Civilization #50: Rule, Britannia!

Okay, so the question we are looking at today is, how did England become the greatest empire in human history? This is about the 19th century, when the British Empire is at its peak. As you can see, it really controls most of the world. So the question then is, how did this happen? Why is it that England was able to surpass Spain, France, Germany, the Holy Roman Empire, Russia, to become the dominant hegemon in the world? So my argument to you today is, it has to do with the fact that throughout its history, England was forced to innovate. In a more rigorous and relentless way than other nations. And a lot has to do with its geography. Okay? So as you can see from its geography, Great Britain, this is Ireland, this is England, Wales, Scotland. It is an extremely mountainous region. They have a lot of rivers, but there are no major rivers. Which meant

that, for most of its history, Britain never had a major population center that could grow and grow until it overwhelmed the entire geographic area. This meant that, for most of its history, England, Britain, was engaged in a process of what we call open competitive cooperation. Not only that, Britain was engaged in a process of open competitive cooperation. But because this area is very mountainous and because these groups, these tribes are divided heavily amongst themselves, throughout most of its history, Britain is actually pretty easy to invade. They have no centralized authority, so it's possible for other groups of people to come and create settlements in Britain, which is what the Vikings did, which is also what the Romans, the Amnaya. So throughout its history, Britain had underwent a series of great destruction, where the elites were constantly replaced by new elites. Okay? And because Britain is poor, because there's so much conflict within Britain, eventually the English people were forced to migrate overseas to create new opportunities.

And this process of colonial expansion led to the British Empire. Okay? So there's a famous saying that the British Empire was founded by accident. Okay? There was no intention to create this empire, but because of these historical, geographic, demographic forces. Britain became the world's largest empire. Let's very quickly look at Britain's demographic history. So for most of its history, because of its geography, because of the fact that it was poor and divided, the population of Britain stayed very flat. Okay? Up until the year 1000. What happened in the year 1000? Well, Europe became wealthier and wealthier. It engaged in a proto -industrial and agricultural revolution. Which caused the demographic to increase. But unfortunately, if your demographics increase, but you don't have improvements in sanitation, in health, in nutrition, well what happens? You have something called the Black Death, which causes the entire population of Europe, including Britain, to collapse.

Okay? After the Black Death, the Europeans start to engage in the Gunpowder Revolution. And with that, you have industrialization, urbanization, and that causes the population to increase. But if you see about the middle of the 16th century, 17th century, up until about 1800, the population is flat. This is what we call the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Britain is the first European nation to undergo the Industrial Revolution. And what that meant is you have this massive migration from the rural areas into the urban areas. Especially London. Okay? So why would this population or demographic shift cause the population to stay flat? Well, the first reason is it's really, really unsafe in the cities. Diseases, malnutrition, lack of sanitation cause people to die really, really young. Also during this time, because of the massive inequality in Britain, people are forced to migrate overseas. Okay? In order to seek better opportunities. Mainly America.

But they will also go to Australia and New Zealand. So even though the Dutch were the first to discover and settle Australia and New Zealand, it is really the British who, because of pressure back home, they will settle in Australia and New Zealand. And today, Australia and New Zealand, of course, they have a British culture instead of a Dutch culture. Okay? Starting in about the year 1800, because of improvements in nutrition, sanitation, the population explodes. Alright? And this is true for, throughout Europe. And this is really why Europe will eventually conquer the world. Alright. So let's go briefly into the history of the British Isles. So at first, we believe that the British Isles were settled by an agricultural people. Okay? These are the people who built Stonehenge. Now, if you remember way back to the beginning of this course, back in September, I discussed Gobekli Tepe, right? Gobekli Tepe is a temple in Anatolia,

in what is modern -day Turkey, that shows the desire for humans to settle down and found religious societies. Well, Gobekli Tepe is very similar to Stonehenge. They are both astronomical. They have astronomical calendars that measure the stars, measure time, and try to bring divine energy onto the earth in order to feed agriculture. So you can argue that what's happening is the Gobekli Tepe culture is spreading all throughout Europe, and it gets into the British Isles. But eventually, these people are conquered by the Yamnaya. Okay? And if you look at the DNA evidence, a lot of these people were eventually wiped out by the Yamnaya and replaced. This is a process of destruction that will happen throughout British history. The next major development is the Roman conquest of Britain. When the Romans conquer Britain, they bring Roman technology, which is aqueducts, irrigation, urbanization. They will also bring Roman customs, especially law. Okay?

So now you have a legal tradition in Britain that continues on to today. They will found a city called Londinium, which is now modern -day London, off the River Thames. Okay? And this city will eventually become the largest city in Europe. After the Romans will come a new group of people who are Germanic. Okay? So these are people who used to live in Denmark and northern Germany. And because of population pressure, they are forced to migrate overseas, and they settle in Britain. There are three different tribes of people that settle in Britain. They are the Angles, the Saxons, and the Dukes. And together, we will collectively call them the Anglo -Saxons. And at this point in history, this culture, this language, it's no different from that of Germany. Okay? So if you were to go to this place in about the year 800, they're speaking the same language, which is West Germanic, and today we call it Old English.

