John Locke (August 29, 1632-October 28, 1704) was an English philosopher, diplomat and educator, whose writings had a profound influence on America's Founding Fathers. He received his master's degree from the Christ Church College of Oxford University, 1658, and lectured there on Greek, philosophy and rhetoric. He served as a diplomat to Madrid, 1665, moved to France, 1675, then Holland, 1683, and returned to England, 1688.
Locke's works include: A Letter Concerning Toleration, 1689; Two Treatises of Government, 1690; An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 1693; Some Thoughts Concerning Education, 1693; and The Reasonableness of Christianity, 1695. Of nearly 15,000 items of the Founding Fathers which were reviewed; including books, newspaper articles, pamphlets, monographs, etc., John Locke was the third most frequently quoted author. In his Two Treatises of Government, 1690, he cited 80 references to the Bible in the first treatise and 22 references to the Bible in the second.
John Locke elaborated on fundamental concepts, such as: parental authority, separation of powers, private property, the right to resist unlawful authority, unalienable rights, and government by consent, whereby governments "derive their just powers from the consent of the governed."
Concerning the idea of a "social compact," a constitution between the people and the government, John Locke trace its origins to:
<That Paction which God made with Noah after the Deluge.> 1632JL001
John Locke classified the basic natural rights of man as the right to "life, liberty and property." This not only influenced Thomas Jefferson, who penned the Declaration of Independence, but also elements in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.
In his Treatise Of Civil Government, 1689, John Locke stated:
<Great and Chief End, therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the preservation of their property....
For Men being all the Workmanship of one Omnipotent, and infinitely wise Maker: all the Servants of one Sovereign Master, sent into the World by his Order, and about his Business, they are his Property, whose Workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another's Pleasure....
Those Grants God made of the World to Adam, and to Noah, and his Sons...has given the Earth to the Children of Men, given it to Mankind in common....
God, who hath given the World to Men in common, hath also given them reason to make use of it to the best Advantage of Life and Convenience.> 1632JL002
On August 23, 1689, in his work, Of Civil Government, John Locke wrote on natural law and natural rights:
<The obligations of the Law of Nature cease not in society, but only in many cases are drawn closer, and have, by human laws, known penalties annexed to them to enforce their observation.
Thus the Law of Nature stands as an eternal rule to all men, legislators as well as others. The rules that they make for other men's actions must...be conformable to the Law of Nature; ie. to the Will of God, of which that is a declaration, and the fundamental Law of Nature being the preservation of mankind, no human sanction can be good or valid against it.> 1632JL003
In The Second Treatise on Civil Government, 1690, John Locke stated:
<Human Laws are measures in respect of Men whose Actions they must direct, albeit such measures they are as have also their higher Rules to be measured by, which Rules are two, the Law of God, and the Law of Nature; so that Laws Human must be made according to the general Laws of Nature, and without contradiction to any positive Law of Scripture, otherwise they are ill made.> 1632JL004
John Locke wrote paraphrases of the books of Romans, First and Second Corinthians, Galatians and Ephesians. In 1695, he published A Vindication of the Reasonableness of Christianity, in which he stated:
<He that shall collect all the moral rules of the philosophers and compare them with those contained in the New Testament will find them to come short of the morality delivered by our Saviour and taught by His disciples: a college made up of ignorant but inspired fishermen....
Such a law of morality Jesus Christ has given in the New Testament, but by the latter of these ways, by revelation, we have from Him a full and sufficient rule for our direction, and conformable to that of reason. But the word and obligation of its precepts have their force, and are past doubt to us, by the evidence of His mission.
He was sent by God: His miracles show it; and the authority of God in His precepts can not be questioned. His morality has a sure standard, that revelation vouches, and reason can not gainsay nor question; but both together witness to come from God, the great Lawgiver.
And such a one as this, out of the New Testament, I think, they would never find, nor can anyone say is anywhere else to be found....
To one who is persuaded that Jesus Christ was sent by God to be a King and a Saviour to those who believe in Him, all His commands become principles; there needs no other proof for the truth of what He says, but that He said it; and then there needs no more but to read the inspired books to be instructed.
