| Definition: The
                    Enlightenment was a set of intellectual,
                religious, scientific, social, and ultimately political
                revolution(s) with competing Radical and moderate
                components (and reactionary counter-Enlightenment
                elements) from mid-17th through the 'long 18th'
                centuries in the European and trans-Atlantic worlds
                especially. The broader Enlightenment recovered ancient
                Greek and medieval Islamic Enlightenment thought via
                the Renaissance and clandestine culture, and ultimately
                overthrew political Christendom and shaped the world and
                the controversies of modernity and postmodernity.  This legacy is
                    the subject of the following homepage and its linked
                    bibliography and resources.  
             | 
          |||||
              ![]() The banner montage attempts to
                      distill the spirit / essence of the crosscurrents
                      of the Enlightenment with each figure and image
                            reminding of a long and clandestine
                            tradition of free inquiry and universal
                            ethics with a host of participants (most
                            long forgotten) going back 2,600 years
                            rebelling against the various dominant
                            orthodoxies and hegemonies of established
                            thought and power. The images are
                      arranged primarily conceptually with only a slight
                      nod to chronology (from left to right):  
            
 Historical work on women luminaries of the Enlightenment is very incomplete. Here we include a sampling of three great philosophes, whose lives essentially spanned the Enlightenment epoch. 
 Also
                                    very incomplete is the history of
                                    Indigenous America (map
                                      of Native North America) and
                                    global African influences upon the
                                    emergence of Enlightenment. The
                                    Haudenosaunee Iroquois Confederation
                                    / League of Nations (link)
                                    & their Great
                                      Law of Peace (~1100 CE) which
                                    included I. Narrative, II.
                                    Constitution, & III. Ceremonies
                                    (link),
                                    practiced a form of federal
                                    democracy for centuries (cf. 1890 Cayuga
                                      version manuscript), which is
                                    in stark contrast to the imperial
                                    Hittite-Assyrian suzerainty
                                    covenants culturally-appropriated
                                    into the Abraham religions. Both the
                                    'American Indian federal
                                      democracy treaty legacy' and
                                    the 'Ancient Near Eastern (ANE)
                                      Suzerainty imperial treaty
                                      covenantalism' are cited as
                                    entries and contrasted in the Select
                                  Bibliography
                                    below. On the Nature of morality,
                                    see also the entry on the Euthyphro
                                      Dialogue (~380 BCE) below. We
                                    will be adding more data on Native
                                    American influence on the
                                    Enlightenment.   
                       ![]() For a larger version link to Map of Native North America: 
 Below: A map of the ancient Iroquois Confederation / League of Nations as it was represented in 1882 (link; cf. link; federal democracy ~600 years prior, a constitutional law debt finally acknowledged by the US Senate in 1988: https://www.senate.gov/reference/resources/pdf/hconres331.pdf). ![]() American Indian influence before and during the long 18th century: NY Governor William Burnett with Indian leaders (1721, cf. link), & later on the Framers: Franklin, Madison, Washington, Adams, and Jefferson (link; cf. Kickenbird, 1987; Miller, 2015 cited below). ![]() The Haitian Revolution of slave self-liberation (1791-1804); among others the great Haitian revolutionary leader, Francois-Dominique Toussaint L'Ouverture (1743-1803) who helped bring the Radical Enlightenment values of the French Revolution home to Santo Domingo; values eventually permeating the Global South; cf. the vast scholarship of CLR James, 1936; Frantz Fanon, 1952; 1959; 1961; 1964; 2015; cited below). ![]() ![]() The long war between the Radical Enlightenment and the Moderate Enlightenment (see below) is manifest not only in how Radical ideas influenced the US Declaration, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, but also how reactionary Moderate and even Counter-Enlightenment tendencies influenced the same: Horne (2014). The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States (New York) cited below. The history of Enlightenment and its many enemies is still being made and written. A rebellion and revulsion
                              against early modern European imperialism
                              began among figures in the Radical
                              Enlightenment, just as indigenous and
                              foreign cultures had been used to critique
                              European Christendom and  l'Ancien Regime. Part of this was
                              inspired by the realization that
                              indigenous morality was often higher and
                              more universal than
                              Judeo-Christian-Islamic 'covenantal
                              morality.' (For more see "Universality: A Copernican
                                Revolution in Morality" below, and
                              in forthcoming work on this
                              website).   
                  To be added in forthcoming sections: 
  | 
          
