AP Euro Absolutism, Science, and Enlightenment — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which action by Louis XIV most directly reversed the policy of limited religious toleration that Henry IV had established in France?
- Calling the Estates-General to approve new taxes on Protestant merchants
- Signing the Peace of Westphalia to recognize Calvinist princes
- Issuing the Edict of Fontainebleau, which revoked the Edict of Nantes (Correct answer)
- Granting the Parlement of Paris authority to protect Huguenot worship
Correct answer: Issuing the Edict of Fontainebleau, which revoked the Edict of Nantes
The 1685 Edict of Fontainebleau revoked the Edict of Nantes (1598), outlawing Protestant worship in France. Louis XIV wanted religious uniformity to support his absolutist claim of 'one king, one law, one faith.'
Henry IV's Edict of Nantes gave Huguenots freedom of worship and certain legal protections. Louis XIV viewed religious division as a threat to royal authority and unity. In 1685 he issued the Edict of Fontainebleau, which ordered Protestant churches destroyed and schools closed. Hundreds of thousands of Huguenots, many of them skilled artisans and merchants, fled to England, the Dutch Republic, Prussia, and elsewhere. This weakened France economically and strengthened its rivals.
Question 2: Peter the Great's creation of the Table of Ranks (1722) is best understood as an effort to
- tie noble status and advancement to service to the state rather than to birth alone (Correct answer)
- transfer legislative authority from the tsar to an elected assembly of nobles
- free the serfs so that they could serve in a professional army
- restore the independence of the boyar families from the central government
Correct answer: tie noble status and advancement to service to the state rather than to birth alone
The Table of Ranks organized military and civil positions into a hierarchy in which promotion depended on service. This bound the nobility to the state and increased the tsar's control.
Peter the Great sought to modernize Russia along Western European lines, especially its military and administration. The Table of Ranks set 14 grades of service, and reaching a certain level could even confer hereditary nobility on commoners. This made the aristocracy dependent on the tsar's service system rather than on ancient lineage. It undermined the boyars' traditional power and strengthened autocracy. It also advanced Peter's wider campaign of Westernization, which included the founding of St. Petersburg.
Question 3: Which was a direct result of the Glorious Revolution of 1688–1689 in England?
- The monarchy was abolished and England became a republic under a lord protector
- Parliament was dissolved so that William III could rule by divine right
- Charles I was executed after being convicted by the High Court of Justice
- The Bill of Rights established that the monarch could not levy taxes or maintain a standing army in peacetime without Parliament's consent (Correct answer)
Correct answer: The Bill of Rights established that the monarch could not levy taxes or maintain a standing army in peacetime without Parliament's consent
After James II fled, William and Mary accepted the Bill of Rights (1689), which limited royal power and affirmed Parliament's control over taxation and the military. This created a constitutional monarchy.
James II's Catholicism and his attempts to rule without Parliament alienated the English political elite, who invited William of Orange and Mary to take the throne. The transfer of power happened with very little bloodshed, hence 'glorious.' William and Mary accepted the Bill of Rights, which barred the monarch from suspending laws, raising taxes, or keeping a peacetime army without parliamentary approval. These limits made England a constitutional monarchy, in contrast to the absolutist model of France. Choices describing a republic or the execution of a king refer to the earlier English Civil War era.
Question 4: How did Johannes Kepler modify the Copernican model of the universe?
- He showed that the Earth is at the center and the planets circle it on epicycles
- He demonstrated that planets move in elliptical rather than perfectly circular orbits around the Sun (Correct answer)
- He proved that objects of different weights fall at the same rate in a vacuum
- He formulated the law of universal gravitation to explain planetary motion
Correct answer: He demonstrated that planets move in elliptical rather than perfectly circular orbits around the Sun
Using Tycho Brahe's observational data, Kepler showed that planetary orbits are ellipses with the Sun at one focus. This corrected Copernicus's assumption of circular orbits.
Copernicus proposed a heliocentric universe in 1543, but he kept the ancient assumption that celestial motion had to be circular. Kepler inherited the precise observations of Tycho Brahe and found that circles could not account for the data, especially for Mars. His laws of planetary motion described elliptical orbits and the varying speed of planets. Universal gravitation, which explained why planets move this way, was later formulated by Isaac Newton.
Question 5: Galileo's telescopic observation of moons orbiting Jupiter challenged which traditional belief?
- That the Sun is a perfect sphere without blemishes
- That the planets move in elliptical orbits
- That all celestial bodies revolve around the Earth (Correct answer)
- That the universe is governed by mathematical laws
Correct answer: That all celestial bodies revolve around the Earth
Moons clearly orbiting Jupiter showed that not everything in the heavens circles the Earth, which undermined the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic geocentric view. It supported the Copernican alternative.
In 1610 Galileo published his telescope observations in The Starry Messenger, including four moons orbiting Jupiter. Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmology held that the Earth was the fixed center around which every heavenly body moved. Jupiter's moons were direct evidence of a center of motion other than Earth. Galileo's other findings, such as lunar mountains and the phases of Venus, further weakened the old model. His support for heliocentrism led to a trial by the Roman Inquisition in 1633.
