Secular Thinking And Education During The Renaissance

The Renaissance Period reintroduced many Classical Greek ideologies to Europe effectively transforming the culture. These ideologies included secular thinking and education, as well as classical art.

The invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg provided a quick and inexpensive way to produce books. This allowed for many common people to become literate and to increase their education. Another man, John Wycliffe, translated the Bible to the vernacular and made it available to the masses, allowing for common people to translate the Bible for themselves.This increased the gap between the people and the Church which led to the Reformation, sparking an increase in secular and independent thinking. In addition, Martin Luther wrote Ninety-Five Theses which criticized the corrupt practices of the Catholic Church, helping to ignite the Reformation. These all helped the common people's want to increase their education, and this turned into secular thinking, or making observations with logic and questioning parts of life. Classical art also made a reappearance during this
Some of these include the printing press, the scientific method, heliocentric theory, the microscope, the telescope, as well as the clock. These inventions, or variations of them, are still used today in every day life. A branch away from the Church also led eventually to a separation of church and state, which was influential in the writing and creation of the United States Constitution. The realism introduced in art during the Renaissance is still used in many paintings today. A part of this realism was the practice of perception, which created a three dimensional look in art, which is still widely used in modern art. An example of architecture that is still used today are columns, which you can see on the Lincoln Memorial and the White