The Enlightenment: Ideas Crossing Borders

Ah, the Enlightenment. That glorious period when folks decided maybe thinking for themselves wasn't such a terrible idea after all. Naturally, this caused a bit of a stir among those who preferred people just doing what they were told. Suddenly, things like 'reason' and 'individual rights' were all the rage, making monarchs and certain religious figures rather uncomfortable. It was like everyone collectively woke up and realized the emperor had been wearing slightly ridiculous clothes for centuries.

These pesky new ideas, it turned out, didn't much care for national boundaries. They hopped across borders faster than a scandal in a royal court, spreading through buzzing salons and intellectual coffee houses. Pamphlets, often smuggled, carried revolutionary thoughts like a particularly stubborn virus. Thinkers debated everything, proving that a good argument, much like a bad cold, is annoyingly contagious and hard to contain.