| 
               (6th-3rd c BCE, 10th-12th c CE, 1650-1815) ~ Greek Ionian, Arab-Islamic, Indigenous American, Radical Renaissance precursors, the Enlightenment (see chronology)  | 
            
               Free critical inquiry & expression impact culture & society, provoke reaction  | 
            
               Philosophy, science, religion: Controversy & contest over the meaning of God—traditional, moderate Deist, radical Deist-monist, & debates over ontology-metaphysics  | 
            
               Scientific Revolution & Enlightenment: Seeking a Natural Cosmology / World-view, and to categorize and organize human knowledge  | 
            
               Enlightenment & Political Revolution: The fight for Universality, Rights of Humankind & Democracy / Brotherhood  | 
          
| 
               New theories of origins of law & social contract: Society & legal trends in upheaval with the rise of early modernity in Europe & America  | 
            
               Luminaries, history & philosophy of history, literature as societal dialectics  | 
            
               Crosscurrents I (1650-1815): Two Enlightenments & a Counter-Enlightenment, Philosophes & Anti-Philosophes  | 
            
               | 
             
               (History of Cosmology)  | 
          
|    "Enlightenment is man's release from
                    his self-incurred immature dependence. Immature
                    dependence is man's inability to make use of his
                    understanding without direction from another.
                    Self-incurred . . . when its cause lies not in lack
                    of reason but in lack of resolution and courage to
                    use it without direction from another. Sapere
                      aude! [Dare to know!] 'Have courage to use
                    your own reason!'—that is the motto of
                    enlightenment. . . . Everywhere there is restriction
                    on freedom. . . .  If we are asked, 'Do we now
                    live in an enlightened age?' the answer is, 'No,'
                    but we do live in an age of enlightenment [—a process ongoing]." 
               —Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), Was
                        ist Aufklarung? 1784. 
             | 
            
              ![]()  | 
          


| Roots | 
                Major
                        historical Events | 
                Key
                        Works (linked) | 
                Developments
                        in Arts & Sciences | 
              
| Paleo- lithic  | 
                Summarized in the
                    History of Cosmology (link);
                     Ch. I. From Mythos to Cosmos (~3.3 Mya - ~11.7 kya section).  | 
              ||
| 6th-3rd
                     cent. BCE  | 
                Greek
                    (Ionian-Melitan) Enlightenment | 
                Links to surviving documents will be added here. | Summarized in greater detail in the accompanying History of Cosmology Ch. I Mythos to Cosmos. | 
| 9th-12th cent. CE  | 
                Arab-Islamic
                    Enlightenment | 
                
                   Links to
                          available documents will be added here.    
                   | 
                Being added in Ch.
                      I Mythos to Cosmos; Partial listing:
  | 
              
| Year | 
                Major
                        historical Events | 
                Key
                        Works (linked) | 
                Developments
                        in Arts & Sciences | 
              
