church’s intolerance. Voltaire believes in tolerance where everyone should tolerate each other. People are going to make mistakes but should be forgiven. Voltaire advances Enlightment values and expresses his thoughts of the world through Candide or Optimism where the character Jacques knows that people can be cruel but he still helps others showing his tolerance of man. Voltaire does not believe in religious fanaticism where higher authority would kill anyone who contradicts what they believe such as “judges who sentence men to death for no other crime than that of thinking differently from themselves”. For example, in Candide or Optimism, authorities hang Pangloss for thinking optimistically. Voltaire’s philosophical views caught the attention of the common people. Common people wanted to think for themselves and not be persecuted for their thoughts.

Meanwhile, John Locke wrote that experience was the foundation of knowledge. He believed human beings were born with their natural rights and a power to preserve “his own property, as he thinks good and nature allows him”. He argued that the government or the monarchy or any assembly did not have the power to take away natural rights of individuals. The authority to govern develops from the approval of the governed and state’s power is restricted by agreement. People have the right to make the rules and allow individuals to make sure everyone followed these rules to live life with more freedom. Locke influenced the common people to want to reform the government and way of living because of the natural rights they were born with. Higher class people wanted the monarchy to remain the same because everything was given to them and they depended on the common people for their way of living. The Monarchy and clergy only consider the rights of the higher class citizens who were protected by traditional privileges. Locke’s idea of natural rights gave the people the opportunity to start thinking they deserved more freedom in society. The common people resented the special privileges of the higher class and the corrupt methods of their government. The common people took a step forward and created the National Assembly who stood for the common people as representatives of the nation.

Another influence on the common people to revolt was Rousseau’s belief that one person did not