Again, what's really important to remember is it's fairly easy to settle down in Britain because there's no centralized authority. So after the Anglo -Saxons comes the Vikings from Denmark. Okay? And even though England has no major rivers, it has still a lot of rivers. So it's fairly easy for the Vikings, with their very fast longships, to come and make settlements. So as you can see, the Danelaw are territory that is ceded by the Anglo -Saxons to the Vikings. Okay? And now you have this merger of the Viking culture with the Anglo -Saxon culture. This process of creative destruction continues with the Norman conquest of England. This is year 1066. This battle is called the Battle of Hastings. In which, when the conqueror of Normandy in France, he comes and conquers the British Isles. Okay? Britain. Okay? This is significant for two reasons. The first reason is that the Normans are Vikings who settled down in France, in an area called Normandy that's off the British coast.

And remember, before the Anglo -Saxons were Germanic people, so their focus was on the Northern Europe. Because the Normans conquered Britain, Britain now is united with parts of France. Okay? So Britain is drawn into the politics of France. Which will lead to something called the Hundred Years' War. In which Britain, the English, are trying to maintain their territory in France. Okay? So that's the first major geopolitical consequence of the Norman conquest. The second consequence, which is also rather significant, is that Britain is trying to create a radical change in the English language. So before, the Anglo -Saxons spoke a Germanic language we call Old English. Now you have a merger of the Germanic language with French and Latin. So French is the language that the Normans spoke, but Latin is the official language of the educated elite of Europe. Okay? So now you have

Latin and French elements blend into Old English, and this creates a new language we call Middle English. And the Middle English, of course, will give rise to Modern English. This is significant because what makes Middle English different from Old English is Middle English is a lot easier to learn because, remember, now you have a very cosmopolitan nature to Britain. You have Vikings, you have Anglo -Saxons, you have French, you have Normans. They all need to speak one language. So the best elements of these different languages are blended into Middle English. And this tradition continues today because if you think about it, English is the most widely spoken language in the world. Why? Because it's the easiest to learn. Now you may argue that, no, it's because we live in the Anglo -American Empire, and therefore people are incentivized to learn English. But at the same time, what I will show you next class is the reason why they were able to establish the Anglo -American Empire.

A lot has to do with the fact that English is easy to learn, and therefore it's easier to spread soft power. Because when you learn a language, you're not just learning a language, you're also learning a culture. You're learning a history. And this is what we call soft power. And the British did this better than anyone else. Now the Americans do this better than anyone else. But it starts with the Norman conquest in 1066. All right. So as I mentioned, what's really important about Britain is it really never had centralized authority. Maybe now and then you had a great king, like Alfred the Great, but it was never centralized because the king could never assert authority over the different fiefdoms. So whenever a king does that, the nobles get together and they rebel. So in 1215, King John tries to impose taxes. King John tries to impose taxes on the nobles in order to finance wars in France.

Because again, the English are trying to maintain their territory in France. And that creates a lot of conflict with the French themselves. So they fight a lot of wars, and you need money to pay for these wars. So King John was trying to make the nobles pay taxes. So what the nobles do, and this is going to be a consistent pattern throughout British history, is they rebel. And they force King John to sign a document called the Magna Carta. The Great Charter. And the Great Charter is significant because it severely limits the power of the king. Now, this has happened throughout human history before, when the nobles rebel and they force a compromise with the king. This has happened throughout human history, but this is actually the first time that this has been written down and become part of the British tradition.

This will become part of what we call the British Constitution. What makes the British Constitution unique is it's not written down. It's not a document like the U.S. Constitution is. It is a set of traditions and norms. So this begins the British Constitution, the Magna Carta. What I want to do now is look at different clauses in the Magna Carta. It's a very old document, so most of the stipulation, most of the clauses don't really apply. But there are three that do apply. So I want us to just look very closely at certain clauses within the Magna Carta. All right, clause 10. If anyone who has borrowed a sum of money from Jews dies before the debt has been repaid, his heirs shall pay no interest on the debt. This is really interesting. This is year 1215. There are Jews in England. Why are there Jews in England? Let me explain the history of...

Europe at this time. So Europe is entirely Catholic. The Catholic religion does not allow for something called usury. And the idea of usury is you charge interest on debt. Okay? Because that goes against the teachings of the Catholic Church. That goes against the teaching of God. Also, it's socially destructive, right? Because if you fall into debt, you're basically stuck there for all of eternity. So the Catholic Church explicitly forbids charging interest on debt. But, this is really important, debt is extremely profitable. So the way that the king and the nobility get around this taboo is they get Jews, okay, to lend out money and to charge debt. And then the king gets part of that, right? Also, because Jews are heavily disliked in Europe, anyway, because they engage in money lending and usury, the king also gets them to go collect taxes. Right? So the Jews throughout European history have been the scapegoats for the elite.

They're the ones who charge usury. They're the ones who collect taxes. They're also the ones who will engage in businesses for the nobles. Okay? So they basically subcontract businesses from the nobles, and they're very good at that. All right? And why do Jews agree to do this? Because the king and nobles provide protection to the Jews. So over time, you have this huge problem where even nobles owe money to the Jews. And the problem of debt creates a lot of social tension within England. So in the Magna Carta, it says very explicitly that, yes, you still owe money to Jews, but if you die, your heir does not have to pay interest. Because the problem of debt, again, is not the debt itself, the principal, but the interest. Okay? All right. So does that make sense to you guys? All right. This is really important because if you want to understand World War II, if you want to understand the Holocaust, it starts way back here.

