Cornell Notes
• Take your notebook paper and
title it “Literature of the
Revolutionaries.”
• Then, set up the sections as
shown in the illustration on the
both pieces of paper.
 Make a column titled
“Questions and Cues” on the
left.
 Make a column titles
“Detailed Notes” on the right.
 Make a section titled
“Summary Bullets” at the
bottom.
Cornell Notes
•
Make eight, six-line sections in the left-hand column of your paper
(four on one piece of paper; four on another piece of paper) .
•
Write one of the following questions in each section:
1. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of education?
2. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of religion?
3. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of work and
worldly success?
4. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of man?
5. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of society?
6. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of authority?
7. What is the Revolutionaries’ view of life?
8. What is the Revolutionaries’ definition of truth?
Literature of the
Revolutionaries
The Enlightenment
• In the 1700’s, there was a burst of intellectual
energy taking place in Europe that came to be
known as the Enlightenment.
• Enlightenment thinkers had begun to question
previously accepted truths about who should hold
the power in government.
• Their thinking pointed the way to a government by
the people – one in which the people consent to
government limitations in exchange for the
government’s protection of their basic rights and
liberties.
The Enlightenment
• American colonists adapted
these Enlightenment ideals
to their own environment.
• The political writings of
Benjamin Franklin, Thomas
Paine, and Thomas Jefferson
shaped the American
Enlightenment.
• Soon, the American
Enlightenment began to
eclipse even the most
brilliant European thought.
A Revolutionary Focus
• While it may sound strange, some of the most
famous figures of the American Revolution lived at
the same time as Puritans.
• As products of the Enlightenment, however,
revolutionary writers focused their energies on
matters of government rather than religion.
Pamphlets and Propaganda
• Many of the gifted minds of
this period were drawn to
political writings as the
effort to launch a grand
experiment in government
that took shape in North
America.
• The most important outlet
for the spread of these
political writings was the
pamphlet.
Pamphlets and Propaganda
• Between 1763 and 1783, about two
thousand pamphlets were published.
• These inexpensive “little books”
became the fuel of the revolution,
reaching thousands of people quickly
and stirring debate and action in
response to growing discontent with
British rule.
• Through these pamphlets, the words
that would define the American cause
against Great Britain became the
currency of the day, and the debate
about independence grew louder and
louder.
Common Sense
• One such pamphlet, Common Sense,
by Thomas Paine, helped propel the
colonists to revolution.
• Though expressing the views of the
rational Enlightenment, Paine also
agreed with the Puritan belief that
America had a special destiny to be
a model to the rest of the world.
• At the end of his stirring essay, he
says that freedom had been hunted
down around the globe and calls on
America to “receive the fugitive,” to
give freedom a home, and to
welcome people from around the
world to its free society.
Writing that Launched a Nation
• Thomas Jefferson also wrote
pamphlets, but his great contribution
to American government, literature,
and the cause of freedom throughout
the world is the Declaration of
Independence, in which he eloquently
articulated the natural law that would
govern America.
• This natural law is the idea that
people are born with rights and
freedoms and that it is the function of
government to protect those
freedoms.
Writing that Launched a Nation
• Eleven years later, after the Revolutionary War
had ended, delegates from all but one state
gathered at the Philadelphia State House – in the
same room in which the Declaration of the
Independence had been signed – in order to
discuss forming a new government.
• The delegates included many outstanding leaders
of the time, such as Benjamin Franklin, Alexander
Hamilton, and George Washington.
Writing that Launched a Nation
• Four months later, they emerged with
perhaps the country’s most important piece
of writing: The Constitution of the United
States of America.
• Although Washington said at the time, “I do
not expect the Constitution to last for more
than 20 years,” it was indeed
flexible enough to last through
the centuries to come.
The Founding Fathers
• The Founding Fathers of the
United States of America were
political leaders and statesmen
who participated in the American
Revolution by signing the United
States Declaration of
Independence, taking part in the
American Revolutionary War,
establishing the United States
Constitution, or by some other key
contribution.
The Founding Fathers
• Some historians define the "Founding Fathers" to
mean a larger group, including not only the
Signers of the Declaration of Independence or the
Framers of the Constitution, but also all those who,
whether as politicians, jurists, statesmen, soldiers,
diplomats, or ordinary citizens, took part in
winning American independence and creating the
United States of America.
The Founding Fathers
• Some of the most notable or most frequently
referenced Founding Fathers are:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
John Adams
Benjamin Franklin
Alexander Hamilton
John Jay
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison
George Washington
The Revolutionaries’ Education
• Many of the Founding Fathers had strong
educational backgrounds at colonial colleges or
abroad.
• Some, like Franklin and Washington, were largely
self-taught or learned through apprenticeship.
• Others gained instruction from tutors or at
academies.
• About half attended or
graduated from college.
• Some had medical degrees
or advanced theology training.
• Most of the education was in the colonies, but a few
lawyers were trained at the Inns of Court in London.
The Revolutionaries’ Religion
• Because the Founding Fathers of the United States were
heavily influenced by Enlightenment philosophies, it is
generally believed that many of them were deists.
• Deism in the philosophy of religion is the standpoint that
reason and observation of the natural world, without the
need for organized religion, can determine that the
universe is a creation and has a creator.
• Furthermore, the term often implies that this supreme
being does not intervene in human affairs or suspend the
natural laws of the universe.
• Deists typically reject supernatural events such as
prophecy and miracles, tending to assert that a god (or
"the Supreme Architect") does not alter the universe by
(regularly or ever) intervening in the affairs of human life.
The Revolutionaries’ Religion
• This idea is also known as the Clockwork Universe
Theory, in which a god designs and builds the
universe, but steps aside to let it run on its own.
• The earliest known usage in print of the English
term "deist" is 1621, and "deism" is first found in a
1675 dictionary.
• Deism became more prominent in the 17th and 18th
centuries during the Age of Enlightenment mostly
among those raised as Christians who found they
could not believe in supernatural miracles, the
inerrancy of scriptures, or the Trinity, but who did
believe in one God.
Revolutionaries in Action
Now, your primary source packet.
Together, let’s examine Benjamin’s Franklin’s “Moral
Perfection” and excerpt from Poor Richard’s
Almanac to identify and evaluate the
philosophical, religious, ethical, and social
influence that shaped the literature of this period.