Nueva axiología de la España del siglo XVIII en el contexto europeo

Abstract

The revision of basic beliefs carried out in Europe in the eighteenth century has its correlation in Spain, where, at the same time that the traditional concepts were questioned and reinterpreted, the sense of the main eighteenth century notions were developing. In this axiology an analysis is made of the "new human archetype" in relation to bourgeois mentality and the qualities corresponding to "the good man" and "the social man" (sincerity, genuineness, sensibility and good taste). The change in the concept of passions, the idea of progress and the sense given life to the notion of happiness are also analysed. The article also deals with the interpretation of humour, irony and laughter, the luxury to frame these concepts in the new idea of sociability and the principie of utility in the change of uses and customs and in the sense of faith in the eighteenth century.