Okay? All right. So the two most important clauses in the Magna Carta that are still applied today is 39 and 40. All right? So let's look at 39. No free man shall be seized or imprisoned except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. This creates a new principle in British history called due process. This means that if you commit a crime, you are still guaranteed a jury, a trial, before you are punished. All right? There's a process in which you are found guilty for your crime. This is what we call due process. Number 40. To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice. This means that no one is above the law. Okay? So number 30 establishes the idea of due process. Number 40 establishes the idea of rule of law.

Everyone is guaranteed due process. Not even the king has the power and authority to take away due process from someone. All right? And this establishes the British common law tradition. And this becomes the basis for the American Constitution. All right? Okay. So as I mentioned, because of the Norman Conquest, Britain now is forced to defend its territory in France, and this leads to a series of disastrous wars in France called the Hundred Years' War. I don't have time to go into the history, but obviously there are certain very important figures that emerged from the Hundred Years' War, the most famous being Joan of Arc. Okay? Joan of Arc, who is this French mystic, a teenager girl who leads the French armies to victory against the British and their allies. All right? During this time, there's also a civil war fought in Britain called the War of the Roses between the House of York and the House of Lancaster.

You may like the Game of Thrones television series. I'm not sure if you've watched it, but that series is actually based on the civil war between the House of York and the House of Lancaster. This goes on for a long time. It's very, very deadly. It almost destroys Britain. But eventually, a man named Richard of York, Richard III, he emerges victorious from this civil war. Okay? But he has a problem. His problem is his family, the House of York, had to borrow a lot of money from overseas, the Florentines, right, the Medici's, in order to finance the war. Once he became king, he thought, well, I'm king and I don't have to pay you back. Okay? So now the bankers are angry at him. And if bankers are angry at you, you have a problem because what bankers will do in this circumstance is finance an invasion of your country.

Okay? So the Medici's, the Florentine bankers, they sponsored a man named Henry Tudor, Henry Tudor, who is of the House of Lancaster. Okay? But he grew up in France. And they sponsored him to invade England and defeat Richard III. Okay? And this establishes the House of Tudor. And so Henry Tudor becomes Henry VII, and his son becomes Henry VIII, who is one of the most famous kings in British history. He's famous because he decides to negate the authority of the pope. He decides, I'm the king, I don't have to listen to anyone, even the pope. Okay? And this came to pass because Henry VIII was trying to divorce Catherine of Aragon, and the pope would not agree. So the Henry VIII decides to set up his own church called the Church of England and separate himself from the Vatican. Now, what's really important for us to remember is there's only one difference, only one difference between the Church of England and the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church swears loyalty to the pope. There's only one. The Church of England swears loyalty to the king of England. That's it, guys. There's no other difference. The customs, the doctrine, the rituals are all the same. Okay? There's only one difference. He will have a very famous daughter called Queen Elizabeth. All right? So, because of the Reformation, there's a huge religious civil war going on between the Catholics and the Protestants. Okay? So, Elizabeth, why she is so consequential is she's on a throne for 40 plus years. And what makes her extremely significant is she brings stability to England by sympathizing with the Protestants, but also by working with the Catholics. Okay? So even though there are all these Catholic conspiracies against Elizabeth in order to instill, install a Catholic monarch, she's still able to resist these conspiracies, these rebellions, and establish a pretty stable nation.

At the same time, during her reign, Shakespeare will write his plays. Next class, we are doing Shakespeare. Okay? Because without Shakespeare, there would be no English language. If there's no English language, you can also argue there'd be no British Empire. So next class, we'll spend an entire class on analyzing how Shakespeare created the English language and created the possibility of the British Empire. Okay? That's next class. Francis Drake is the most famous pirate at this time. And he is a trusted deputy of Elizabeth. Elizabeth has a policy of piracy. Right? England is poor. Spain is rich. So what do you do? You steal from the rich and you give to the poor. Right? And that's what Sir Francis Drake did. So at this time, England is emerging as a naval power. And it's going to surpass both Spain and France, become the dominant navy in the world. And as you know, it's with the navy that allows the British Empire to control the world.

The major innovation of the British, of the English, is how they fight at sea. Traditionally, the way you fight naval battles is by ramming the enemy and then boarding the ship and then killing everyone. That's what the Romans did. That's what everyone did. The English decided that's silly because we're always outnumbered. We're always outmanned. Okay? So they pioneered long -range cannon warfare where from a distance, maybe a few hundred meters, you will blast your enemy with cannons. There are lots and lots of problems with this. Okay? The first problem is you could possibly sink your ship because the cannons are very heavy. Also, you could blow up your own ship because the cannons are very explosive. Also, the cannons aren't very accurate. But the English persisted even though you can make the argument that this type of warfare, it's not sustainable. Okay?

In the beginning, for the first few decades, the way they fought was terrible. But the thing about the British that made them very similar to the Romans is they were relentless. They were willing to suffer heavy casualties, major setbacks, major failures, and still persist until they eventually won. Okay? That's the mentality of the British. That's very Roman. All right. So this is 1588, the Battle of the Spanish Armada. Okay? And this is something that's heavily celebrated in England because for the English, it marks the day when the British Navy reigns supreme over the seas. Okay? This is the day that the Spanish Armada was conquered and destroyed by the English. Something that's really important for us to remember is that in a year later, in 1589, the Spanish will defeat the English and the English will suffer tens of thousands of casualties. Okay? So what's important for us to remember is that these wars go back and forth. There's no one time when, okay, now the British are dominant.

