The Life of John Locke
Many look at John Locke as the intellectual father of liberalism. Born in Wrington, England in 1632. He was born to Puritan parents who lived a very simple life. Young Locke would eventually go onto become an Oxford Academic and medical researcher. He is often remembered for his contributions to a philosophical school known as empiricism.
This is a school of thought advocates for the theory that all knowledge is derived from sense and experience. Locke wrote a well known defense for empiricism entitled An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. The book is hailed as one of the first modern defenses of empiricism. Much of the book deals with determining the limits of human understanding. Locke wrote several other philosophical works but one political writing in particular ended up birthing a new nation.
On July 4, 1776 the United States of America was officially founded. Framers of the Constitution founded the nation on the ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These three ideals served as the philosophical foundation for American exceptionalism. While slightly different than the ideals of American exceptionalism, a similar sentiment appeared many years before the founding of the United States in John Locke's book Two Treaties of Government.
Two Treaties of Government was published in 1688 but was written in 1681 and is believed to have been intendended to inspire armed uprising which many country leaders were planning. The book tackled many philosophical topics such as government and natural rights. Though one passage in particular has echoed through American history.
"The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions… (and) when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another."
It is this paragraph that encompasses the age old liberal ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of property. The ideals that all men are entitles to life, the freedom to be the master of their own destiny and the opportunity to secure property through hard work. No man made government may ever take away these rights and if if they try then it is the right of the people to take up arms and abolish that government.
Works Cited:
Uzgalis, William. “John Locke.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 1 May 2018, plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke/
“Empiricism.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/empiricism. Accessed 7 May. 2020.
John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, ed. Thomas Hollis (London: A. Millar et al., 1764). 12/16/2019.
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