| 1600 | 
                1582: Il
                      Candelajo (Candelier; a play, link) 1584: De l'Infinito Universo e Mondi (link) 1588: De la Causa, Principio e Uno (link)  | 
                Bruno's Il
                      Canelajo forecast the idea of 'Enlightenment' His 1584 & 1588 works introduced (Epicurean) monism —Roman Inquisition burns Giordano Bruno to death  | 
              |
| 1603 | 
                Johannes Bayer: Uranometria (link expanded edition)  | 
                Artistic-scientific
                    mapping of the visible starry Universe | 
              |
| 1610 | 
                Galileo turns a
                    telescope on the heavens (January 1610):  —> Mountains on the Moon & —> 4 moons of Jupiter: Io, Ganymede, Callisto, Europa —> And the gibbous phases of Venus: (Aristarchan-)Copernican
                        Revolution 
                 | 
              ||
| 1618-1648 | 
                Thirty Years' War | 
                Indecisive outcome
                    & horrific cost led many to question providence
                    in these religious conflicts in Europe | 
              |
| 1620 | 
                Francis Bacon:  Novum Organum Scientarum (link)  | 
                ||
| 1625 | 
                Hugo Grotius:  de Jure Belli ac Pacis (link)  | 
                ||
| 1632 | 
                Galileo Galilei: Dialogo Sopra i Due Massimi Sistemi del Mondo (autograph; link); Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (link)  | 
                Master comparison
                    between the Ptolemaic &  Copernican cosmologies (cf. history of cosmology, ch. I)  | 
              |
| 1633 | 
                Roman Inquisition
                    condemns Galileo | 
              ||
| 1635 | 
                Académie Française
                    founded | 
              ||
| 1637 | 
                René Descartes:  Discours de la Méthode (link) Les Météores (link) La Dioptrique (link) La Géométrie (link)  | 
                Descartes published
                    these instead of his larger planned Discourse on the World,
                    abandoned after the Galileo condemnation; Descartes develops Cartesian or analytical geometry (algebraic analyticity applied to geometry)  | 
              |
| 1641 | 
                René Descartes: Meditationes de Prima Philosophia (link)  | 
                ||
| 1642-1651 | 
                English Civil War | 
                ||
| 1644 | 
                René Descartes: Principia Philosophiae (index Latin)  | 
                ||
| 1651 | 
                Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan (link)  | 
                ||
| 1656 | 
                Christiaan Huygens: De Motu Corporum ex Percussione: Concerning the Motion of Colliding Bodies (publ. posthumously 1607; Engl. link)  | 
                Correct physical
                    theory of elastic collisions | 
              |
| 1657-67 | 
                Florentine Sciences Academy (Cimento) founded | ||
| 1660 | 
                Restoration of
                    monarchy in England  | 
                ||
| 1661 | 
                Johannes Bayer:
                    expanded Uranometria (link)  | 
                12
                      southern constellations added from explorers'
                    accounts of the southern starry skies  (cf. history of cosmology, ch. I)  | 
              |
| 1664-1665 | 
                Comets controversy | 
              ||
| 1666 | 
                Académie des
                    Sciences founded | 
              ||
| 1667 | 
                Observatoire de
