Darwin was strongly attacked, particularly by the Church.The theory of evolution led to a crisis of faith and spiritual doubt among so many people. The book was extremely controversial because it implied that man was simply another form of animal and that people might have evolved from apes. CHARLES DARWIN: Darwin’s theory of evolution, proposed in his book The Origin of Species (1859), has transformed the way we think about the natural world.Capitalists often twisted his words to oppose child labor laws, maximum working hours, and factory health codes. He was against trade restrictions and minimum wage laws as being harmful to a nation's economy.This laissez-faire policy of government non-intervention remained popular throughout the Victorian Era. In The Wealth of Nations (1776), advocated free trade and believed that the market is best left untouched.Government intervention only prevents the economy from righting itself.He therefore strongly opposed any government interference with business affairs. ADAM SMITH: Smith’s economic ideas had great influence on Victorian thinking.For example, there were the climbing boys employed by the chimney sweeps, the little children who could scramble under the moving machinery to retrieve the cotton fluff boys and girls working down the coal mines, crawling through tunnels too narrow and low to take an adult. They often worked long hours in dangerous jobs and in difficult situations for very little wages. ![]() II.Child Labor Children were expected to help to support their families. The homeless waiting for admission into a workhouse are depicted in this picture by Luke Fildes Applicants for Admission to a Casual WardLuke Fildes, 1874. The old rural social pattern was receding under the impact of harsh industrialization Diseases raged, hunger, poverty, and deprivation prevailed, crime accelerated, and misery increased. There were too many workers and not enough houses. They had to live in very dirty and unhealthy conditions. People, in search of work left the countryside to work in factories in the different cities of Britain. The Emergence of Overcrowded Cities One result of the advance of technology was the unprecedented growth of cities. The Impact of the Industrial Revolution I. ![]() Urban squalor and misery were signs of a massive change in the English society. Workers in the cities lived in miserable conditions. But as industry grew, it was accompanied by a rapid increase in the numbers of the urban working-class poor. ![]() A formerly agricultural nation was now based on urban and industrial growth. Scientific ideas were applied to the making of machines that transformed the way things were made and dramatically changed people’s lifestyles. THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION It started at the end of the eighteenth century, when theoretical knowledge and practical technology were connected. The British considered the empire as a means of fulfilling the white man’s mission of civilizing the nations under their control and spreading Western values throughout the whole world. THE BRITISH EMPIRE Queen Victoria ruled over a vast and expanding empire, over which, it was said, the sun never set. But as Victorian England was a time of great ambition and grandeur, it was also a time of misery, squalor, and urban ugliness. Like Elizabethan England, Victorian England saw great expansion of wealth, power, and culture. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined culture, great advancements in technology, and national self-confidence for Britain.During the Victorian age, Britain was the world's most powerful nation. By the end of Victoria's reign, the British empire extended over about one-fifth of the earth's surface. THE VICTORIAN PERIOD The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 1837 until her death in 1901. THE VICTORIAN ERA:SOCIAL AND CULTURAL CONTEXTS ![]()
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