Enlightenment Philanthropy: Pennsylvania Hospital, Philadelphia
Using public funds and private donations, Philadelphia reformers built this imposing structure in 1753. The new hospital embodied two principles of the Enlightenment: that purposeful actions could improve society, and that the products of these actions should express reason and order, exhibited here in the building’s symmetrical facade. Etchings like this one from the 1760s (A Perspective View of the Pennsylvania Hospital, by John Streeper and Henry Dawkins) circulated widely and bolstered Philadelphia’s reputation as the center of the American Enlightenment. Historical Society of Pennsylvania.