In the 1700s, people did not have phones, the Internet, or social media. News did not spread as fast as it does today.
But people in Europe and the Americas still shared ideas. The Enlightenment ideas of individual freedom, progress, and human rights came from Europe. Then they crossed the Atlantic. These ideas inspired the rebellion of Britain’s American colonies. They also helped to shape a new kind of government. Soon, those ideas traveled back to Europe. They became very important in France. Many French people read and liked the Declaration of Independence. Both Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson spent years in Paris as ambassadors for the United States. By 1789, the ideas that had traveled from France to North America and back to France had started a revolution there.