Okay? What matters is persistence. What matters is resilience. And in this, in that respect, the English are far superior to the European adversaries. Okay. So Queen Elizabeth dies and King James of Scotland inherits the English throne. Okay? So now Scotland and England are united. What's significant about King James is he produces what we call the King James Holy Bible. This is something that the Protestants have been demanding for a long, long time. Remember, the difference between the Protestants and the Catholics is the Catholics are not allowed to read the Bible. The priests tell the parishioners what to believe, what the orthodoxy is. The Protestants believe that everyone must read the Bible. So the King James Bible, it's the first time that the Bible has been mass produced for everyone. Okay? So this spreads very quickly throughout the English and British Isles. Also, what's really significant is with the Bible, now you've standardized the language.

Okay? Now you can make the transition from Middle English to Modern English, the language we speak today. 1620 is significant because it's the year when the pilgrims on the Mayflower, they moved to America to found a new colony, a new civilization, a new empire that will take over the world. So what are the pilgrims moving to America? Well, the Protestants are divided into two major factions at this time. You have the Puritans. Who are the Puritans? The Puritans believe that the Church of England is too Catholic. And so, therefore, we must purge the Church of England of Catholic tendencies, like rituals, like priests. Okay? The pilgrims are what we call separatists. Okay? So there's another group called the pilgrims, is too corrupt, it's too evil, it's too much like the Vatican. Therefore, we should abolish it or we should just separate from it. And so, of course, they were persecuted by the king.

And, as a compromise, the pilgrims were allowed to go to America to build a new civilization based on their beliefs. And this civilization, of course, will be called America. All right? So that's something that you must remember, that America was founded by pilgrims who wanted to build a kingdom of heaven on earth. And we'll discuss this next week when we discuss the American Revolution. Back in England, there is a civil war now raging. Okay? And it starts again when the king tries to impose too much authority over the nobles. But there's also a religious dimension to it because the Puritans want to impose a religious state Okay? So the fanatics at this stage are the Puritans. And what will happen is the Puritans will emerge triumphant under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell and he will establish something called the Commonwealth of England. And this is a disaster. It doesn't really work out well because it goes against British tradition.

Remember, the idea of the Puritans is they want to establish a religious centralized theocracy on England. But England has always been pretty independent and autonomous. So what will happen is after Cromwell dies the Commonwealth goes away and the nobles reinstate a new king. Okay? Who is Charles II. After he dies James II will take the throne. The problem with James II is he's a Catholic. Okay? He's a Catholic. And so there are a lot of English who are afraid that he will be too close to France, Spain, and the Vatican. And these are British enemies. Okay? So what will happen is this. The nobles will invite a Dutch king William of Orange who is of British blood to come to England in the year 1688. And William of Orange will bring about 10,000 soldiers to Britain. This is an invasion. This is the very last invasion that succeeds in Britain.

King James has a larger army. But what will happen is King James is not very decisive. He's not very effective. So a lot of his army will desert him. So basically his army dissipates and he's allowed to go to France. And William of Orange bloodlessly not bloodlessly but he's very quickly able to assume the throne. And this is significant because this is called the Glorious Revolution. This is significant because it establishes for the first time officially the sovereignty of Parliament over the king. This is really important. Now it's official. Parliament is the ultimate authority ultimate sovereignty in Britain. And the king is a figurehead. And this is significant because it will now allow Britain to energize the middle class. If you're middle class you now have an incentive to work hard because now there's patents there's trademarks. There's incentive for you to get rich. And this will lead to of course the Industrial Revolution.

All right so the Glorious Revolution is one of the main contributing factors to the Industrial Revolution in Britain. This is also significant because in 1694 the Bank of England is established. All right now I I can't emphasize enough what a huge deal this is. All right so let me slowly explain what is the big deal and I want I want to make sure you understand because now we go into into into finance and economics. And I really haven't taught finance and economics before. I want to make sure that you understand the idea here. to fight a war what you do is you borrow money from the rich and these are usually cartels. All right so the charge of second borrowed a lot of money to fight wars from the goldsmiths of London including a group of Jews. Okay and then he refused to pay it back. Now you have a problem because now you have a credit crisis you have a trust crisis right?

If the king refuses to pay back the rich for their loan, why would the king ever be able to raise funds ever again? So Parliament solves this problem. Because now if Parliament is the central authority, the central sovereignty in the land, then you are not lending money to the king, you are lending money to the nation. Right? If a king dies, or a king is deposed, you're screwed. You're not getting your money back. But if you lend money to the nation, the people, for the Parliament, then you are always guaranteed to get your money back unless England gets conquered, okay? But we know because of the Navy, England cannot be conquered. And so not only are the rich willing to lend money to the nation now to finance wars, but also foreigners. Foreigners, especially the Dutch, right? Because the Dutch were very wealthy, and they needed a safe place to put their money.

So where's the safest place in the world to put your money now? England, right? Because if you are in the Netherlands, you could be conquered by the French or the Germans, which happens a lot. But if your money, your gold, and this is gold, right, goes to London, no one's going to be able to touch that, okay? So now, the Bank of England allows Britain to borrow money from its people, from foreigners, and from the future by printing money, right, by issuing war bonds. And therefore, Britain has infinite financing. And this is a major reason, this is the main reason why Britain was able to defeat Napoleon, right? It took seven wars, seven coalitions, to defeat Napoleon. Each of these coalitions was financed by Britain, okay? And once Napoleon was defeated, Britain became the hegemon of the world. It became the British Empire.

