The Moral and Political Philosophy of John Locke

1. Locke has always held an important place in all histories of modern philosophy, and his wide influence on the development of thought since his day has been generally recognized. But it has been his epistemology to which attention has been chiefly directed; and his moral theories, and to some extent his political theories, have been correspondingly neglected. Such disproportionate emphasis upon one phase of his contribution to philosophy is not altogether surprising. Epistemological problems have been the storm center of controversy both in England and Germany ever since the Essay concerning Human Understanding precipitated them in so striking a form. Indeed philosophy has often been treated as if it were synonymous with epistemology; and ethics has been relegated, even where it has been mentioned at all, to an appendix. Recently, however, a reaction has undoubtedly been going on against too exclusive an absorption in epistemological matters, and moral and political questions are regaining the importance which they once held in philosophical discussions. It seems desirable, therefore, to consider more fully than has yet been done the ethics of Locke and the relation of his ethics to the development of thought in his century.

The sources for information concerning the ethics of Locke are not as plentiful as the historian might well desire. Various phases of his social and political philosophy he discussed in his Letters for Toleration, Treatises of Government, and Thoughts concerning Education. But nowhere did he present a systematic statement of his general ethical position, of the fundamental ethical principles upon which all social and political principles must rest. He was repeatedly urged to write a treatise on morality by his friend Molyneux,' whose expectations he had stimulated by his repeated assertions in the Essay that ethics should be classed with mathematics among the demonstrable sciences.2 Molyneux insisted that such a task as a treatise on morality would be "worthy of your consideration," and well suited to "so clear and distinct a thinker as you are." Locke humbly replied that "though . . . I

1Cf. Molyneux's letters to Locke: Works, Vol. IX, pp. 291, 299, 329. The same request was repeated by others of his admirers, e. g., Mrs. Katherine Trotter Cockburn in the introductory letter to her Defence of Mr. Locke's Essay in 1702.

2 Cf. below, Book II, Chapter II, § 3.

saw that morality might be demonstratively made out, yet whether I am able so to make it out, is another question." He promised indeed to employ his leisure hours in thinking of the matter, and may possibly have designed a short fragment among his papers entitled Of Ethics in General1 in answer to Molyneux's request. Yet he never actually published any work dealing directly with ethical theory. Had he ventured to do so, his exact position on certain questions would not be so difficult to determine to-day, and some of the ambiguities and inconsistencies in his theories might have been removed. As such a treatise was not framed, the historian's evidence for an outline of his thoughts on ethics consists mainly of the various isolated passages in the Essay in which he dealt with moral problems, and a number of brief selections from his Journals and Common-place Books printed by his biographers, together with the assumptions upon which his discussions of social and political matters seem to have rested.

2. The reasons which deterred Locke from publishing a treatise on the principles of morality are probably two. In the first place, he came to be more and more absorbed in controversial writings in defending the Essay, The Reasonableness of Christianity, and the first Letter concerning Toleration against the attacks of Stillingfleet, Edwards, and Proast respectively. He was so vitally interested in the issues involved in those controversies that he gave over to wearisome, and at times petty, refutation the leisure which might otherwise have been employed on more constructive tasks. In the second place, he had a simple religious trust in the complete adequacy of the revelation of moral principles in Scripture. He was to be sure a confident rationalist, insisting that revelation can never contradict the sure results of reason, and will not even, especially where the revelation is traditional instead of original, carry the same conviction which reason carries.5 He granted that, because of the imperfections of language, the written revelation in Scripture is exposed to misunderstanding; and he drew the lesson therefrom that men should be "more careful and diligent" in using their powers of reason, and less "magisterial, positive, and imperious" in interpreting revealed truths. Yet though he was fond of proclaiming the glory of reason in general, he often fell back upon revelation when any particular, concrete point needed to be proved. All through The Reasonableness of Christianity he emphasized the insufficiency of natural religion," and of "natural morality" also, as morality established by reason might be called. "It would seem, by

& Locke: Works, Vol. IX, pp. 294-295.

4 King: Life of Locke, pp. 308–313. Cf. below, Book II, Chapter V, Section 2.

↳ Essay IV, 18, 3-4. Cf. Works, Vol. VII, p. 142. (In this and similar references to Locke and other authors, Roman numerals indicate the book, Arabic numerals the chapters, and superior figures the section.)

• Essay III, 9, 23.

7 Works, Vol. VII, pp. 5, 102, 135-156, 157-158.