How Did The Enlightenment Upset The Balances Of Society?

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Social Studies 9 Enlightenment Essay In what ways did the Enlightenment Upset the Balances of Society? The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement during the 17th and 18th century. The Enlightenment changed the way people thought about their society and the entire world. The effort to discover the natural laws that govern the universe led to scientific, political, and social advances. People became more reasonable, individual and skeptical. This movement formed a history-changing force to disturb the society and brought new visions for the future. Firstly, during the Enlightenment, people started to use reasoning to discover the world. For the first time, people began to think about the laws governing the world. They found that nature has its own order and humans could only discover it through curiosity and science. This challenged a lot of the old institutions, especially the Roman Catholic Church, which insists it is the only source of truth. People were not happy with what the priest said, but …show more content…

People found out that they had the right to think differently about the church. If people thought what the priest said was incorrect, they could choose not to follow it. They had the freedom of thought. Since people had the doubt about the church and priests, they decided to share their ideas with others by forming reading clubs and coffeehouses. Without the priest or government officials to monitor them, people could freely express and discuss their ideas of the Enlightenment. Individual freedom also led to self-improvement. Since people were motivated to make the world a better place, they decided to improve their personalities and their social status. This motivation helped form a better society. Since people have the free will to think, to say, and to improve, this made them want to end the rule of the church, which ultimately upset the