Early Modern & Enlightenment audiobooks
Doubt, reason and daring to know.
The period when philosophy broke from the medieval schools: Montaigne's essays and Erasmus's satire, Francis Bacon's new science, Descartes doubting everything he could, Spinoza's Ethics, Pascal's Pensées, Thomas More's Utopia, La Rochefoucauld's maxims, Rousseau and the materialist Baron d'Holbach. Much of how we still think about reason, science and the self was argued out here. It runs on into the Enlightenment: Voltaire, Rousseau on inequality and education, and Kant's plan for perpetual peace.
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The best-known early modern & enlightenment titles in the libraryShort listens
Under 5 hours — finish one this week-
Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting One's Reason and of Seeking Truth in the Sciences
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A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality Among Mankind
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New Atlantis
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The Praise of Folly
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Theologico-Political Treatise — Part 1
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The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral
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Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Essay
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A Theological-Political Treatise [Part III]
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Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims
All 25 early modern & enlightenment audiobooks
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Candide
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Utopia
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The Social Contract & Discourses
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Ethics
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The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
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Six Metaphysical Meditations
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Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting One's Reason and of Seeking Truth in the Sciences
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Emile
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A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foundation of the Inequality Among Mankind
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An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Volume 1
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An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Volume 2
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New Atlantis
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The Praise of Folly
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Pascal's Pensées
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Theologico-Political Treatise — Part 1
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The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral
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Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Essay
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The System of Nature, Volume 1
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The Advancement of Learning
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New Essays Concerning Human Understanding
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A Theological-Political Treatise [Part III]
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Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims
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The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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The Philosophy of Spinoza
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Theologico-Political Treatise — Part 2
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Good to know
Are these early modern & enlightenment audiobooks free?
The first chapter of every book plays free with no account. A free account adds the opening chapters of every book, plus one whole book of your choice from a shelf of five classics. The full library — all 25 early modern & enlightenment titles and everything else — is $4.99 a month or $49 a year after a 7-day free trial, cancel anytime.
Can I read along while I listen?
Yes. Every Compendium audiobook shows the full chapter text on screen as it plays, on the web and in the iPhone and Android apps.
What's the shortest and longest early modern & enlightenment audiobook here?
New Atlantis is the shortest at 1 hr 20 min; The Essays of Michel de Montaigne is the longest at 45 hr 22 min. The whole collection runs about 217 hours.
