Great Books Ladder · High school · Grade 7–12

The Age of Reason

The 17th century, volumes 15 and 21 to 32: Gilbert, Kepler, Bacon, Harvey, Descartes, Galileo, Hobbes, Spinoza, Pascal, Milton, Molière, Racine, Huygens and Newton.

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24 topics in 5 units. Builds on Renaissance and Reformation. Leads to The Enlightenment. Not sure this is the right course? Find your rung.

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Unit 1 The New Science

11 topics

Gilbert, Kepler, Bacon, Harvey, Descartes and Galileo: nature tested by experiment and written in mathematics.

  1. Gilbert: On the Loadstone
  2. Bacon: The Advancement of Learning (being written)
  3. Kepler: The Harmonies of the World
  4. Kepler: Epitome of Copernican Astronomy
  5. Bacon: Novum Organum
  6. Bacon: New Atlantis
  7. Harvey: On the Motion of the Heart and Blood
  8. Descartes: Discourse on the Method
  9. Descartes: The Geometry
  10. Galileo: Two New Sciences
  11. Harvey: On the Generation of Animals

Unit 2 Philosophers

3 topics

Descartes' doubt, Hobbes' Leviathan and Spinoza's Ethics.

  1. Descartes: Meditations on First Philosophy (being written)
  2. Hobbes: Leviathan (being written)
  3. Spinoza: Ethics (being written)

Unit 3 Pascal

3 topics

The vacuum and the arithmetic triangle, the Provincial Letters and the Pensées.

  1. Pascal: The Scientific Treatises
  2. Pascal: The Provincial Letters (being written)
  3. Pascal: Pensées (being written)

Unit 4 Poets and Playwrights

4 topics

Milton's epic, Molière's comedies and Racine's tragedies.

  1. Milton: Paradise Lost (being written)
  2. Milton: Areopagitica and the Poems (being written)
  3. Molière: The Comedies (being written)
  4. Racine: Berenice and Phaedra (being written)

Unit 5 Newton and Huygens

3 topics

The laws of motion and gravity, light as a wave, and light split into colors.

  1. Huygens: Treatise on Light
  2. Newton: The Principia
  3. Newton: Optics
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