Game Plan: -Introduction to the Age Of Reason -American Lit YouTube video -Scarlet Letter Clips Class Starter: Copy down Vocab unit 1 in your notes away from your other class starters. Fun fact: Snails breathe through their feet.

1763 French and Indian War ends 1773 Boston Tea Party Revolutionary War 1776 Declaration of Independence is adopted 1793 Invention of cotton gin 1796 Development of smallpox vaccine 1800 Washington, D.C. is named the capital

The Age of Reason is also known as the Enlightenment, a movement that began in Europe with the development of rationalism by scientists and philosophers.

Rationalism: the belief that human beings can arrive at truth by using reason, rather than by relying on the authority of the past, on religious faith, or on intuition. Rationalists believed in the perfectibility of humans through the use of reason (optimistic view of human nature). Deism: the belief that God created the world but does not interfere with its workings. God = clockmaker (Sir Isaac Newton)

Most literature from this time period is rooted in reality. Literature was often intended to serve practical or political ends. This is considered the age of pamphlets.

Benjamin Franklin: Autobiography, Poor Richard’s Almanac Patrick Henry: “Speech to the Virginia Convention” Thomas Paine: The Crisis, No.1; Common Sense Thomas Jefferson: The Declaration of Independence