No one could now challenge the might of Britain. Okay, so you understand the impact of central banking, okay? Central banking allows you to mortgage your nation's future in the pursuit of total war. It allows you to weaponize the trust and confidence of your people, okay? Does that make sense? But there's a problem, okay, this is really important. There's a problem with this innovation. The problem is this. Once you commit to a war, once you raise debt and commit to a war, you're forced to fight the war until the very bitter end, right? Because if you lose the war, your nation goes bankrupt. Does that make sense, guys? Okay, that's why Britain refused to ever compromise Napoleon, right? Napoleon said to Britain, hey guys, I control all of your debt. You're up, let's talk peace. Let's just trade peacefully. And Britain says, no, we can't do that because we lent a lot of money to the Austrians, the Prussians, and the Germans, and the Russians in order to defeat you.

If we sign a deal of peace, all this money is now gone. And we, the Bank of England, we, the British nation, is completely wiped out. We are completely wiped out. Okay, do you understand? This is really important for the future history of Europe. If Britain fights a war, it does so through financing. It does so through debt. But because it does so through debt, it has to fight the war until it wins. It can never, ever compromise. It can never, ever surrender, all right? And this is important because this explains what happened in World War I, World War II, and this also explains, and I'll discuss this towards the end of the semester, it also explains American foreign policy, okay? Okay, was that clear to you guys? Any questions about what we've learned so far? Okay.

Now I want to talk about political philosophy of the British, okay? Because again, we discussed this throughout this course. You can have new ideas, but now you have to justify these new ideas. You have to explain the innovation through philosophy to the people, okay? So Britain at this time is really famous for its political philosophers. At this time, Thomas Hobbes is one of the most dominant, political philosophers. He lived through the English Civil War. He saw all the chaos, all the destruction, and he wrote a book called Leviathan. Leviathan is to justify why Britain returned to a monarchy instead of maintaining a commonwealth, okay? And this is the most famous passage from his book, Leviathan, which you'll probably read in university, okay? There is no place for industry because the fruit thereof is uncertain, and consequently, no culture of the earth. No navigation. No use of commodities that may be imported by sea. No commodious building, no arts,

no letters, no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear and danger of violent death. The life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short, okay? So he's trying to explain why there's government, and so he gives the idea like we were born in a state of nature, and we're free to do whatever we want. We can kill. We can love. we can steal we can do whatever we want so why would we give up this freedom in order to enter a state of nature it is so in order to have government and the answer is because state of nature sucks okay because you can be killed because because things will be stolen from you because to be no innovation so no matter how bad government is it's absolutely necessary okay now this is John Locke okay and John Locke is writing during the time of the course revolution he is a supporter of

Parliament he's a supporter of the glorious revolution okay and he writes something called so 1688 is March Revolution in 1689 he will publish the second Treatise on government and this is his most famous work again when you go to university you'll have to study the second treatise but in it he basically explains that okay Hobbes is right we are born a saloon a chair and we do need government but let's remember this when we're born in a state of nature we are born with circumstances that we need to live in because a man has to live with his certain inalienable rights and these three rights are the right to life liberty and the pursuit of property and the proper function of government is to maintain our rights the government does not do that then we have the flexibility we have the freedom to rebel against the government okay so Hobbes is saying government isn't necessary

you can never ever challenge it because if you do things will get much worse Locke is saying government is only legitimate if it guarantees us our inalienable rights okay so Locke is considered the founder of liberalism and his ideas will become the basis for the US Constitution which will which we'll study next Thursday okay so I want to remember this all right now what I'm doing now and this is really important okay it's compare contrast the British Enlightenment with the European Enlightenment remember before the British Enlightenment the British Enlightenment the British Enlightenment before we did the European Enlightenment we studied Rousseau we studied Kant Voltaire okay and I told you the British Enlightenment is very different from the European Enlightenment in three major ways okay so now what I will do is explain what the differences are okay all right so let's compare Rousseau and Locke Locke published his theories at the end of the

17th century Rousseau comes about 50 years later okay and Rousseau will give us a French Revolution so there are three major differences I want you to remember between British ah local philosophy and European political philosophy okay the first is this Locke believes that we are born tabula rasa the blank slate okay which means that we are influenced by the environment if our parents are nice to us will be good people the other parents are mean to us will become bad people tabula rasa okay we are controlled controlled, nurtured by the environment. Rousseau, the Europeans believe, no. We are born inherently good. Not only that, we were born with a capacity to reason. We are given the freedom to reason. Remember, when we discussed Rousseau, he said, do not educate your child before the age of 12. Because if you do, you'll just screw up the child. And the idea is, there's a natural capacity in us that will grow over time that allows us to reason naturally.

So Rousseau believed this, but also Kant believed this as well. Okay, so that's a huge difference, right? Second major difference is this. Locke believes the purpose of society is liberty. Liberty just means you are free to do whatever you want. You want to eat ice cream? Go ahead and do it. Yes, ice cream will make you fat. Ice cream will, maybe increase your cholesterol. But you should have the freedom, the liberty, to make that choice, okay? That's the purpose of society, to give you the liberty to make bad choices. For Rousseau, the purpose of society is reason. Society, if it's good, should enable you to reason properly. Okay? So the Europeans believe that society should be much more interventionist. It should help you become more reasonable. Because reason is what allows for freedom. Okay? And the last major difference, and this is key, okay guys?

