The Importance of Locke's Political Philosophy in the Colonies

ABSTRACT

This research paper analyzed The Importance of Locke's Political Philosophy in the Colonies and the Importance of the argument of the Second Treatise on Civil Government. Throughout this paper, the researcher has analyzed the political philosophy of John Locke's in colonies. It has also been highlighted that Locke-as is usual in historical time-period has influenced the way colonies have been working and the way people were residing in such circumstances.

The Importance of Locke's Political Philosophy in the Colonies

Introduction

John Locke was the first philosopher who articulated the central ideas of modern empiricism, in which there are very few issues that can be decided without a careful and dispassionate consideration of evidence obtained through the senses. He was born in 1632, wrote his works in the time that Newton's physics was replacing the science of Galileo and Descartes, whose ideas were focused more on reason than empirical evidence. This versatile man studied at the University of Oxford, where he received his doctorate in 1658. John Locke was also a diplomat, theologian, economist, professor of ancient Greek and rhetoric, and was renowned for his philosophical writings, in which he laid the foundations of liberal political thought (Delaney, 2005).

Thesis Statement

This research paper will be focusing on explaining the importance of Locke's political philosophy in the colonies.

Discussion

John Locke's View about State

"For me, the state is a society of men constituted only for the purpose of acquiring, maintaining and improving their own civil interests. Civil interests I call life, liberty, health and prosperity of the body, and the possession of external goods, such as money, land, house, furniture and the like. "(. J. Locke: Letter Concerning Toleration, 1689. )

In his political writings he defended popular sovereignty, the right to rebellion against tyranny and tolerance for religious minorities. In the mind of Locke and his followers, the state exists for the spiritual salvation of human beings but to serve citizens and ensure their lives, liberty and property under a constitution. He was the theorist of the second "English Revolution" or the agreement between the nobility and the bourgeois parliamentary block. He expounded his ideas in Charter Treaty on Tolerance and Civil Government. Locke departed from the principles of natural law as Hobbes; an abstraction made ??considering that the man lived in a bygone age, in a state of nature in which there was no social or political organization. In this situation or primitive state man was governed by basic natural laws, inspired ultimately by God, that he wished given by their natural reason and are self-evident (Dunn, 2000). These laws or natural rights are the right to life, liberty and property, but in this primitive society there was no one, no person, no organization, no institution that it ensures compliance. However, Locke's vision of this state of nature and psychology of the human species is less dramatic, less pessimistic than Hobbes. There is a war of all against all ("man is wolf to man").

Man must ensure these rights and ...