Our Saviour's great rule, that we should love our neighbors as ourselves, is such a fundamental truth for the regulating of human society, that, by that alone, one might without difficulty determine all the cases and doubts in social morality.> 1632JL005
John Locke stated:
<The Bible is one of the greatest blessings bestowed by God on the children of men.-It has God for its author; salvation for its end, and truth without any mixture for its matter.-It is all pure, all sincere; nothing too much; nothing wanting.> 1632JL006
--
American Quotations by William J. Federer, 2024, All Rights Reserved, Permission granted to use with acknowledgement.
Endnotes:
1632JL001. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, Of Civil Government, Book Two, II:11, III:56; V:25, 55; XVIII:200. John Eidsmoe, Christianity and the Constitution-The Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, A Mott Media Book, 1987, 6th printing 1993), p. 61. Donald S. Lutz and Charles S. Hyneman, "The Relative Influence of European Writers on Late Eighteenth-Century American Political Thought," American Political Review 189 (1984): 189-197. (Courtesy of Dr. Wayne House of Dallas Theological Seminary.) John Eidsmoe, Christianity and the Constitution-The Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, A Mott Media Book, 1987, 6th printing 1993), pp. 51-53. Stephen K. McDowell and Mark A. Beliles, America's Providential History (Charlottesville, VA: Providence Press, 1988), p. 156. [1760-1805], Origins of American Constitutionalism, (1987).
1632JL002. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, 1689, in his work Of Civil Government. John Locke, Two Treatises on Civil Government (London: George Routledge and Sons, 1903) Book 2, p. 262. John Locke, The Second Treatise Of Civil Government 1690 (Reprinted Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1986) p. 77. Frank Donovan, Mr. Jefferson's Declaration (New York: Dodd Mead & Co., 1968), p. 137. Pat Robertson, America's Dates with Destiny (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1986), p. 66. Verna M. Hall, Christian History of the Constitution of the United States of America (San Francisco: Foundation for American Christian Education, 1975), pp. 58, 63-64, 91. Marshall Foster and Mary-Elaine Swanson, The American Covenant-The Untold Story (Roseburg, OR: Foundation for Christian Self-Government, 1981; Thousand Oaks, CA: The Mayflower Institute, 1983, 1992), pp. 111-112.
1632JL003. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, August 23, 1689, in his work Of Civil Government. John Locke, The Second Treatise on Civil Government, 1690 (reprinted Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1986), p. 75. John Locke, Two Treatises on Civil Government (London: George Routledge and Sons, 1903), Book 2, p. 262. Verna M.Hall, The Christian History of the Constitution of the United States of America-christian Self- Government with Union (San Francisco: Foundation for American Christian Education, 1976), p. 58. Marshall Foster and Mary-Elaine Swanson, The American Covenant-The Untold Story (Roseburg, OR: Foundation for Christian Self-Government, 1981; Thousand Oaks, CA: The Mayflower Institute, 1983, 1992), p. 108.
1632JL004. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, 1690, Of Civil Government, Book Two, XI:136n. John Locke, The Second Treatise on Civil Government, 1690 (reprinted Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1986), p. 76, n. 1. Richard Hooker, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Book 1, section 10. John Eidsmoe, Christianity and the Constitution-The Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, A Mott Media Book, 1987, 6th printing 1993), p. 62.
1632JL005. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, 1695, A Vindication of the Reasonableness of Christianity, a paraphrase of the books of Romans, First and Second Corinthians, Galatians and Ephesians. John Churchill, The Works of John Locke, Esq., 3 Vol. (1714). Verna M. Hall, The Christian History of the Constitution of the United States of America-christian Self-Government with Union (San Francisco: Foundation for American Christian Education, 1976), Vol. I, op cit, 56. Russ Walton, One Nation Under God (NH: Plymouth Rock Foundation, 1993), p. 22. Stephen Abbott Northrop, D.D., A Cloud of Witnesses (Portland, OR: American Heritage Ministries, 1987; Mantle Ministries, 228 Still Ridge, Bulverde, Texas), pp. 289-290. Tim LaHaye, Faith of Our Founding Fathers (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, Inc., 1987), pp. 51, 85-86.
1632JL006. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). John Locke, Statement. Tryon Edwards, D.D., The New Dictionary of Thoughts-A Cyclopedia of Quotations (Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1852; revised and enlarged by C.H. Catrevas, Ralph Emerson Browns and Jonathan Edwards [descendent, along with Tryon, of Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), president of Princeton], 1891; The Standard Book Company, 1955, 1963), p. 46.