                    Paris founded;  von Leeuwenhoek discovers sperm  | 
              ||
| 1668 | 
                Christiaan Huygens:
                     'De motu corporum ex mutuo impulsu' read to the Royal Society (autographs, 1669)  | 
                Koerbagh dies in
                    Amsterdam prison | 
              |
| 1670 | 
                Frederik de Wit: Planisphærium Cœleste (link; cf. link) Benedict de Spinoza: Tractatus Theologicus Politicus (link)  | 
                de Wit's planisphere
                    included the ancient Greek constellations plus the 12 new ones by J. Bayer (1661), & a summary of the competing cosmological models.  | 
              |
| 1672 | 
                Dutch "True Freedom"
                    overthrown | 
                ||
| 1672-1678 | 
                Franco-Dutch War | 
                ||
| 1673 | 
                Christiaan Huygens: Horologium Oscillatorium (link; Engl. link)  | 
                ||
| 1675 | 
                Lucy Hutchinson:
                    Dedicated her translation of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (cf. link)  | 
                ||
| 1677 | 
                Benedict de Spinoza
                    (post-humus): Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata (link)  | 
                ||
| 1678 | 
                Richard Simon: Histoire Critique de Vieux Testament (link).  | 
                Spinoza's works
                    banned. | 
              |
| 1682 | 
                Pierre Bayle:  Pensées Diverse sur la Comète (link)  | 
                Acta Eruditorum
                    founded | 
              |
| 1683 | 
                Thomas Creech:  T. Lucretius Carus, Of the Nature of Things (in English iambic pentameter rhyme; link)  | 
                Ashmolean Museum
                    opened | 
              |
| 1685 | 
                Revocation of the
                    Edict of Nantes | 
                ||
| 1686 | 
                Bernard le Bovier de
                    Fontenelle:  Entretiens sur la Pluralité des Mondes (link) Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds (link)  | 
                Popularized the
                    discoveries and work of Descartes and of Copernicus,
                    as well as helping make widespread the (Brunesian)
                    theory of the plurality of worlds.  | 
              |
| 1687 | 
                Sir Isaac Newton:  Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (link) De Motu Corporum (Liber Primus; link)  | 
                Extended the light
                    of physical law across the cosmos, (cf. history
                      of cosmology, ch. I) | 
              |
| 1688 | 
                Glorious Revolution
                    in England | 
                ||
| 1689 | 
                John Locke: Essay Concerning Human Understanding (link)  | 
                ||
| 1690 | 
                Williamite conquest
                    of Ireland | 
                Anne Conway:  Principia Philosophiae Antiquissimae et Recentissimae (1692 English link) Christiaan Huygens: Traité de la Lumière (link) John Locke: Two Treatises of Government (link)  | 
                Conway's original
                    philosophy of ontological monism;  Huygens' wave theory of light, prior to Newtonian corpuscular theory of light: Quantum theoryincorporates both the wave conception (wavelength & frequency) as well as the corpuscular in the photon going beyond classic electromagnetism to electron-photon field perturbations (QFT; 20th century)  | 
              
