1.

The Renaissance of the late 15th and 16th centuries presented a different set of problems
and therefore suggested different lines of philosophical endeavour. The modern period as
opposed to the medieval outlook began in Italy with the movement called the Renaissance The
term Renaissance literarily means "rebirth." The Renaissance, therefore, was a time of rebirth
and renewal; a time of release and discovery. It was a rebirth of learning in the letters, humanism
and philosophy. During this period, men began, once again, to emphasize the natural abilities of
the human person to reason independently of faith. The Renaissance marked the age of
humanism-the focus on man.
2. The Reformation or Protestant Reformation, was another important wave that played a
significant role in the rise of modern philosophy. The Protestant Reformation, spearheaded by a
young Augustinian monk, Martin Luther, started in Germany. The reformation started as a form
of rebellion against the authority of the Pope and the Catholic Church which was the seat of
Christianity in Europe. This rebellion arose as a result of the political and spiritual decline of the
church's influence.
3. The decay of Scholasticism itself. SCHOLASTICISM may be said to have decayed
because it no longer attracted the best intellects of Europe. Men's thoughts came to be taken up
with other things -- with wars and the new growth of nationalities, with the schism in the Papacy,
with the great scourge known as the Black Death, with Greek art and literature, and that revival
of Graeco-Roman tastes known as the Renaissance.