John Locke

Examples of John Locke in the following topics:

• John Locke

  • John Locke, an English philosopher and physician, is regarded as one of the most influential Enlightenment thinkers, whose work greatly contributed to the development of the notions of social contract and natural rights.
  • John Locke was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the "Father of Liberalism." 
  • Locke never married nor had children.
  • However, Locke did not demand a republic.
  • Portrait of John Locke, by Sir Godfrey Kneller,1697, State Hermitage Museum, St.

• The American Enlightenment

  • Historians have considered how the ideas of John Locke and republican ideas merged together to form republicanism in the United States.
  • Deism greatly influenced intellectuals and several noteworthy 18th-century Americans, such as John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson.
  • For example, the English political theorist John Locke was a significant source of influence and inspiration to the American intellectual elite.
  • Essentially, Locke claimed that since men created governments, they could also alter or abolish them.
  • John Locke is often credited with the creation of liberalism as a philosophical tradition.

• Popular Consent, Majority Rule, and Popular Sovereignty

  • Using thinking similar to that of English philosopher John Locke, the founders of the United States believed in a state built upon the consent of "free and equal" citizens; a state otherwise conceived would lack legitimacy and legal authority.
  • Popular sovereignty in its modern sense, that is, including all the people and not just noblemen, is an idea that dates to the social contracts school (mid-17th to mid-18th centuries), represented by Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), John Locke (1632–1704), and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778), author of The Social Contract, a prominent political work that clearly highlighted the ideals of "general will" and further matured the idea of popular sovereignty.
  • John Locke was an English philosopher whose writings on the consent of the governed heavily influenced the founders of the United States

• The Rights of Englishmen

  • The Magna Carta, sealed in 1215 by King John after coercion from an assembly of his barons, is an English charter that limited the power of the king by guaranteeing certain rights, liberties, and privileges to the English aristocracy .
  • For instance, in 1690, John Locke (one of the fathers of the English Enlightenment) wrote that all people have fundamental natural rights to "life, liberty and property," and that governments were created in order to protect these rights.
  • If they did not, according to Locke, the people had a right to alter or abolish their government .
  • Locke's political theory was founded on a social contract theory: that in a state of nature, all people were equal and independent, and everyone had a natural right to defend his "life, health, liberty, or possessions. " However, Locke argued, as it is more rational to live in an organized society where labor is divided and civil conflicts could be decided without violence, governments were established to protect the "life, health, liberty, and possessions" of men.
  • John Locke, often credited for the creation of liberalism as a philosophical tradition.

• The Concept of Civic Duty

  • For instance, in 1690, John Locke (one of the fathers of the English Enlightenment) wrote that all people have fundamental natural rights to "life, liberty and property" and that governments were created in order to protect these rights.
  • If they did not, according to Locke, the people had a right to alter or abolish their government.
  • John Locke is often credited for the creation of liberalism as a philosophical tradition.

• Natural Rights

  • The most famous natural right formulation comes from John Locke in his Second Treatise, when he introduces the state of nature.
  • Another 17th-century Englishman, John Lilburne (known as Freeborn John) argued for level human basic rights he called "freeborn rights" which he defined as being rights that every human being is born with, as opposed to rights bestowed by government or by human law.
  • Portrait of John Locke, by Sir Godfrey Kneller, Britain, 1697, State Hermitage Museum, St.
  • The most famous natural right formulation comes from John Locke in his Second Treatise.
  • For Locke, the natural rights include perfect equality and freedom, and the right to preserve life and property.

• The Bill of Rights

  • To some degree, the Bill of Rights incorporated the ideas of John Locke, who argued in his 1689 work, Two Treatises of Government, that civil society was created for the protection of property .
  • Locke also advanced the notion that each individual is free and equal in the state of nature.
  • Unlike Thomas Hobbes, Locke believed that human nature is characterized by reason and tolerance.
  • Like Hobbes, Locke believed that human nature allowed men to be selfish.
  • However, Locke never refers to Hobbes by name and may instead have been responding to other writers of the day.

• The Limits of Democracy

  • The Federalist Papers form a collection of 85 articles and essays by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, promoting ratification of the United States Constitution.
  • The most important influences on the Constitution from the European continent were from Enlightenment thinkers John Locke and Montesquieu.
  • Locke advanced the principle of consent of the governed in his Two Treatises of Government: essentially, government's duty in a social contract with the sovereign people was to serve them by protecting their rights to life, liberty, and property.

• Liberty

  • Within the context of social liberty, the British philosopher John Stuart Mill, in his work On Liberty, sought to define the "nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual."
  • The founders of the United States were heavily influenced by the writings of John Locke, who had declared in Two Treatises of Government that under natural law, all people have the right to life, liberty, and estate.

• Introduction to the Enlightenment

  • A second, more moderate variety, supported by René Descartes, John Locke, Christian Wolff, Isaac Newton and others, sought accommodation between reform and the traditional systems of power and faith.
  • John Locke and Rousseau also developed social contract theories.
  • Locke is particularly known for his statement that individuals have a right to "Life, Liberty and Property" and his belief that the natural right to property is derived from labor.
  • The radical Enlightenment promoted the concept of separating church and state, an idea often credited to Locke.
  • For Locke, this created a natural right in the liberty of conscience, which he said must therefore remain protected from any government authority.