I need you guys to remember these three differences. The last major difference is this. How do you base laws? On what basis do you have laws, okay? And so for Locke, the answer is very simple. Tradition, guys! It's just what we've been doing all this time, right? British common law. If the Romans did it, and we're still doing it, it's probably for a reason. It's probably because it works. But for Rousseau and the Europeans, it's general will. Remember, okay, so just to remind you, general will is what is in the best interest of people. Okay? This is really important. It's not what people want, it's not what the majority says, it's what is in the best interest of people. So Rousseau talks about this a lot, where, okay, if you let people vote, there's a danger that they'll be influenced by a minority who manipulates them, okay? The idea of the general will is, think about this using a reason.

Think about what is in the best interest of everyone. All right, so if everyone's like, you know, I want free ice cream, okay? This entire school says, I want free ice cream, then we should give you free ice cream, according to Locke, right? But according to Rousseau, no, we cannot give you ice cream, because if you sit down independently and think about what is in your best interest, you would know that ice cream is bad for you. Therefore, we should not give you ice cream, okay? The general will is, what is in the best interest of everyone involved? Not necessarily what you vote for, not necessarily what you believe, but what is in your best interest, okay? If you have reason, if you have the capacity to reason. All right? Now, let's just summarize what the difference is. The Europeans always asking, what is good? What is right?

The British, and then later on the Americans, only ask, what works, okay? What works? What is the least, okay? Worst world we can live in, okay? So the British are practical. You can also say the British are utilitarian, where the Europeans are romantic, and they are idealistic, all right? Also, and this is really important, because Rousseau's thinking will give us the philosophies of communism and Nazism, okay? Does that make sense? And of course, Locke's ideas will give us the US Constitution, okay? So this is part of the, the Anglo -American political tradition. This will now become the European tradition, which will give us Marxism and communism. All right, all right, let's continue. So one of the most important political philosophers in Britain is Jeremy Bantham. He's the founder of something called utilitarianism, okay? So Bantham agrees with Locke in that we need a more liberal society. We need a more progressive society. But for him,

it's really a question of like, how do you, how do you mathematically and logically come to the point where you have a tolerant, liberal, progressive society? And so he develops the idea of utilitarianism, okay? And the idea of utilitarianism is, there are two principles that govern the universe, okay? That motivate us. There's the pleasure principle, and there's the pain principle, okay? And so what he says is, if something makes us happy, it's inherently good. If something is, makes us feel pain, it's inherently bad. Okay? So we should structure a society that mathematically calculates the amount of pain and pleasure we produce, and then we should maximize the pleasure and reduce the pain, okay? And if you do that, then you get to the same point of Locke where people should be guaranteed liberty. People should be allowed to do whatever they want, as long as it doesn't really harm other people, okay?

You wanna eat ice cream, go eat ice cream. You're not harming anyone, all right? Obviously there are lots of issues with this theory of utilitarianism, so along comes his disciple, John Stuart Mill. And John Stuart Mill is considered the most significant political philosopher of the past 200 years, okay? He is the founder of what we'll call classical liberalism. The very basis of classical liberalism is people should be free to do whatever they want, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. Also, People should be allowed to say whatever they want because free debate, free open debate, is what allows for society to progress. So what John Stuart Mill does is he takes the principles of utilitarianism and refines it in order to explain why classical liberalism is the best philosophy out there. And classical liberalism will include women's rights. It will include prison reform. It will include a more egalitarian society. All right, so another thing that John Stuart Mill does that's very important is he explains pleasure is not what you think it is.

Pleasure isn't like, okay, whatever makes me happy. Because there are different types of pleasure. There's short -term pleasure and there's long -term pleasure, right? Short -term pleasure is eating ice cream every day. Long -term pleasure is having a healthy body and which allows you to climb mountains, which allows you to enjoy life more, okay. Short -term pleasure is just watching Tiktok videos. Long -term pleasure is being able to read Shakespeare. Being able to read Dante and being able to enjoy life more, okay. So that is his major refinement of Bantham. Just because you enjoy something today doesn't mean it's good for you. So we have the capacity to understand there's short -term pleasure and there's long -term pleasure, right. okay long -term pleasure is what he refers to as happiness the purpose of life is to be happy it's

not necessarily to seek pleasure it's it's but it's the purpose is to to seek happiness okay all right so this is a very rough introduction you will learn all the stuff when you get to university okay all right so these are the reasons why the rich Empire came to conquer the world okay all right it's history it's geography its demographics forces it to engage in a continuous series of innovation this innovation will allow to eventually dominate the entire world and even though the British Empire is gone we still have to comment the British Commonwealth okay so these are nations that speak English that believe British culture it's the best in the world and who believe that working together in a community you will be beneficial for all okay the British Commonwealth okay and that's a legacy we still have of the British Empire okay so now that I've done a brief introduction what I'll do