| 1691 | 
                Balthasar Bekker: A World Bewitched (link)  | 
                ||
| 1692 | 
                Boyle lecture series
                    begins | 
              ||
| 1693 | 
                Pierre Bayle
                    dismissed from his teaching post | 
              ||
| 1694 | 
                University of Halle
                    founded | 
              ||
| 1695 | 
                Expiration of the
                    Licensing Act in England | 
              ||
| 1696 | 
                John Toland: Christianity not Mysterious (link)  | 
                ||
| 1697 | 
                Pierre Bayle: Dictionnaire Historique et Critique (link)  | 
                ||
| 1699-1711 | 
                Leibniz-Newton
                    Calculus controversy | 
              ||
| 1700 | 
                Prussian Academy of
                    Sciences founded | 
              ||
| 1702-1713 | 
                War of the Spanish
                    Succession | 
                ||
| 1704 | 
                Battle of Blenheim | 
                John Toland: Letters to Serena (link)  | 
                |
| 1705 | 
                Samuel Clarke: A
                      Demonstration of  the Being and Attributes of God (link)  | 
                ||
| 1706 | 
                Matthew Tindal:
                      Rights of  the Christian Church Asserted (link)  | 
                ||
| 1710 | 
                Gottfried Wilhelm
                    Leibniz: Theodicy (link)  | 
                ||
| 1711-1712 | 
                Addison and Steele:
                     The Spectator (link; volume 1)  | 
                ||
| 1713 | 
                Peace of Utrecht
                    ends Louis XIV's  wars  | 
                ||
| 1720 | 
                Sweden's "Age of
                    Liberty" begins | 
                ||
| 1721 | 
                Baron de
                    Montesquieu: Lettres Persane (link)  | 
                ||
| 1723 | 
                Wolff expelled from
                    Prussia | 
              ||
| 1724 | 
                Anthony Collins: Discourse of the Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Religion (link)  | 
                St. Petersburg
                    Academy of Sciences founded.  | 
              |
| 1725 | 
                Giambattista Vico: Principij
                      Scienza di Nuova The New Science (link)  | 
                ||
| 1726 | 
                Edinburgh Medical
                    School founded | 
              ||
| 1726-1728 | 
                Voltaire's exile in
                    England | 
              ||
| 1728-1753 | 
                Ephraim Chambers:  Cyclopædia: or, An Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences (link; 2 volumes & supplement; multiple editions)  | 
                ||
| 1729 | 
                Jean Meslier: Testament
                    (1729;
                    1732;
                    1762) | 
                ||
| 1732 | 
                Carolus Linnaeus'
                    expedition to Lapland | 
              ||
| 1733-1734 | 
                Alexander Pope: An Essay on Man (link)  | 
                Written in heroic
                    couplet this work in light-hearted, sardonic tones
                    described the zeitgeist / l'esprits des temps of the
                    Enlightenment, under the guise of light-hearted
                    moderation, actually surreptitiously promoting
                    Radical sentiment | 
              |
| 1734 | 
                Voltaire: Lettres Philosophique (link)  | 
                Capitoline Museum
                    opens in Rome | 
              |
| 1735 | 
                Carolus Linnaeus: Systema Naturae (link)  | 
                La Condamine sets
                    out for South America | 
              |
| 1736 | 
                Christian von Wolff: Theologia Naturalis (link [1739])  | 
                ||
| 1737 | 
                Göttingen University
                    founded | 
              ||
| 1739 | 
                David Hume: Treatise of Human Nature (link)  | 
                Royal Swedish
                    Academy founded | 
              |
| 1740 | 
                Gabrielle Émilie,
                    Marquise de Châtelet: Institutions de Physique (link)  | 
                First to propose the
                    conservation of total energy,  then derived the mass-velocity relation (link)  | 
              |
| 1742 | 
                Royal
                    Danish-Norwegian Academy founded | 
              ||
| 1743 | 
                American
                    Philosophical Society founded | 
              ||
| 1744 | 
                Royal Prussian
                    Academy re-founded in Berlin | 
              ||
| 1747 | 
                Julian Offray de la
                    Mettrie:  L'Homme Machine (link)  | 
                The Encyclopédie
                    project begins | 
              |
| 1748 | 
                Baron de
                    Montesquieu: De l'Esprit des Loix (link)  | 
                ||
| 1748-1750 | 
                The journal La
                      Spectatrice Danoise edited by  La Beaumelle in Copenhagen  | 
              ||
| 1749 | 
                Dennis Diderot: Letter on the Blind (link)  | 
                ||
| 1749-1750 | 
                Georges-Louis
                    LeClerc de Buffon: Histoire Naturelle (link; link)  | 
                Voltaire moves to
                    Berlin | 
              |
| 1750 | 
                Thomas Wright: An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of the Universe (link)  | 
                Wright proposed that
                    other stellar systems exist out there beyond our
                    local stellar system; what we now call galaxies (history
                      of cosmology: ch.
                      I). | 
              |
| 1751-1752 | 
                Abbé Nicolas-Louis
                    de Lacaille: A catalogue of 9766 stars in the southern hemisphere (1847)  | 
                Abbé de Lacaille
                    journey of astronomical observations  from the Cape of Good Hope  | 
              |
| 1751-1772 | 
                d'Alembert; Diderot
                    (eds.) & many lumières: Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire Raisonné des Sciences, des Arts et des Métiers (17+11 vols.; link)  | 
                ||
| 1753 | 
                The British Museum
                    founded | 
              ||
| 1754-1761 | 
                David Hume: History of England (link)  | 
                ||
| 1755 | 
                The Lisbon
                    Earthquake & the  start of Pombal's reforms in Portugal  | 
                Immanuel Kant:  Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels (link); Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (link)  | 
                Madrid Royal
                    Botanical Gardens founded Kant's theory proposed the "island universe" hypothesis for distant nebulosities seen through the telescope,what we now call galaxies (history of cosmology: ch. I).  | 
              
