1. What is meant by the Enlightenment? Where did the Enlightenment begin, and what contributed to its spread?
2. Describe the new public sphere and discuss some of the societies that grew within it?
3. Why did Christianity come under attack by deists, skeptics, and freethinkers? What criticism did they advance?
4. In what ways did Voltaire and Madam du Châtelet exemplify the philosophes?
5. What were the essential characteristics of the political thought of Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, and Rousseau? What are the similarities and differences between their ideas?
6. What was Locke's theory of learning, and what was its significance for the Enlightenment?
7. How did the philosophes come to terms with the status of slaves and criminals?
8. What were the views of the philosophes concerning the position of women in society? Did women have an Enlightenment?
9. Did the philosophes approve of capitalism? Why or why not?
10. What made the High Enlightenment different than what preceded it? How did the Encyclopedia exemplify the High Enlightenment?
11. What were the major military conflicts of the eighteenth century? What was the significance of each?
12. To what extent is "enlightened despotism" and contradiction in terms? Who were the major enlightened despots, and how did their policies exemplify this contradiction?
13. In what ways was the American Revolution based on Enlightenment principles?
14. In what ways was the Enlightenment the pivotal period in the shaping of the modern mentality?