Renaissance Science and the Heliocentric Theory:
 Europe’s scientific and technological aptitude increased during the early
modern period.
 During the late Renaissance, certain thinkers and scholars were already
moving away from the intellectual orthodoxy of the Middle Ages, in which a
fixed set of ideas from the age of ancient Greece and Rome (especially
selected theories from the writings of Aristotle, Ptolemy, and Galen) were
combined with Catholic doctrine.
 During the mid-1500s, despite the continued power and willingness of the
Catholic Church to control European intellectual life, individuals like the
Flemish doctor Andreas Vesalius and the Polish astronomer Nikolai
Copernicus began to cross important scientific boundaries.
 Vesalius did pioneering work in the field of human anatomy.
 Even more famously, Copernicus provided astronomical and mathematical
proof for the heliocentric theory, or the theory that the earth and other
planets revolve around the sun.
 The Catholic Church favored the geocentric theory, in which the earth –
home to what the Church considered God’s greatest creation, human beings
– was at the center of the universe.
 Because of this, it took more than another century before the heliocentric
theory was accepted as fact throughout Europe.
The Scientific Revolution:
 The pace of scientific discovery accelerated during the 1600s and early 1700s.
 Consequently, it is common to speak of these years as a period of scientific
revolution in Europe.
 During this time, thinkers like René Descartes of France and Roger Bacon of
England laid the groundwork for modern formal logic and revitalized the
ancient concept of the scientific method.
 Also during these years, astronomers such as the German Johannes Kepler
and the Italian Galileo reconfirmed and popularized Copernicus’ theories
(Kepler also proved that the planets move in elliptical, not circular, orbits.)
 Many of the ideas that make up our basic understanding of science were
discovered or proven during the Scientific Revolution.
 They include the states of matter (liquid, gas, or solid), the question of
whether light is made up of waves or particles, the fact that living creatures
are made up of cells, the existence of small blood vessels called capillaries, the
concept of the vacuum, and the science of statistics.
 Among the basic scientific instruments invented or perfected during these
years were the telescope, the microscope, the pendulum clock, the
thermometer, and the barometer.
 The single person who most represents the Scientific Revolution at its peak
was Sir Isaac Newton (1642 – 1727) of England.
 Newton is famous for a number of ideas and discoveries, including his laws of
motion, his laws of thermodynamics, his thoughts on the concept of gravity,
and his role in inventing the mathematical system of calculus.

The publication of his mathematical work Principia (1687) is considered one
of the most important moments in European intellectual history.
 Just as important as all of these accomplishments, however, is the fact that
Newton, more than any other figure of the Scientific Revolution, understood
scientific thought as a totality.
 Newton was able to take all the discoveries and theories of his day, and tie
them together into a single system of thought – Newtonian physics – backed
up by mathematical proof.
 Not until Einstein’s development of the theory of relativity at the beginning
of the twentieth century would Newton’s fundamental conception of how
scientific principles operated be seriously challenged or altered.
The Time Line of Feudalism:
 Feudalism persisted throughout the medieval period, and its effects were felt
long afterward.
 Ironically, it outlasted its original purpose.
 Even after political units in medieval Europe began to centralize and
resemble nations in the modern sense, many feudal practices remained in
place.
 Serfdom took many centuries to disappear, especially in central and eastern
Europe.
 The knightly class transformed into aristocratic nobility that remained a
permanent part of European politics and society until the 1800s (in some
countries, the 1900s).
 The class differences that feudalism set into place also survived as tensions
between the poor and powerless on one hand and the rich and power on the
other.
Romanticism:
 The principal cultural movement of the late 1700s and early 1800s was
Romanticism.
 Originating in the poetry and drama of German authors, as well as the
writings of French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Romanticism
represented a backlash against the logic- and reason-oriented outlook of the
Enlightenment.
 Romanticism placed a premium on emption and passion, the self-realization
of the individuals, heroism, and a love of the natural world.
 Among the many famous Romantics are the writers and poets William Blake,
Lord Byron, J.W. von Goethe, and Victor Hugo; the artists J.M.W. turner
and Eugene Delacroix; and the musicians Ludwig van Beethoven (generally
considered to be the first major Romantic composer), Richard Wagner, and
Pyotr Tchaikovsky.
Realism:
 Although Romanticism did not die out, it yielded its place of prominence
around the 1840s and 1850s.
 As its name suggests, Realism rejected Romanticism’s idealized, dramatic
outlook in favor of a more sober, critical view of life.
SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY
by: George Gordon (Lord) Byron (1788-1824)
HE walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!