| 1756 | 
                Voltaire: Essai
                      sur les Mœurs et l'Esprit des Nations
                    (Multi-volume history: link) James Ferguson: Astronomy Explained On Sir Isaac Newton's Principles (link)  | 
                Pombal institutes
                    the Douro Wine Company | 
              |
| 1757 | 
                British seize
                    Calcutta | 
                Rupture between
                    Rousseau and Diderot | 
              |
| 1758 | 
                Claude-Adrien
                    Helvétius: De l'Esprit (link)  | 
                ||
| 1759 | 
                Voltaire: Candide
                    (link;
                    link) Gabrielle Émilie, Marquise de Châtelet: Principes Mathématiques de la Philosophie Naturelle (transl. Newton's Principia: link)  | 
                Encyclopédie
                    banned Kew Gardens founded  | 
              |
| 1761 | 
                Jean Jacques
                    Rousseau: La Nouvelle Héloïse (link; link)  | 
                Berlin State Library
                    founded | 
              |
| 1761-1767 | 
                Danish Royal Arabian
                    Expedition | 
              ||
| 1762 | 
                Jean Jacques
                    Rousseau: Du Contrat Social, ou Principes du Droit Politique (link) The Social Contract (link; link)  | 
                Cambridge Botanical
                    Gardend founded | 
              |
| 1763 | 
                Abbé Nicolas-Louis
                    de Lacaille:  Coelum Australe Stelliferum (link)  | 
                Abbé de Lacaille
                    added 14
                      new constellations  to the southern skies  | 
              |
| 1767 | 
                The Jesuits expelled
                    from Spain & Spanish America  | 
                ||
| 1770 | 
                |||
| 1770-1772 | 
                Struensee's reforms
                    in Denmark- Norway  | 
                Voltaire:  Questions sur l’Encyclopédie (1772; link)  | 
                |
| 1772-1784 | 
                Gustav III's reforms
                    in Sweden- Finland  | 
                ||
| 1773 | 
                Baron d'Holbach: La
                      Politique Naturelle (link) | 
                America's first
                    public museum founded | 
              |
| 1773-1774 | 
                Diderot's visit to
                    Russia | 
              ||
| 1775 | Thomas Paine: African Slavery in America (link)  | 
                ||
| 1774-1776 | 
                Turgot's failed
                    reforms in France | 
                ||
| 1774-1781 | 
                Charles Messier (link):
                     Catalogue des Nébuleuses & des Amas d'Étoiles (1771-1774; 1781 scans); Catalogue of Nebulae & Star Clusters (link)  | 
                Charles Messier,
                    astronomer and comet-hunter,  created the first deep sky catalogue of astronomical bodies, significant in the history of cosmology.  | 
              |
| 1775-1776 | 
                Start of the
                    American Revolution | 
                ||
| 1776 | 
                Thomas Paine: Common
                      Sense (link;
                    link) The American Crisis series (link) US Declaration of Independence (link) Adam Smith: Wealth of Nations (link)  | 
                Thomas Paine,
                    Abolitionist, social security / old age pension
                    advocate, democratic constitution & human rights
                    advocate, freethinker and Deist.  | 
              |
| 1776-1783 | 
                Thomas Paine: The
                      Crisis (link) | 
                ||
| 1776-1785 | 
                Ben Franklin is US
                    Envoy in Paris | 
              ||
| 1778 | 
                Franco-American
                    alliance | 
                Batavian Arts and
                    Science Society founded in Jakarta  | 
              |
| 1779 | 
                Fridericianum state
                    museum founded in Kassel | 
              ||
| 1780 | 
                Jeremy Bentham: Introduction to the Principles of Morals (link)  | 
                ||
| 1780-1787 | 
                Dutch "patriot"
                    democratic movement  | 
                ||
| 1781 | 
                Immanuel Kant: The Critique of Pure Reason (link)  | 
                ||
| 1781-1789 | 
                William Herschel
                    astronomical discoveries (link): —> Planet Uranus (1781) —> Proper motion of Sun & solar system by stars (1783) —> Model of the Milky Way galaxy (1785) —> Titania & Oberon = moons of Uranus (1787) —> Mimas & Enceladus = moons of Saturn (1789)  | 
              ||
| 1782 | 
                Joseph II's
                    Toleration Edict | 
                ||
| 1784 | 
                Calcutta's Asiatick
                    Society of Bengal founded | 
              ||
| 1785 | 
                Start of Pantheism
                    controversy in Germany | 
              ||
| 1786 | 
                William Herschel: Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (link)  | 
                ||
| 1788 | 
                US
                      Constitution ratified | 
                Immanuel Kant: The Critique of Practical Reason (link)  | 
                Iroquois 6 nation /
                    Am. Indian federal
                      democracy influence on US representative
                    federalism (Kickenbird,
                      1987;  Miller, 2015; US Senate 1988 acknowledgment).  | 
              
