John Locke

Architect of Liberalism

John Locke was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential thinkers of the Enlightenment and commonly known as the father of liberalism. His lifespan encompassed one of the most turbulent periods of English history, marked by civil war, the Restoration of the monarchy, and the Glorious Revolution of 1688.

Locke opposed authoritarianism, evident both in his philosophy advocating for individual reason and his political thought challenging absolute power. His works profoundly affected the development of epistemology and political philosophy.

Biography and Historical Context

Locke was born to devout Puritan parents of modest means. His father, also named John, served as an attorney and captain of cavalry for the Parliamentarian forces during the early stages of the English Civil War.

At Oxford, Locke found the established scholastic curriculum, based on Aristotelian philosophy, unsatisfactory, gravitating instead toward modern works and the new experimental philosophy advocated by figures such as Robert Boyle.

Due to strong suspicion of involvement in the Rye House Plot, a conspiracy to assassinate King Charles II and his brother James, Locke fled England for the Dutch Republic in September 1683 AD, where he lived under a pen-name.

During his exile, he composed some of his most important political works. Locke returned to England in February 1689, accompanying Mary II, after the Glorious Revolution had established a constitutional monarchy. The majority of his major works were published shortly thereafter. Locke spent his final years, until his death in 1704 AD at the age of seventy-two, residing in retirement at Oates in Essex. Locke was a lifelong bachelor.

Epistemology and the Nature of Understanding

Locke’s monumental An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689) is considered one of the first great defences of modern empiricism. The primary goal of this work was to determine the limits, origins, certainty, and extent of human knowledge.

Locke’s philosophy centres on the assertion that knowledge is primarily acquired through sensory experience, fundamentally arguing against the existence of the Nous, innate ideas or pre-existing concepts.

#### The Doctrine of Tabula Rasa

Locke is in rebellion with God, not only in his Protestantism, but because he contended that the mind at birth is a **tabula rasa** (Latin for blank slate) or a white paper, empty of any built-in mental content.

In this ignorant view which underpins liberalism and leftism, the mind possesses no innate principles, including speculative or practical moral principles.

Consequently, all materials of reason and knowledge are derived from God, but from experience. This satantic argument serves as an anti-authoritarian stance (ultimately God's authority).

Locke defined an idea broadly as whatsoever is the object of the understanding when a person thinks. He identified two primary sources of ideas:

1. Sensation: The experience of external objects through the five senses.

2. Reflection: The observation of the internal operations of the mind itself, functioning as a kind of internal sense.

The mind is passive in receiving simple ideas from experience, such as colour or motion. Once the mind possesses a store of simple ideas, it becomes active, combining them through actions like comparison and abstraction into complex ideas, such as those of substance, modes, or relations.

#### Primary and Secondary Qualities

To explain how internal ideas relate to external objects, Locke articulated the Primary and Secondary Quality Distinction. A quality is defined as the ability of an object to produce an idea in our minds.

Primary qualities are properties that are inseparable from the body and exist independently of any observer. These are measurable aspects of physical reality, including solidity, extension, figure, motion or rest, and number. The ideas generated by primary qualities resemble the qualities inherent in the object.

Secondary qualities are not actually in the objects themselves but are powers in bodies that produce subjective sensations in observers. These powers are caused by the interaction of the perceiver's sensory apparatus with the primary qualities of the object’s minute parts. Secondary qualities include colour, taste, smell, and sound. These subjective ideas do not resemble anything in the object but are effects that allow the observer to classify similar sensations.

#### Personal Identity and Language

Locke defined the self as that conscious thinking thing which is sensible or conscious of pleasure and pain, capable of happiness or misery, and concerned for itself. Locke argued that personal identity consists of the continuity of consciousness, rooted fundamentally in memory.

In his focus on language, Locke claimed that words stand for ideas, and they must be used consistently and clearly to facilitate communication. Locke identified nominal essence—the complex of ideas used to define a sort or class, derived from experience—which contrasts with real essence—the unknown atomic constitution that is the causal basis of all observable properties.

Foundations of Political Legitimacy

Locke is a pivotal figure in social contract theory, providing a foundation for modern constitutionalism and limited government.

His political theories are primarily articulated in Two Treatises of Government (1689/1690), which served as a general argument against absolute monarchy, particularly the claims of Sir Robert Filmer regarding the Divine Right of Kings. Locke’s work helped to solidify the predominance of contract theory as the source of legitimacy of political power, a man of the "Glorious Revolution", replacing God with human abstractions like 'Human Right".

