Development of private enterprise. Desire to understand life on this earth. The Age of Reason. Historical optimism. The human intellect will be able to free itself of prejudice, superstition, ignorance, of traditional authority - the Enlightenment.
It was based on Descartes's rationalism, which had brought the spirit of mathematical, mechanistic natural sciences into philosophy and on John Locke's empirism. Locke reduced human knowledge to what can be perceived by human senses.
Absolute faith in scholarly and scientific research. The world was seen as an extraordinarily complex mechanism which it was possible to grasp by the intellect and the senses.
God was the Prime Mover - he had only set the world in motion. Isaac Newton proved his heliocentric and gravitationa theories.
Montesquieu: laws are derived from human nature, not from God's revelation.
Voltaire criticised the church and society.
The scholarship of the enlightenment understood the natural world in mechanistic terms. Natural phenomena were exactly classified and described. Attempts to impose a system on the world. Hierarchies. France: Encyclopaedia. Interest in scientific research amongst a large number of autodidacts - many botanical gardens, collections, scientific discussions in noble and burger society. Quick development of journalism.
But 18th century Britain was not absolutistic: the power of the King was curtailed by Parliament.
But many absolutistic monarchies in Europe. Realisation that only social improvement of all classes can prevent regression and disintegration of the state.
The interest of the state demanded that the ruler should stand above all social classes and present himself as an impartial judge.
The deistic, enlightenment notion of the state: complex machine which can work only if all its parts (all citizens) function properly. Thus only wrongly functioning spare parts must be removed. No morals.
Marquis de Sade: "as long as citizens are free to give vent to their instincts and prejudices within state channels, designed for this, they are not a danger". Police terror against citizens is justified if it preserves the stability of the state.
Absolutism demanded strong SOCIAL DISCIPLINE. Due to the sad experience of recent religious wars.
Ideal of "model community" which ignored conflicts of individual classes.
Recatholisation of Bohemia was regarded increasingly as a matter of the state, not of religion. Non-catholic religious belief was increasingly seen as a crime against the state.
Mid 17th century: Jansenism: against frequent religious services. Only some people will be saved. Later, in 18th century, Jansenists provided arguments for enlightened absolutism, for the introduction of secular power into the matters of religion. Jesuits against this: "Jansenist religious principles are faar too strict: all people can be saved if they wish to be saved."
Josephinism was based on the principles of mercantilism and populationism:
Josephinists argued that church property was not sufficiently productive, not sufficiently taxed, the church bureaucracy is too expensive, celibacy is against human nature and against the state population policy, too many religious feasts curtail business activity,
Joseph II: all people are equal, since all had been given a soul by God. 18th century moral individuals do not need the mediation of the church for their salvation.
1781: Decree of Toleration: some non-catholic denominations were permitted. Abolishment of a main principle of the existence of the Habsburg dynasty in the 17th and 18th centuries: monopoly of catholicism.
Emperor Charles VI. died on 20th October 1740. Male Habsburg line ended.
Pragmatic sanction: Archduchess Maria Teresa, married to a Tuscany duke, assumed power. But problems: German princes disputed her accession, especially the Prussian King Friedrich. He defeated the Habsurg army in 1741. The antihabsburg coalition was also joined by the French and Spanish Bourbons.
The aristocracy in Bohemia accepted Charles Albert of Bavaria as their king in 1742. But Maria Teresa managed to push him out of Prague (losing Silesia and Klodsko) and in 1743 was crowned in Prague. Henceforth Maria Teresa distrusted Bohemian aristocracy and gave more leeway to Hungarian nobles who had supported her. More wars with Prussia, the wars of the Austrian succession did not end until 1748.
Prussian King Friedrich II. set up a spying network in Saxony and Bohemia, concluded a treaty with Britain in 1756.
Austria joined a coalition with Russia and France.
In 1756, the Prussians occupied Saxony, the Habsburg army was defeated, in 1757, the Prussians invaded Bohemia, defeated the Habsburg army, but the Prussians were defeated by Marshall Leopold Daun in 1757.
From 1759 Austria, France, Russia, tried to crush Prussia. But the coalition disintegrated and Prussia's role in Europe was preserved. Silesia was lost to Austria for ever.
Maria Teresa's son Joseph II. elected empeeror in 1764.
1763 - 1792 - more wars with Prussia. Fortification of Hradec Králové, Olomouc, the building of new fortresses: Terezín and Josefov. Nevertheless, Joseph II. admired Prussian King Friedrich II. Militarisation of life in the Austrian monarchy.
In the 1770s and 1780s, Joseph's foreign policy depended on Russia. In 1772- 1773 Russia, Austria took part in the first division of Poland.
1787 unsuccessful war against Turkey.
Joseph II. died in 1790,
His brother Leopold ruled 1790-1792, then his son Francis II. - he assumed a sharpy anti-French, anti-revolutionary attitude.
The French Legislative Assembly declared war on Francis II. on 20th April 1792.
On 22nd September 1792 the French National Convention proclaimed France a republic and French King Louis XVI was guillotined on 21st January 1793.
Austrian offensive against France, Jacobine revolutionary terror, executions.
Later, a number of defeats of Austria by Napoleon. In 1797 - an Austrian - French peace treaty, but further wars waged by Austria against France.
Francis II. made himself hereditary Austrian Emperor in 1804 and called himself Francis I.
In 1805, Napoleon occupied Vienna and French troops appeared in a number of South Bohemian towns. On 2nd December 1805, Napoleon won the greatest battle of his career over Austrian near Austerlitz (Slavkov).