| 1789 | 
                Start of the French
                    Revolution | 
                The Declaration
                      des Droits de l'Homme et du Citoyen published
                    by the revolutionary Assemblée Nationale in Paris:
                    Freedom of the press in France | 
              |
| 1789-1791 | 
                Erasmus Darwin: The Botanic Garden: Parts I & II (link; cf. link)  | 
                Abolitionist; equal
                    rights for women; Forerunner of Darwinian evolution by his grandson, Charles Darwin online.  | 
              |
| 1791 | 
                C. F. Volney: The
                      Ruins (link;
                    
                      link). A radical 'philosophy of history' essay.  | 
                Pantheonization of
                    Voltaire in Paris | 
              |
| 1791-1792 | 
                Thomas Paine:  The Rights of Man; Parts I & II (link; link; link; link; link);  | 
                ||
| 1791-1793 | 
                Louvre transformed
                    into a national museum | 
              ||
| 1792 | 
                First French
                    Republic founded | 
                Mary Wollstonecraft: Vindication of the Right of Woman (link)  | 
                |
| 1792-1793 | 
                Condorcet's
                    attempted  constitutional and educational reforms 
                 | 
                ||
| 1793 | 
                15-16 February 1793
                    introduction  of Le Plan de Constitution, signed by Le Comité de Constitution: Nicolas de Caritat, Marquis(e) de Condorcet with his wife, the Marquise, Armand Gensonné, Bertrand Barère de Vieuzac, Charles Jean Marie Barbaroux, American Thomas Paine, Jérôme Pétion de Villeneuve, Pierre Victurnien Vergniaud, Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès or Abbé Sieyès (Le Constitution Girondine; link)  | 
                Marquis(e) de
                    Condorcet: Plan de Constitution Présenté à la Convention Nationale, 15 fev 1793 (link; link) Constitution presented, 24 juin 1793 (link; link) Jean-François Varlet: Declarations des Droits de l’Homme dans l’état social (link)  | 
                Le Constitution
                    Girondine = the world's first democratic
                    constitution (J. Israel, 2014).  Paris National Natural History Museum founded  | 
              
| 1793-1794 | 
                Terror in France | 
                Jacobins suppress
                    press freedom | 
              |
| 1794 | 
                Abolition of slavery
                    in the French Empire  | 
                Thomas Paine: The Age of Reason (link; link)  | 
                Antoine Lavoisier
                    guillotined | 
              
| 1794-1796 | 
                Erasmus Darwin: Zoonomia (Part I; Part II)  | 
                Erasmus
                    Darwin, Abolitionist; equal rights for women | 
              |
| 1795 | 
                Batavian Revolution
                    in the Netherlands  | 
                Marquis de
                    Condorcet:  Esquisse d'un Tableau Historique des Progrès de l'Esprit Humain (link)  | 
                Institut de France
                    founded | 
              