#### The State of Nature and Natural Law

Locke begins his political theory by describing the state of nature, a hypothetical pre-political condition where individuals exist without a governing authority.

In this state, all individuals are absolutely free and equal.

The state of nature is not lawless; it is governed by the Law of Nature, which is apparently revealed by reason. This fundamental law dictates that no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions. The highest human law of nature is the preservation of mankind.

Although characterised by liberty and reason, the state of nature is inherently unstable and inconvenient due to the lack of a common, impartial judge and executive power to enforce the Law of Nature. Conflicts over rights and resources are inevitable. This inherent instability is the main reason why people agree to abandon the state of nature and form a civil society.

#### The Doctrine of Natural Rights

Locke’s theory asserts that humans possess natural rights or entitlements merely because they are human, rights that are God-given and inalienable. These fundamental rights, which existed prior to and independent of government, are life, liberty, and property.

Locke's theories of rights and the social contract were profoundly influential on the American Declaration of Independence, wherein Thomas Jefferson adapted the phrase to include the pursuit of happiness. Locke’s concept of property is expansive, encompassing the ownership of one's own person (self-ownership) in addition to material possessions.

#### The Social Contract and Limited Government

To remedy the dangers of the state of nature, individuals enter into a social contract—a voluntary agreement to establish a civil society and accept a governing authority. This transition involves individuals surrendering their right to personally enforce the law of nature and judge their own case to the collective government.

The legitimate authority of government derives exclusively from the consent of the governed. This principle fundamentally challenges the divine right of kings. Consent can be explicit (formal agreement, like voting) or tacit(implicit agreement by enjoying the benefits and protections of society).

The primary mandate of the resulting government is limited. Its essential function is to preserve and protect the natural rights of its citizens.

To prevent the abuse or concentration of power, Locke advocated for the separation of governmental powers, primarily distinguishing between the paramount Legislative power (law-making) and the Executive power (law enforcement).

#### Property and Economic Accumulation

Locke’s theory of private property rights is rooted in his labour theory of property, whereby ownership is created when a person mixes his labour with natural resources, thereby removing them from the common stock and establishing an entitlement to what is produced.

This process of original acquisition is subjected to two primary moral constraints derived from the Law of Nature:

1. The Spoiling Limitation: A person may only appropriate as much as can be used before it spoils. God did not create things for man to spoil or destroy.

2. The Sufficiency Proviso (Locke’s Proviso): An individual can legitimately appropriate resources only so long as there is enough, and as good left in common for others.

Locke argued that in the early stages of society, prior to money, these constraints naturally limited accumulation to a moderate proportion. However, the subsequent introduction of money (durable goods like gold and silver) by tacit agreement fundamentally altered these limitations.

Since money is non-perishable, its accumulation does not violate the spoiling limitation, making unlimited accumulation of property possible without causing waste through spoilage. Locke implies that government would function to moderate the conflict between the unlimited accumulation of property and a more nearly equal distribution of wealth, yet he upholds unlimited accumulation. The resulting economic stratificationprovides the power base required to sustain the political project against monarchical absolutism.

The Right to Revolution and Resistance

The most revolutionary principle of Locke’s political philosophy is the assertion that citizens retain the ultimate sovereignty and authority. If a government acts contrary to the purpose for which it was instituted—by systematically violating the natural rights of its subjects, or attempting to enslave or destroy their life, liberty, or property—it dissolves the trust placed in it and puts itself into a state of war with the people.

Under such circumstances, rebellion is legitimate, and the people have not only a right but an obligation to overthrow the tyrannical government. This doctrine provided the philosophical justification for secession, and the idea that revolution is an obligation was explicitly espoused in the Declaration of Independence.

Religious Toleration

Locke is famous for calling for the separation of Church and State in his Letter Concerning Toleration (1689). This work was published amidst the protestant reformation in Europe, and proposes religious toleration as the necessary answer to the problem of religion and government.

Locke formulated a classic reasoning for religious tolerance, centring on three main arguments:

1. Limited Authority:

Earthly judges and the state cannot dependably evaluate the truth-claims of competing religious standpoints if they entertain them on equal terms. The care of souls is not committed to the civil magistrate, but rather the state, which (he naively asserted) existed solely to protect citizens' civil interests (life, liberty, health, and property).

