Enlightenment Era vs. Roman Republic (College elective class)

"Virginia Tech 4ever"

Let me preface my comment by saying both sound really interesting, but I'd reluctantly go with Western Civ since 1700 since we're talking about the Roman Republic, which predates the Caesars, who were, in my view, what made Rome so incredibly interesting. Rome is incredibly interesting and important, but I think having a great foundation in Western civilization post-Industrial Revolution is incredibly helpful in understanding why the West rose to such prominence when 700 years ago we were slightly above the level of barbarian.

I would strongly suggest "Western Civilization since 1700" instead of "History of the Roman Republic". As @Virginia Tech 4ever" alluded to, this was a more interesting and relevant period of time for the development of western civilisation. It will give you some background on which you can use explore the work of Adam Smith, John Locke, Friedrich Hayek, etc. If you're American, it will do well to highlight how the Democratic and Republican parties have slowly but surely destroyed freedom over time, as we reach the present day.

"SSits"

Western civilization. Hopefully you'll learn a lot of the conceptual frameworks we still operate on (often in error, hello concepts of perfectly rational actors developed before we learned about evolution and psychology).

I'm curious what you meant by this? How does evolution change the economics of perfectly rational actors (I'm not saying that people are perfectly rational actors)?