Using your knowledge of the modern United States, write a paragraph explaining how society's interpretation of natural rights has changed over time. What differences do you notice between 1787 and today? What groups have different rights? What do these changes suggest about the Enlightenment concept of natural rights? Your response should be at least five sentences long.

The Illuminists were concerned to denounce injustice, religious domination, the absolutist state and privileges as vices of a society that, increasingly, removed men from their "natural right" to happiness. According to the view of these thinkers, societies that are not organized around the improvement of the conditions of their individuals conceive a reality incapable of justifying, by logical arguments, their own existence.

For this reason, Enlightenment thinking chooses "reason" as the great instrument of reflection capable of improving and undertaking more just and functional institutions. However, if man does not have his freedom guaranteed, reason ends up being hampered by obstacles such as that of religious belief or by the imposition of governments that oppress the individual. The rationalization of habits was one of the great ideas defended by the Enlightenment.

Religious institutions were systematically attacked by these thinkers. The Church's meddling in economic and political affairs was a type of habit harmful to the development and progress of society. Even religious dogmatic thinking was placed as a barrier between God and man. Enlightenment thought believed that the divine nature was present in the individual himself, and therefore reason and experiment were a sure means of understanding the divine essence.