Famous John Locke Quotes Explained
John Locke was an English philosopher and physician, regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers. Locke's <em>Essay Concerning Human Understanding</em> (1689) and <em>Two Treatises of Government</em> (1689) shaped Anglo-American empiricism and liberal political theory. Below are eight of the most-quoted lines.
“No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience.”
Book II, Ch. 1, sec. 19
What it means
From the Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book IV. Locke's empiricism is uncompromising: the mind contains no innate ideas, and so cognitive content is bounded by the experiences from which it has been compounded. The principle frames the rest of his theory of knowledge.
“All mankind being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. II, sec. 6
What it means
From the Second Treatise of Government (1689), chapter 2. Locke grounds his political theory in a state-of-nature account: each person is naturally equal in rights and independent of any human authority, and so any legitimate government must derive from the consent of these natural equals.
“The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VI, sec. 57
What it means
From the Second Treatise, chapter 6. Locke distinguishes liberty from licence: genuine freedom requires the protection of law against the predation of others, so the function of law is to expand, not contract, the sphere in which one can safely act.
“Where there is no law, there is no freedom.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VI, sec. 57
What it means
From the Second Treatise, chapter 6. Locke's pair states a deliberate paradox: without enforceable law there is only the power of the strongest, which is the negation of liberty rather than its purest form. Hobbes had reached the same conclusion from different premises.
“Government has no other end, but the preservation of property.”
Second Treatise of Government , Ch. VII. sec. 94
What it means
From the Second Treatise, chapter 9. "Property" in Locke's broad use covers life, liberty, and estate; government exists to secure these against violation, and forfeits its legitimacy when it instead becomes the violator.
“It is one thing to show a man that he is in error, and another to put him in possession of truth.”
Book IV, Ch. 7, sec. 11
What it means
From the Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book IV. Locke distinguishes negative correction (showing that a belief is wrong) from positive teaching (supplying the correct belief). The two operations are different and both are usually required, since refutation alone leaves an empty space.
“New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not common.”
Dedicatory epistle, as quoted in Fred R Shapiro (2006). The Yale Book of Quotations . Yale University Press. p. 468. ISBN 0-300-10798-6 .
What it means
From the Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book IV. Locke's sociological observation is that novelty itself triggers opposition prior to any evaluation of content; the resistance is to the unfamiliar, and the rational evaluator has to discount this initial reaction.
“To love truth for truth's sake is the principal part of human perfection in this world , and the seed-plot of all other virtues .”
Letter to Anthony Collins (29 October 1703)
What it means
From Locke's Conduct of the Understanding (published posthumously 1706). Locke treats the love of truth, undertaken for its own sake rather than for instrumental gain, as the disposition out of which other intellectual virtues grow.