Enlightenment is often referred to as age of reason and some of its characteristics were the preoccupation with the moral and intellectual improvement of all humanity, the use of criticism as a scalpel to cut away the fanaticism, superstition, and bigotry, the use of reason in all human affairs, and perfectibility of humankind. Two of the philosophers who tried to defy the old traditions and bring a change were Voltaire and Montesquieu