Age of Enlightenment and French Revolution

1. Napoleon Bonaparte claimed to have put into practice the ideals of the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. Do you think he did? Did his actions and the legacy of his reign represent those ideals? Explain in a short essay whether or not Bonaparte’s reign and legacy embodied the ideals of the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. Provide facts to support your claim. Answer: No, I do not believe that Bonaparte successfully enacted the ideals, requests, and visions of his people. As proven by the French Revolution, the people of France sincerely wanted and yearned for some form of representation in the government.

Bonaparte was aware that the French people wanted nothing other than that, but still pursued a monarchy because HE believed that people needed some form of ruling/monarchy. All Bonaparte managed to do was RECREATE the prior monstrosity of a monarchy that had ruled prior, but this time it was backed by a ruthless and efficient man who was 10 times the man King Louis was. Not only did Napoleon not fulfill the desires of his people in respect to the government, he also spit in their faces by restoring and backing Catholicism in France again. Ultimately, Napoleon only succeeded in creating a more powerful and ruthless French Monarchy that played by all the same rules.

2. There were similarities and differences between the American and French revolutions. Compare and contrast these two revolutions in a short essay. Describe both how they were alike and how they were different. Answer: Though different, the French and American revolutions were stemmed from a long period of oppression by a ruling government that got too big for their britches. The American Revolution consisted of many intellectual people initially working together in hopes of properly discussing and working something out that would give them an out from England. As we all know, that failed and the end result was a war. France was unable to even pursue the idea of discussing things out, and hoping to achieve a peaceful out with the King and Queen, solely because the King and Queen’s VAST ignorance in relation to the wellbeing of their people put up impassable walls and barriers.

The French people naturally HAD to resort to violence, because it was the only way to achieve any form of an out. In both Revolutions, the end game was violence, death, and bloodshed. But the beginning game was different, the Colonies had a bit more of a chance for discussion and peaceful end than the French did.. as well as the face that the Colonies stopped their war with England once they were given what they were demanded, while the French continued massacres of their own people for long periods of time.