Preview

Difference Between Enlightenment And Romantic Thinkers

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
516 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Difference Between Enlightenment And Romantic Thinkers
The enlightenment was a period where revolutions changed how people thought; it introduced the thoughts of liberty, equality and fraternity. People began questioning everything and that lead to change. These people thought different laws and liberties improved their lives, the romantics, emotion driven people interpreted things differently. The Romantic era was a reaction to the Enlightenment and had many differences to it. Enlightenment thinkers and romantics agreed on the ideas of individuality and man’s limitations, but disagreed on how science should have been used, how society should have been run, and how a person should base their opinions.

Both the Enlightenment and Romantic thinkers believed that the individual self is very important.
…show more content…
Enlightenment thinkers believed that constitutional monarchies and republics allowed the people to express their wants, but still keep order in society. Romantics believed that the law centered society does not allow people to embrace nature to their fullest capabilities and that restrict the relationship that people can have with themselves and others.
One of the biggest differences in the Romantic and Enlightenment ideas is how they thought a person should base their thoughts and actions on. Enlightenment people believed that on should base their actions on reasoning and science. But, romantics believed that actions and thoughts should be based on emotion and feelings which stem from nature. Enlightenment people believed romantics were chaotic and irrational, but romantics thought that Enlighten thinkers were oppressive and distant.

Romantic and Enlightenment thinkers had ideas that were similar but the majority of their thinking was not alike. Similarly they believed that individuality was important, and science could only be understood to a certain extent. But they disagreed on ideas such as experimenting, societal issues and personal thought. Like any other groups of strong minded people, they had their similarities and

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Mukcrakers 5.02

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages

    -Romantic writers believed that all people were encouraged torward self-development, and that everyone is valued as individuals from birth. They also believed in expressing themselves in ways that they chose, like art, and all kinds of expression.…

    • 265 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    iwt 1 task 1

    • 1000 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Romanticism, often thought of as a reaction to Neoclassicism and the Age of Enlightenment, was introduced in the 19th century. Unlike Neoclassicism or The Age of Enlightenment, which focused on harmony and reason, Romanticism opposed the rational thought and played on the emotions. Seen mostly in literature, visual art and music, this type of art often included dramatic scenes and subjects that were meant to invoke an emotional…

    • 1000 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    During the Renaissance and Enlightenment times there had been many similarities and differences one similarity was that both times had encourage knowledge and discovery. Some differences included what they had promoted the most, and the roles of women.…

    • 337 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Government gives the citizens protection and guidelines for one’s daily behavior which may often result in an individual’s well-being and contentment, because without the necessity of a government our society would be chaotic. For example, the government can protect our health from the food we intake by inspecting the restaurant to make sure the food is safe for the public. Still, we as a society do not notice the small actions the government completes to ensure we have safety. In order for the people to be pleased in the environment we live in, the government must enforce all regulations. On the other hand, Enlightenment thinking promotes liberty since one is presented with a voice in government which gives the individual the ability to ‘be free within society’, because one is capable of involving oneself in new knowledge and speaking for their stance. Additionally, the people can be free with their…

    • 489 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Enlightenment thinkers essentially believed in freedom. They believed in freedom of the state from the church, freedom of the people from oppression and the monarchy, and freedom of the politicians to change government when things become corrupt. Revolutions followed through those beliefs and separated church and state by dissolving rights and privelegas, gave the people the power they wanted in the third estate, and continually innovated the government structure in search of something better. Ultimately, the Revolutionaries lived up to their motto “liberty, equality,…

    • 757 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Romantics believed in following their emotions and remaining true to their feelings through their labor. They excelled by having an abundance of intuition that helped them succeed in their line of work and praised the romantic heroes for sacrificing life. The romantics used their intuitions to guide them in the right direction without questioning…

    • 385 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Age of Enlightenment was where people of Britain questioned traditional authority and embraced the notion that humanity could be improved through rational change. The outcome of this was new inventions, scientific discoveries, laws, wars and revolutions.…

    • 305 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    As the Enlightenment had a firm hold in France during the last decades of the 18th century, so the Romantic view on science was a movement that flourished in Great Britain and especially Germany in the first half of the 19th century.[5] Both sought to increase individual and cultural self-understanding by recognizing the limits in human knowledge through the study of nature and the intellectual capacities of man. The Romantic movement, however, resulted as an increasing dislike by many intellectuals for the tenets promoted by the Enlightenment; it was felt by some that Enlightened thinkers' emphasis on rational thought through deductive reasoning and the mathematization of natural philosophy had created an approach to science that was too cold…

    • 231 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Enlightenment had many new conceptions and views throughout various nations, by putting and emphasis on science and natural law over religious authority. Some of these ideas were about man's natural rights, freedom of speech, democracy just to name a few of the beliefs that came about during this time period. Some countries that the started to use these thoughts were Italy, France, and a few other countries. There were also many different philosophers that tried to preach many different ideas during the enlightenment time period.…

    • 547 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Enlightenment and Romanticism are both periods of literature that not only are intriquing, but brought forth iconic pieces of work and ideas. I am a huge realist, but I am admittedly more of a Romantcism fan, which rejects reason. Still, I acknowldege the importance of the period and how it has set the foundation of American writing. Before reading work in the Romanticsm movement, I completely dreaded the idea of it. I had a preconcieved notion that it would consist of only love and romance. While there is nothing wrong with that, Romanticism is so much more. For example, I love the story "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving. It consists of key elements of Romanticism including individualism and the supernatural. Irving's story, like most…

    • 252 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    During the late 18th century arose the movement of Romanticism. Ideas emphasized during this period was poetry, art, imagination, and emotions over reasoning. This proceeded the Enlightenment era which began earlier in that century. The focuses of these two eras were different but I believe both were important to the development of the world and not just to Western societies. Since the Romantics followed Enlightenment, philosophers critiqued areas and concepts from the previous age to prove that their present conclusions were ultimately true or at least credible. The whole point of the Enlightenment period was the promotion of human progress by reasoning and science rather than religion or tradition. Important influencers of this age were…

    • 2004 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Even though they showed similarities they differed greatly from each other as Enlightenment tried to explain events and saw God as a faraway figure as opposed to Romantics who used inner feelings and thought God walked closely with humans. As…

    • 677 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Another thinker in this Enlightenment who is very important is John Locke. Locke believed that humans are rational and capable but they need to compromise their beliefs in order to form a government. He believes in the ideas of “Social Contract” and “Natural Rights” as well. Social Contract is an idea in which a government has to protect its citizens to stay in power. Natural Rights is another idea which is that each human is born with three rights, and these are the right to life, liberty, and property. This is what makes John Locke such an important thinker to The Era of…

    • 567 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    To better understand the differences one must know what each of these two ideas encompasses. This “Age of Enlightenment” was a new concept of freedom to think…

    • 481 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Enlightenment was the traditional thought of the time. Thomas Paine was able to exert vast international influence in this subject. His contemporaries in America were Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. The Enlightenment was the scientific and intellectual developments of the 17th century such as Isaac Newton's discoveries, Rene Descartes'…

    • 1159 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays