Age of Enlightenment Louis XV until the French Revolution. If taken back to the mid-17th century, the Enlightenment would trace its origins to Descartes' "Discourse on the Method", published in 1637. In France, many cited the publication of Isaac Newton's "Principia Mathematica" in 1687. It is argued by several historians and philosophers that the beginning of the Enlightenment is when Descartes shifted the epistemological basis from external authority to internal certainty by his "cogito ergo sum" published in 1637. As to its end, most scholars use the last years of the century, often choosing the French Revolution of 1789 or the beginning of
Mr. Cogito which unequivocally identifies the character with the poet for the very first time in the oeuvre. It mentions his return to his homeland, and the other poems in the collection treat about various aspects of Mr. Cogito's being – imagination ("Mr. Cogito and the Imagination"), longevity ("Mr. Cogito and Longevity"), virtue ("Mr. Cogito on Virtue"), eschatological concepts ("Mr. Cogito's Eschatological Premonitions"), bloodshed ("Mr. Cogito Thinks about Blood"), a contact with Maria Rasputin ("Mr. Cogito and Maria Rasputin – an Attempt at Contact"), the need for precision ("Mr. Cogito on the Need for Precision), the notes from a house of the