Soon thereafter Napoleon crushed Prussia. Further Austrian-French wars, until the French Emperor married the daughter of the Austrian Emperor Marie Luisa and Austria pledge to give Napoleon support for his campaign to Russia.
Napoleon defeated in Russia in 1812. Austrian - Russian ceasefire, secret negotiations with the Russian tsar Alexander I. No final agreement. Austria declared a new war on France
Napoleon was eventually defeated in the battle of nations near Leipzig on 16th-19th October 1813.
Vienna Congress: 14th September 1814- 19th June 1815: ended the epoch of wars with France, intending to restore political status quo from 1792.
Maria Teresa realised the importance of the Czech Lands. Hence social and economic policy of enlightened absolutism directed at Bohemia.
1749: existing separate Chancellries for Bohemia and Austria were abolished and two new centralist institutions to rule both countries together were set up. They were headed by reformist count Václav Antonín of Kounic.
At the end of the Seven year war, problems of feeding the population of Bohemia: short supply of foodstuffs. Heavy taxes: 42 per cent. Impossible to lower them, great indebtedness of the state.
Farming production mostly in Austria. People were in subjugation. Need for reform to free people.
Large rebellion of subjects in Austrian Silesia in 1760s. Instances of cruel treatment of subjects in Bohemia investigated in 1768-1771. After a bad harvest in 1771 - last great famine in Bohemia. Strong criticism of state policy from everywhere: "the state should not represent only the interests of the highest nobility".
Hence reform work, with a view to reduce large forced labour of the subjects. A number of peassant rebellions, accusing the nobility of "hiding freeing decrees".
1775: the "robota" decree partially alleviated the heavy burdens ¨ 1781: Josef II. published a decree, abolishing "Leibeigenschaft" (subjugation) - subjects could now marry, move and send children to schools without the concent of the nobility. Certain curtailment of unpaid work of subjects at noblemen's hosues, but "robota" continued unchanged. More riots.
In 1789 - introduction of a unified tax: Most "robota" work was turned into taxes and the tax burden was not allowed to be more than 30 per cent.
The nobility forced the successor of Josef II. to abolish this, 1790-1792: more riots. Joseph II - seen by ordinary people as "peasant emperor".
Lack of affluence in towns and in the countryside. Farmers: "honest livelihood above all". Rejection of profit, that was regarded as immoral - only Jews did that.
But after Austrian lost Silesia, the Austrian state stimulated cloth manufacturing in Bohemia, state subsidies, setting up schools, limiting the rights of guilds. Principles of free enterprise.
Technological backwardness. System of factoring: Enterpreneurs gave weavers raw materials to process at home and collected finished work. Later, concentrated manufacture. Cotton industry. Work for the army.
From 1780s, fast growth of a number of businesses. Manufacture of sugar, china, paper making, suphuric acid.
First machines at about 1800. Beginnings of the industrial revolution.
State bankruptcy in 1811., due to a number of wars. The value of paper money was reduced to twenty per cent.
First industrial exhibition in Prague, Klementinum, in 1791 - considerable sophistication of manufacturing methods. First such exhibition in Europe.
Rococo style after 1740. With the growth of absolutism and the arrival of professional bureaucracies, the nobility lost its raison détre. Began to support the arts.
Musical emigration: Jan Dismas Zelenka, the Benda family left Bohemia for religious reasons. Jan Mysliveček, the Stamitz Family left for lack of professional opportunities.
Czech musicians played an important role in the musical life of Dresden, Berlin, Mannheim, Paris, Vienna. The cult of Christmas. Premiere of Mozart's Don Giovanni in Prague on 29th October 1787, conducted by Mozart.
Censorship - was still strict under Maria Teresa. Import of books was disallowed.
1781 - Joseph II. liberalised censorship, but in 1792 Francis II. tightened it again. No pro-French articles in newspapers.
1798 decree banned the display of uncensored newspapers. Hundreds of copies of newspapers.
At the beginning of Maria Teresa's rule, schools were in the hands of jesuits.
In 1784, Latin replaced by German as a teaching language. In 1773 the Jesuit order was abolished, which affected the teaching of Czech, since Jesuit schools were mostly Czech.
1774: Allgemeine Schulordnung: the General School Regulations: Dense network of "trivial schools" in villages and small towns. Reading, writing, arithmetics, religions, fundaments of professions.
Which originated at the beginning of the 18th century in England became a movement of the intellectual and aristocratic elite, striving for cultural and social improvement of mankind. Masons set up in Prague in 1742. Orphanage, a deaf-mute institute, various museums. Aristocrats specialised in caballistic teachings, secretiveness. Later used by Romanticism.
Illuminates - wanted to improve mankind, not individuals. Fundamentals of enlightened democratism. Humanisation of criminal law and civic equality before law. 1776 - torture during criminal investigation was banned.
Development of modern statistics. Aristocrats, peasants, equal items. Practical abolishment of capital punishment - no educational impact.
The Police - an inspection network, checking upon bureaucrats and the clergy. Later, under Francis II., secret masonic agents in the police were useful - the masonic lodges abolished themselves.
Widespread discussions on reforms of the Enlightenment in Bohemia. Sophisticated law. Principles of human rights.
originated in connection with the wars for Silesia - Czech came into contact with other nationalities. Nobility in Bohemia - cosmopolitan, non Czech. Territorial patriotism. Czech language - symbol of the state.
Maria Teresa: 1747: decree that Czech should be taught properly in the interest of the state. Mostly only in theological schools.
Important role of critical historical studies. Ad fontes. To primary sources. Dobrovský,.
Priests and clergymen, catholic and protestant, became the bearers of new Czech democratism.
Jungmann's concept of Czech nation, idiosyncratic linguistically, ethnically and culturally.