Compare And Contrast Thomas Jefferson And The Enlightenment

In the years of 1670 – 1800 there was an intellectual movement that dominated Europe on ideas that were based around reason, the movement is the called the enlightenment. This was a period of: relative political stability, economic recovery, prosperity for emerging “middle class”, new markets, and trends in consumption. Additionally, society was more accepting or more tolerable to different religions, while also applying science to world problems rather than relying on religion to fix the problem. In saying that, these ideas could not be possible without people with great minds to elicit such ideas. These great thinkers challenged their society’s traditional way of operating. Some of the thinkers discussed will be Thomas Jefferson and Mary

Thomas Jefferson was born in Virginia in the year of 1743 and died in 1826. Jefferson was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence written in 1776, his rational though and useful knowledge would soon guarantee the progress of humanity. In this document, Jefferson used key words like reason and right to justify the acts he was stating. For example, Jefferson states, “…all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” This conveys how Jefferson wanted equality for men because it is their right. Jefferson also mentioned the idea of consent, which was based on Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Rousseau, a great thinker as well wrote about the idea of consent of the governed. This was the idea that the leader and the people are in a contract and the authority of the government should depend on the consent of the people. For example, in The Declaration of Independence, it states, “—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 of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it…” For the most part, Jefferson’s implementation of these ideas challenged society’s traditional