Voltaire was one of the many brilliant men from this time period whose inspiring pieces of literature were an example of what France wished their nation to embody. Despite intentions, throughout the duration of the French Revolution, the people failed to uphold the newly established ideals of the Enlightenment.
In France specifically, they were so haunted by their conditions, and inspired by the new ideas that they led a Revolution, believing they could positively change their nation. Many believed that they were being treated unfairly by those who ruled them, and these feelings were validated by the words of the philosophes. The foundation of such information emanated from the minds of ingenious scholars by the name philosophes.ĭue to the immense power of these peoples’ writings, discoveries and theories, commoners began to question their basic understandings of life, and evaluate their circumstances in terms of their role in government. The Enlightenment was a time of educational prosper in which new ideas and standards were developed through processes of logic and reason, allowing the expansion of influential knowledge across Europe.