Voltaire

Voltaire’s Candide and the Enlightenment




It is true that Voltaire is considered to be one of the greatest figures to come out of the 18th Century Enlightenment. Voltaire is one of the first to establish new ways of thinking and to present new ways to express ones ideas. As we have learned, the Enlightenment is considered to be the beginning of the spread of Western thought and culture. It was a movement that brought out a wide variety of ideas and advances in the fields of philosophy, science, and medicine in the 18th century. As stated in the textbook, “Voltaire virtually personified the Enlightenment (Western Civilizations pg. 651).” Voltaire’s themes were of religious and political liberty, and he argued for common sense and simplicity. He persuaded that these themes would help bring out the goodness in humanity and establish stable authority. In Voltaire’s Candide, we can find many examples of how Voltaire can be considered a “modern” thinker, and...