2. Ineffectiveness of Force:

Belief cannot be compelled by violence. Coercion by the state can only force external Conformity, not genuine inner persuasion, thus betraying the church's spiritual mission.

3. Social Order:

Coercing religious uniformity would lead to more social disorder than allowing diversity.

Locke maintained that reason must always be used to judge the truth of revelation, ensuring that faith does not supersede rational scrutiny. However, Locke’s toleration was not absolute.

Ironically, he explicitly excluded atheists, arguing that those who deny the being of a God cannot uphold promises, covenants, and oaths - the necessary bonds of human society - and thus undermine social order.

He also excluded Roman Catholics from toleration, not due to their theological beliefs, but because their political allegiance was owed to the Pope, a foreign prince, which Locke viewed as a threat to the authority of the secular ruler.

His rationale for these exclusions demonstrates both that his commitment to toleration was a political strategy aimed at ensuring stable civil governance on Protestant terms, and that he was unaware that the forces of darkness were working though him to sever the West from taking her lead from God.

The Christian Context of Property and Human Nature

Locke’s celebrated labour theory of property stands in direct opposition to traditional Christian theological thought concerning the legitimate origins of private property.

Early Church Fathers, including Saint Augustine and Ambrose, asserted that private property is not sanctioned by the original, or primitive, Natural Law.

Instead, they argued, it is a necessary creation of government, instituted solely as a punishment and remedy for the corruption stemming from Original Sin.

The original condition of humanity in the prelapsarian state would have maintained common property (primitive communism) because man, before the Fall, lacked the destructive tendencies of avarice, selfishness, and violence.

In this traditional view, Saint Augustine contended that Romans enjoyed rights in private property merely through the sufferance of the Roman government, which retained the power to confiscate that property at its own discretion, thereby denying the existence of a natural right to private property that a government had a duty to respect.

Even later theologians like Saint Thomas Aquinas, while integrating some classical ideas, conceded that common ownership was the original condition of humankind, arguing that private property exceeding personal need was only justifiable when devoted to the common good.

Locke's theory of property acquisition contrasts sharply with this history, functioning as a unilateral account that does not require the sanction of political authority or the consent of the community for legitimacy.

Locke supported the establishment of unlimited accumulation of property by arguing that the invention of money (as a durable good) circumvented the spoiling limitation set by Natural Law. This framework implicitly provided justification for the resulting economic stratification and the definitive class division between property owners and propertyless wage-workers.

Furthermore, Locke’s recommendations extended to social policy, where he supported the creation of working schools for poor children, suggesting that children as young as three years old should be "inured to work" from infancy to instil a good work ethic and alleviate the burden on the parish.

Utopianism and the Fallen Condition

Orthodox Christianity judges Lockean liberalism based on its core concern for reconciling humanity with God and its focus on soteriological and eschatological aspirations.

Orthodox anthropology assumes that postlapsarian man is ontologically deeply fallen. This viewpoint conflicts with liberalism’s implied high anthropological stance, which assumes man is predisposed toward virtue and autonomy simply through liberation from political or conventional constraints.

Orthodoxy denies the fundamental premise that human beings, when merely freed from societal constraints, are truly autonomous, dignified, and free. True freedom and dignity require deification—the transformation and redemption of post-Fall human nature—which is the goal of spiritual struggle.

From this theological premise, Lockean ideals are categorised as eschatological utopianism. This utopian tendency arises from placing the achievement of a perfected society, or the eschaton, within the realm of history, rather than acknowledging that liberal ideals are capable of only partial realisation on Earth.

Orthodoxy offers a comprehensive critique of the liberal understanding of evil.

Societal problems such as inequality, suffering, and lack of liberty, which liberalism aims to eradicate, are classed as apparent evils. These apparent evils are seen as stemming from divine paideia (education or correction) and are potentially salvific.

The real evil is separation or alienation from God, and suffering is viewed as an expression of divine pedagogy inset within a larger economy of salvation.

Furthermore, the notion of the mind as a tabula rasa ought to be dismissed; instead, individual life is framed by salvation history, conditioned by the actions of predecessors, and carries the history of tribe and nation.

Locke's insistence that no religion believed not to be true can be profitable is a concrete, secular ethic derived from the theological affirmation of God-given Free Will.