now is summarize the main points so that you are so you have a pretty clear framework to work with as we progress into the American Empire okay all right so what we do now is just summarize what we've learned in terms of what we've learned in terms of what we've learned in terms of the American Empire is to make a relationship withers have a solid relationship what we found is right to make a relationship withers and the answer to this question was obviously that they think of themselves as traditional Britishini their own mission is to form a local Chelsea Conway Union in order to develop try in the protest and slow down their well -being at first what help to be the new Mrs. cook in the British Empire okay let's start with common sense okay so like I mentioned to a lot of times the British Empire grew up in southernérieur in northern conquest

its main purpose is actually to to maintain global trade why because remember Britain is the first nation to industrialize therefore it's producing a lot of finished goods if you have finished goods you need markets so the British Navy its main purpose is to open up new markets and then to maintain safe trade routes against pirates okay to facilitate global trade so and this of course made Britain extremely wealthy second major reason is the Bank of England all right I cannot stress enough how important this innovation was also what's really important first remember is the Bank of England was private okay private so we have the powers of a central bank the power to print money issue currency the power to issue debt sell bonds but it was private so it was private so it was private so it was private so it was private meaning was controlled by which stockholders okay and the reason why

they did this is it was just the easiest way in order to raise money quickly okay that makes sense right because if you're if you're a public person you may not want to give your money to the government but you're a rich person where you're gonna put your money you're gonna put your money into a central bank that's that's supported by government okay all right and the third major reason is English all right so the development of English which is again the East the world's easiest language to learn so most languages in order to speak it well yet you guys have you actually have to grow up in a place right so once you want to speak Chinese very well then the best solution is to be born in China but English is different English is you can learn at any age and you can learn at any age and you can learn at any

age and still have a pretty good command of the language okay that's a huge innovation in human history all right so now let's let's try to figure out why was England able to achieve these three major innovations okay and not other places okay the first principle is the idea of open cooperative competition which I'll explain okay secondly said you have creative destruction meaning the elite is being constantly replaced by a new elite that brings in new ideas the third is expansion okay so colonial expansion where the British are the English are forced to migrate overseas instead of Canada the United States Australia New Zealand and other places as well okay but permanently these places so these are the three major factors that drive innovation and because of all this constant process of innovation you have Britain develop a Navy a bank and a new language that is fairly easy to learn all right really quickly

I'm going to discuss the idea of open cooperative competition all right so historically civilization developed like on a major river so if you look at China China developed on the Yangtze Egypt developed on the Nile Mesopotamia Mesopotamia developed on the Tigris and Euphrates. India developed on the Indus Valley and the Ganges. Why, because if you have a major river, you can build a settlement, and then for irrigation, you can expand your population, okay? And once your population expands, it will allow you to colonize other areas, and then your population keeps on growing before it becomes a dominant civilization in an area. Does that make sense? Britain is different, and Europe is different. Why, because there are no major rivers, and therefore, the population is constant. You never have a need to go conquer new territory. You just want to protect your own territory, okay? But because the population is so diffused and limited, it allows for foreign conquests, okay?

Which allows for great destruction. And that's the main factor driving innovation in Britain. So that's the history of the British Empire. Any questions? Anything you guys are not clear about? Feel free to ask any question, okay? But please make sure you guys understand the logic of this, because we're gonna build on this as we go further and further into the present, okay? And remember, this is being influenced by the Dutch, who will now, and then these ideas will then go on to influence America, okay? So America basically just takes all the ideas of the British Empire for itself, all right? So it's really important you understand what's driving the British Empire. Sure, the Puritans. Okay, all right guys, all right. So let's go into, so the question is, what's the difference between the Puritans and the Pilgrims? Okay, let's go into the problem of religion in England at this time, okay?

So when you have a diversity, you have diversity in England, and so even though England is a small place, as I keep on saying, a lot of control is localized, okay? So if you cross from one village to the next, the culture can be very different, all right? So this is a feudal system. So you have a lot of diversity. So this diversity can be very different and diversity is gonna impact your religious outlook, okay? So what's gonna happen is this. So England is Catholic, and then the Henry VIII is going to turn this into the Church of England. But then what's gonna happen is you will have new ideas, basically Calvinism, come in from Europe, okay? Why is Calvinism important? It's because, you know, England is the first to industrialize. It's the first to have a middle class. It's the first to have merchants. Merchants prefer Calvinism to Catholicism, right? In Catholic, in the

Catholic religion, you have to give all your money to the church, but in a Calvinist religion, you have to keep your money for yourself, right? So Calvinism is a much more popular religion in Britain than the Catholic religion in England, as England begins to industrialize. And so the middle class is rising, rising in power, okay? And the problem is the response to the Church of England. The Church of England, it's not Catholic, but it's using a lot of Catholic principles. And the Calvinists, the feeling of the Calvinists is they're fanatics, okay? They believe everyone should be a Calvinist, everyone should believe in hard work, everyone should be like us, and the Pope is evil. So the Calvinists are not very tolerant. So there are two major responses to the Church of England, okay? There's the idea of reform, and then there's the idea of dissolution, all right? So the idea of reform is, look, the

Church of England, it's fine, but there's certain things within the Church of England which is too much like the Catholic Church, so if we get rid of these things, we'll be good, okay? So, but within the reform movement, you have different factions as well, okay? So there's some who want to replace the governance structure of the Church of England, because the Church of England is controlled by the king, and they believe, no, we should all be obedient to God, not the king, so they want to destroy the hierarchy, the governance. There are some who want everyone to read the Bible. There are some who want to change the nature of the priesthood, okay? So there are different theories of change, okay? And these group of people we call the Puritans, okay? The Puritans. But then you have a minority who are extremely violent and fanatical, and they believe, no, let's just get rid of the Church of England, period, because there should be no earthly authority before God, okay?

