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Article: A Designer Enlightenment Tailored to Conservative Tastes.(Arts&Entertainment)(Review)
- Article from:
- The New York Observer (New York, NY)
- Article date:
- August 30, 2004
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 The New York Observer. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: James Buchan
The Roads to Modernity: The British, French and American Enlightenments, by Gertrude Himmelfarb. Alfred A. Knopf, 272 pages, $25.
Europe and North America in the second half of the 18th century thought of themselves as enlightened. Images of light and enlightenment sparkle through the philosophy, the sermons, the journalism, even the commercial prospectuses of the age.
Historians have largely taken the 18th century at its own estimation. The Enlightenment (with definite article) was to the 20th century a sort of mental sea change that swept away the dilapidated superstitions and tyrannies of the Christian West before coming ...