Chapter 4, Section 4The Spread of New Ideas

Section Focus Question:

How did ideas about religion and government influence colonial life?

New ideas about religion and government strengthened democratic ideas among the colonist.

The Importance of Education

• Puritan ideas Influenced colonial education. • To Puritans education went hand and hand

with religion, and everybody was expected to read the Bible.

• They made laws requiring towns to provide public schools.

• Puritan schools were supported by both private and public money.

The Importance of Education (cont)

• These Massachusetts laws were the beginning of public schools in America.

• Colonial schools taught religion, reading, writing, and arithmetic.

• Most schools in Colonial America were in the North.

• In the South, members of the gentry hired private teachers.

• Children of poor families often had no education.

The Importance of Education (cont)

• Only some schools admitted girls. • Dame schools were opened by women to

teach girls and boys to read.• Schools did not admit enslaved Africans.• Some Quaker and Anglican missionaries

taught slaves to read.• After elementary school, some boys went to

grammar school.• The first American colleges were founded

mainly to educate men to become ministers.

How did education differ for girls and boys?

Boys received more education than girls and studied a wider variety of subjects.

Roots of American Literature

• The first American literature was sermons and histories.

• America’s first published poet was Anne Bradstreet. Her poems described the joys and hardships of life in Puritan New England.

• Phyllis Wheatley was an enslaved African in Boston. Her first poem was published in the 1760s when she was about 14.

Roots of American Literature (cont)

• Benjamin Franklin started writing the Pennsylvania Gazette when he was 17.

• His most popular work, Poor Richard’s Almanac, was published yearly from 1733 to 1753.

• He was also a scientist, businessman, and diplomat.

How did Ben Franklin contribute to American literature?

He published a newspaper, an almanac, and a popular autobiography.

The Great Awakening

Preachers

• Jonathan Edwards

• George Whitefield

Jonathan Edwards

• 1703-1758

• Interpreter of and

apologist for the

Great Awakening

05/09/2010 13

George Whitefield

• 1714 - 1770• In 1738 made 1st of

7 visits to the America• Ordained Anglican• “Great Itinerant”• Member of Wesley’s Oxford

“Holy Club”• Popular as G. Washington• Huge crowds: 30,000

Message

• Personal relationship with God

• Revival Meetings

• No clergy to channel prayers

• Emotional

• Mission to Indians

Change in religions

• Baptists and Methodists grew

• Church of England and Puritan churches declines

AMERICAN RELIGION BECOMES MORE

DEMOCRATIC

Baptists

• In America since 17th century

• Galvanized by

Great Awakening

• Baptists (Separate Congregationalists) in

New England (Connecticut) expands to

Separate Baptists in N. Carolina

• From 6,000 – 20,000 in 3 years, foundation of

Southern Baptists

How did the Great Awakening affect American society.

It reinforced democratic ideas by encouraging people to make their own decisions about religion and politics.

The Enlightenment-Starting in the late 1600s, a group of Enlightenment thinkers believed that all problems could be solved by reason. -They look for “natural laws” that governed politics, society, and economics.-Englishman John Locke contributed some of the movement’s key ideas.

John Locke

• One of the great philosophers of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century.

• An Oxford scholar, medical researcher and physician, political operative, economist and ideologue

• According to Locke, we can know with certainty that God exists.

• We can also know about morality with the same precision we know about mathematics, because we are the creators of moral and political ideas.

• He gives us the theory of natural law and natural rights which he uses to distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate civil governments.

Liberalism and the Age of Reason

Foundations of the Liberal Tradition

Any single man must judge for himself whether circumstances warrant obedience or resistance to the commands of the civil magistrate; we are all

qualified, entitled, and morally obliged to evaluate the conduct of our rulers.

- John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, 1689

Montesquieu

Montesquieu - The Spirit of the Laws 1748

- favored separation of powers

- this would prevent any on group from gaining too much power.

- checks / balances- this became the basis of government in

the United States.

New Core Values

• The general trend was clear: individualism, freedom and change replaced community, authority, and tradition as core values in Europe and Colonial America.

Enlightenment in America• Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, many of

the intellectual leaders of the American colonies were drawn to the Enlightenment. – Jefferson, Washington, Franklin, and

Paine were powerfully influenced by Enlightenment thought.

Heritage of the Enlightenment (3)

• Yet in many ways, the Enlightenment has never been more alive.

• It formed the consensus of international ideals by which modern states are judged.– Human rights– Religious tolerance – Self-government

What was the goal of Enlightenment thinkers?

They wanted to solve problems by applying reason to discover the “natural laws” that governed the universe.