The Enlightenment also promoted a scientific-even scientifically methodical-approach to knowledge, as scientists like Isaac Newton began to discover and explain natural phenomenon. Voltaire and Rousseau were taking down intolerant churches and oppressive states and laying the foundation for major innovations like the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. We're talking about the Enlightenment, a system of knowledge sweeping across Europe, America, and England. That's one big mass of ideas to fit into a (relatively) little book. Tristram brings in current philosophical and scientific knowledge to make his book a product of what he calls up-to-date "knowledge physical, metaphysical, physiological, polemical, nautical, mathematical, enigmatical, technical, biographical, romantical, chemical, and obstetrical" (1.21.4). That is to say, Tristram Shandy's setting isn't afraid to be a little bit radical. Welcome to the 1760s-a time not altogether unlike the shagadelic 1960s in the U.S. Although most of the novel takes place on the Shandy estate, Tristram and everyone else (except his mother) jet off to Europe in the seventh book.
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