18th century in literature Juvenal’s Third Satire, by Samuel Johnson is published. Like so many poets of the 18th century Johnson sought to breathe new life into his favorite classical author Juvenal. In 1740, Samuel Richardson's "Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded" is published and Marquis de Sade is born. 1744 1745 1748 1749 1751 1754 1755 1760–1767 Laurence Sterne wrote "Tristram Shandy". 1764 1766 1768 1770 April 7: William Wordsworth is born. 1773 Oliver Goldsmith's play "She Stoops to Conquer", a farce, was performed in London. 1776 The United States Declaration of Independence is created and ratified. 1777 the comedy play "The School for Scandal",
Virtue ethics and America; indeed the term "virtue" appears frequently in the work of Niccolò Machiavelli, David Hume, the republicans of the English Civil War period, the 18th-century English Whigs, and the prominent figures among the Scottish Enlightenment and the American Founding Fathers. Although some Enlightenment philosophers (e.g. Hume) continued to emphasise the virtues, with the ascendancy of utilitarianism and deontology, virtue theory moved to the margins of Western philosophy. The contemporary revival of virtue theory is frequently traced to the philosopher G. E. M. Anscombe's 1958 essay "Modern Moral Philosophy". Following this: The aretaic turn in moral philosophy is paralleled by