Question 6: Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica (1687) was a landmark of the Scientific Revolution primarily because it
- offered the first empirical evidence that the Sun is at the center of the solar system
- argued that knowledge should be built only from deductive reasoning without observation
- used the telescope to catalogue the moons of Saturn and Jupiter
- used a single set of mathematical laws, including universal gravitation, to explain both earthly and celestial motion (Correct answer)
Correct answer: used a single set of mathematical laws, including universal gravitation, to explain both earthly and celestial motion
Newton showed that the same laws of motion and gravitation govern falling objects on Earth and the orbits of planets. This unified physics and presented the universe as a rational, mathematically ordered system.
Before Newton, Aristotelian thought treated the earthly and heavenly realms as governed by different principles. Newton combined the work of Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo into a comprehensive system built on three laws of motion and universal gravitation. The result was a universe that operated like a vast, predictable machine that human reason could understand. This inspired Enlightenment thinkers to look for natural laws governing society, politics, and economics.
Question 7: In his Two Treatises of Government, John Locke argued that
- people have natural rights to life, liberty, and property, and may overthrow a government that violates them (Correct answer)
- people must surrender all rights to an absolute sovereign in order to escape the state of nature
- political power should be divided among executive, legislative, and judicial branches
- individuals must submit to the general will even if it requires them to be 'forced to be free'
Correct answer: people have natural rights to life, liberty, and property, and may overthrow a government that violates them
Locke held that government rests on the consent of the governed and exists to protect natural rights. If rulers violate that trust, the people have the right to replace them.
Locke rejected the divine right of kings and described a social contract in which people create government to protect their natural rights. In his view the state of nature was relatively peaceful but lacked a neutral judge to protect property and resolve disputes. Because government's authority comes from consent, a ruler who acts tyrannically forfeits legitimacy. His thought strongly influenced the English Bill of Rights tradition, the American Revolution, and later liberalism. The other options describe Hobbes, Montesquieu, and Rousseau.
Question 8: Which idea did Montesquieu advance in The Spirit of the Laws as a safeguard against despotism?
- A strong monarch should hold all legislative, executive, and judicial power
- Government power should be divided among separate branches that check one another (Correct answer)
- Society should be governed by a philosopher-king chosen for wisdom
- Property should be held in common so that no group can dominate others
Correct answer: Government power should be divided among separate branches that check one another
Montesquieu argued that dividing power among separate branches, with each limiting the others, protects liberty. This idea of separation of powers influenced later constitutions, including that of the United States.
Montesquieu studied different forms of government and admired aspects of the English system, as he understood it. He concluded that when legislative, executive, and judicial powers are concentrated in one person or group, liberty is endangered. By dividing authority and allowing each branch to restrain the others, a state can prevent tyranny. His work shaped constitutional thinking in the American and French revolutions.
Question 9: Which Enlightenment-era ruler's policy is the clearest example of 'enlightened absolutism'?
- Louis XVI, who allowed the Estates-General to meet in 1789 to resolve the fiscal crisis
- Charles II, who restored the monarchy and shared power with Parliament
- Joseph II of Austria, who issued an Edict of Toleration extending limited worship rights to Protestants and Orthodox Christians (Correct answer)
- Philip II of Spain, who used the Inquisition to enforce Catholic uniformity
Correct answer: Joseph II of Austria, who issued an Edict of Toleration extending limited worship rights to Protestants and Orthodox Christians
Joseph II used his absolute authority to impose reforms inspired by Enlightenment ideas, including limited religious toleration and the Serfdom Patent. Enlightened absolutists sought to improve the state from above rather than share power.
Enlightened absolutism describes rulers such as Frederick II of Prussia, Catherine II of Russia, and Joseph II of Austria. They embraced ideas such as rational administration, legal reform, and religious toleration, but they did not give up their own supreme authority. Joseph II issued the Edict of Toleration in 1781 and reformed the legal and serf systems, often against noble resistance. Philip II belongs to the sixteenth century, and the other two rulers describe different political situations.
Question 10: In Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes used the idea of a 'state of nature' to argue that
- people are naturally good and corrupted only by private property
- power should be divided so that no ruler can become a tyrant
- citizens should be free to overthrow any ruler who restricts their religion
- life without government would be a war of all against all, so people should submit to a strong sovereign (Correct answer)
Correct answer: life without government would be a war of all against all, so people should submit to a strong sovereign
Hobbes believed that without a central authority, life would be 'solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.' He concluded that people should enter a social contract and give up their rights to an absolute sovereign for security.
Hobbes wrote Leviathan (1651) during the turmoil of the English Civil War. He argued that humans are driven by self-interest and fear, so without government they would fall into constant conflict. To escape this, individuals agree to a social contract that gives a sovereign nearly unlimited power to keep order. Unlike Locke, he did not support a right of revolution against the sovereign. His conclusion gave a secular, rational justification for strong central government instead of divine right.
AP Euro Absolutism, Science, and Enlightenment
Which action by Louis XIV most directly reversed the policy of limited religious toleration that Henry IV had established in France?
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