tutorial". The Café Procope was established in Paris in 1686, and by the 1720s there were around 400 cafés in the city. The Café Procope in particular became a center of Enlightenment, welcoming such celebrities as Voltaire and Rousseau. The Café Procope was where Diderot and D'Alembert decided to create the Encyclopédie. The cafés were one of the various "nerve centers" for bruits publics, public noise or rumour. These bruits were allegedly a much better source of information than were the actual newspapers available at the time. Debating societies The debating societies are an example of the public sphere during the Enlightenment. Their origins include: Clubs of fifty or more men who, at the beginning of the 18th century, met in pubs to discuss religious issues and affairs of state. Mooting clubs, set up by law students to practice rhetoric. Spouting clubs, established to help actors train for theatrical roles. John Henley's Oratory, which mixed outrageous sermons with even more absurd questions, like "Whether Scotland be anywhere in the world?". In the late 1770s, popular debating societies began to move into more "genteel" rooms, a change which helped establish a new standard of sociability. The backdrop to these developments was "an explosion of interest in the theory and practice of public elocution". The debating societies were commercial enterprises that responded to this demand, sometimes very successfully. Some societies welcomed from 800 to 1,200 spectators per night. The debating societies discussed an extremely wide range of topics. Before the Enlightenment, most intellectual debates revolved around "confessional"—that is, Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed (Calvinist) or Anglican issues, and the main aim of these debates was to establish which bloc of faith ought to have the "monopoly of truth and a God-given title to authority". After this date, everything thus previously rooted in tradition was questioned and often replaced by new concepts in the light of philosophical reason. After the second half of the 17th century and during the 18th century, a "general process of rationalization and secularization set in" and confessional disputes were reduced to a secondary status in favor of the "escalating contest between faith and incredulity". In addition to debates on religion, societies discussed issues such as politics and the role of women. However, the critical subject matter of these debates did not necessarily translate into opposition to the government; the results of the debate quite frequently upheld the status quo. From