| 1796-1799 | 
                The Triennio of
                    Napoleonic reforms in northern Italy  | 
                ||
| 1797 | 
                Thomas Paine: Agrarian Justice (link; link)  | 
                ||
| 1798 | 
                Napoleon invades
                    Egypt | 
                ||
| 1798-1801 | 
                Institut d'Égypte in
                    Cairo founded | 
              ||
| 1799 | 
                Pierre-Simon,
                    Marquis de Laplace:  Traité de Mécanique Céleste, Vol 1 (link) Traité de Mécanique Céleste, Vol 2 (link)  | 
                Rosetta Stone
                    discovered | 
              |
| 1800 | 
                Lamarck outlines his
                    evolutionary theory | 
              ||
| 1802 | 
                Napoleon restores
                    slavery in the French Empire  | 
                Pierre-Simon,
                    Marquis de Laplace:  Traité de Mécanique Céleste, Vol 3 (link)  | 
                Secularization of
                    the Bavarian State Library | 
              
| 1803 | 
                Louisiana Purchase
                    by Jefferson  | 
                Erasmus Darwin: The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society (link)  | 
                |
| 1805 | 
                Pierre-Simon,
                    Marquis de Laplace:  Traité de Mécanique Céleste, Vol 4 (link) Traité de Mécanique Céleste, Vol 5 (1852)  | 
                ||
| 1806-1813 | 
                Napoleon's
                    Confederation of  the Rhine  | 
                ||
| 1807-1810 | 
                King Louis
                    Bonaparte's reform in the Netherlands  | 
                ||
| 1808 | 
                Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences founded | ||
| 1808-1813 | 
                King Joseph's
                    reforms in Spain | 
                ||
| 1810 | 
                The new University
                    of Berlin opens | 
              ||
| 1811-1812 | 
                First Venezuelan
                    Republic | 
                ||
| 1814-1815 | 
                Congress of Vienna | 
                ||
| 1815 | 
                Napoleon's 100 days | 
                ||
| 1817 | 
                Bentham reveals his radicalization | ||
| 1819 | 
                Open of the Prado
                    Museum in Madrid | 
              ||
| 1923 | 
                Pierre-Simon,
                    Marquis de Laplace:  Précis de l'Histoire de l'Astronomie (link)  | 
                ||
| 1824 | 
                Pierre-Simon,
                    Marquis de Laplace: Exposition du Système du Monde (link)  | 
                Braille invented;
                    London College National Gallery founded | 
              |
| 1826 | 
                University College
                    London founded | 
              ||
| 1830 | 
                String of
                    revolutions in Europe | 
                ||
| Legacy | 
                Major historical Events | Key Works (linked) | Developments in Arts & Sciences | 
| 19th- present  | 
                ![]()  | 
                
| 
                   In
                        1720s, in the Netherlands, a huge step in
                        Enlightenment was made by the collaboration of
                        Amsterdam bookmaker Jean-Frédéric Bernard with
                        engraver Bernard Picart in the
                        publication of a multi-volume dictionary of
                        religion between 1723-1743, Ceremonies et
                          Coutumes Religieuses de tous les Peuples du
                          Monde (Amsterdam: J Bernard), indeed "the
                        first global view of religion" (https://historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=2838)
                        and cosmopolitan understanding across cultures.
                        In 1727, the following tableau engraving of
                        world religions illustrated the spirit of the
                        dictionary.  
                    ![]() ![]() ![]() US Declaration of
                            Independence, 04 July 1776 (link);
                            Declaration des Droits de l'Homme et du
                              Citoyen, 1789 (link);
                            Eugene Delacroix, "Liberty Leading the
                            People" (28 July 1830); Louvre,
                            Paris. 
                Historic documents prefiguring and enshrining various aspects of the Enlightenment legacy of universal freedoms and rights: 
  | 
              

.  | Infernalist
                      (Hell forever) | 
                Annihilationist
                      (Hell until 'debt' paid & eternal death) | 
                Universalist
                      (Restoration of all the Universe) | 
              
.