And these people we call separatists, okay? And they will become the pilgrims, because obviously the king will persecute these people. They will feel, the king sees them as a threat, and they will be persecuted, they'll be outlawed, a lot of them will be executed, so a lot of them will flee to America in order to practice their religion, okay, in order to found a new religion. All right, so the pilgrims are the ones who flee, the Puritans are the ones who will stay and eventually engage in the Civil War and over for the king. But remember this, okay? While this is happening, while this is happening, and this is really important, there's also a counter -reaction, okay? So there are these Catholics who want to return England into the Catholic fold. And they're, so Scotland is very Catholic, okay?

You also have other people, called the Armenians, who want to maintain the Church of England as it is, okay? So you have all these massive factions emerging, and they're all in conflict over religion. And religion is a proxy for economic class as well. Okay, so it's obviously the middle class who support reform. There are a lot of nobles who support the Catholic religion. And the king is primarily a sympathizer of the Catholic religion. All right? So during the Holocaust Revolution, they will make a stipulation that no king can ever be a Catholic. Okay? And that's a way to limit the power of the king. Because if you're a Catholic king, you can draw on the French, the Vatican, the Spanish as allies in your suppression of the nobles and of the middle class, you can't be a Catholic. So there's a fear that the king will ally with the Catholic in order to destroy the authority of Parliament.

And so after the Glorious Revolution, a major reform is the king cannot be Catholic. And in fact, if you adhere to the throne, but if the Parliament suspects you have Catholic sympathies, they will replace you with someone else. Parliament has that power. And they did that actually during its history, okay? So there's a deep fear of the Catholic religion within the, among the English people, okay? But as you can see, this is a very complicated process that will take about 20 years to fully play out. Does that make sense? What's really important for us to remember is this conflict is being, through the pilgrims, is now migrating to America. And these people will make America into the most religious, fanatical, intolerant place of worship. And this is a tradition that continues on Earth in certain places in America, okay? And it's a tradition that still continues today. There are some, certain parts of America that are extremely tolerant, like New York City and Los Angeles.

But hey, go to, I don't know, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas. They're not very tolerant people, okay? And you can make the argument that they are the most fanatical people in the whole world, much more so than the Jews, much more so than the Muslims. Okay? So, does that answer your question? Great. Any more questions? You know, that's a great question, okay? So, how much power does a king have? Okay. So, the thing about the British is, because it's a system based on tradition, there's a lot of flexibility built into the system. So depending on the personality of the king, the king can have a lot of power, okay? So, for example, Henry VIII was a very powerful king. He was considered one of the most powerful kings in the world. Why? First of all, because he was a huge guy. He was extremely charismatic. He was a huge guy that was very good at winning friends with the nobles, okay?

So he was very good at building alliances. Also, he was in power for a long, long time, over 50 years. Okay? So he was able to slowly insert his prodigies, his minions, into positions of authority. Okay? And also, he was also very popular in the Middle Ages because he took England away from the Catholic Church. Okay? So, the power of the king, it's not written down. It has to do, and a lot of his power has to do with his personality, his longevity, his alliances, his charisma. Okay? So there are a lot of different factors in place. And that's why the British think their constitution, it's the most perfect in the world. Because it's not written down, so they're not actually constrained by words. It's, but there's traditions that allow the constitution to be living. Okay?

To be flexible and to be pertinent to the present. Okay? And so the English are extremely proud of their constitution. Does that make sense? Okay? Okay. So, that's a great question. So, if these pilgrims went over to America, how was America able to become this multicultural empire? Right? Because that goes against a lot of periodical teachings. And the answer, which we'll discuss next week is, America is a coalition of conflicts. Okay? It is a melting pot of differences. Okay? So, what I will teach you next Thursday, when we do the American Revolution is, there are two dominant strands in the founding of America. There's the pilgrim strand, which is puritanical, which is like, let's create a theocracy. There's also an enlightenment strand, where they believe that they're founding a new empire based on reason. And so, the religion we use for them is deism. Okay? These are deists. And most of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, were deists.

They wanted to found a tolerant, multicultural, empire. Okay? So these are two dominant strands in America. And, quite honestly, what's really important is, if you want to understand what's happening in America today, Donald Trump, right? You need to understand that it's these two strands that have always been present in America, that are now coming into conflict with each other. Okay? Because you have, on the left, these multiculturalists, like Barack Obama, who believed that America is great because America welcomes immigrants. And you have people like J.D. Vance, and there are lots of others as well, on the conservative side, who say, no, America is great because we are Christian. Okay? Because we have this tradition of Christianity. That's what makes us great. And right now, we're losing our Christianity due to multiculturalism, and therefore, we must close our borders. Therefore, we must reassert the Christian faith in our nation. Okay?

So we will discuss this next Thursday when we do America, but as this course progresses, I will show you how complicated America is and show you that because of this conflict, America is probably headed towards a civil war. Okay? If that makes sense to you. All right. Great. Any more questions, guys? Okay. So next class, we'll do William Shakespeare. And then after William Shakespeare, we'll do Christian. Okay?