The AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT was a fascinating time when European intellectuals decided that reason and logic would save the world from superstition and tyranny. Armed with powdered wigs and pointed feathers, they proudly proclaimed: «Sapere aude!» («Have the courage to use your own mind!»). The irony is that many of these «luminaries of reason» enthusiastically wrote treatises on freedom, sitting in the cozy salons of aristocrats, whose privileges were precisely the main obstacle to this very freedom. They believed in limitless progress, believing that if people understood everything correctly, they would do the right thing. Subsequent revolutions and wars have dampened this optimism in Europe.... Show more