During the 18th century, writing shifted from the Puritanism of Winthrop and Bradford to Enlightenment ideas of reason. The
belief that human and natural occurrences were messages from God no longer fit with the new human-centered world. Many
intellectuals believed that the human mind could comprehend the universe through the laws of physics as described by Isaac
Newton. One of these was Corton Mather. The first book published in North America that promoted Newton and natural theology
was Mather's The Christian Philosopher (1721). The enormous scientific, economic, social, and philosophical changes of the 18th
century, called the Enlightenment, impacted the authority of clergyman and scripture, making way for democratic principles. The
increase in population helped account for the greater diversity of opinion in religious and political life as seen in the literature of
this time. In 1670, the population of the colonies numbered approximately 111.000. Thirty years later it was more than 250.000
By 1760, it reached 1,600,000. The growth of communities and therefore social life led people to become more interested in the
progress of individuals and their shared experience in the colonies. These new ideas can be seen in the popularity of Benjamin
Franklin s Autobiography