CHAPTER VII
JOHN LOCKE
The Enlightenment in Great Britain. The history of the philosophy of Great Britain includes the teachings of Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and the Scottish School. With the exception of the teachings of the reactionary Scottish School, all the important philosophical teachings appear in the first half of the eighteenth century. We need to understand, first, the philosophical position of Locke, who was the father of the Enlightenment. We shall then see how his doctrine developed in three different directions: (1) as Deism,—a rational Christianity, (2) as an associational psychology in ethics, (3) as a theory of knowledge in the philosophies of Berkeley and Hume.
Our discussion of the philosophy of Bacon and Hobbes has been followed by that of Rationalism. It would, however, be a mistake for the reader to infer, as we are about to take up the study of Locke, that a long period of time intervened between Hobbes and Locke. A chronological comparison of their lives shows that they were contemporaries for forty-seven years. Both lived through the reign of Charles I, during the Commonwealth and the Restoration. Hobbes died eleven years before Locke published his only philosophical essay. We must remember, too, that the English empirical philosophers of the Enlightenment were not insulated from the Rationalists of the Continent. On the contrary, there was a lively interchange of ideas. Descartes influenced Hobbesand Hobbes influenced Spinoza. The influence of Descartes upon Locke was not inconsiderable, and Leibnitz felt the influence of Locke. Berkeley and Leibnitz arrived at idealistic conclusions from independent points of view. Bacon alone seems to stand apart both from his contemporaries and from his immediate followers.
The English Enlightenment was the natural development of the English Renaissance. Locke was the successor of Bacon and Hobbes. On the other hand, the English Enlightenment is similar to what went on in France and Germany. The first half of the English Enlightenment—from 1690 to 1750—was absorbed in philosophical discussions; during the second half, the period abandoned philosophy, and was engaged entirely in politics. The classes that won in the Revolution of 1688 had little trouble in maintaining their place of power. The peaceful coming of William and Mary gave well-ordered conditions for intellectual development and for a powerful literary movement. The Jacobites were crushed, and there ensued a period of political peace. In the latter half of the century, however, another set of topics came to the front. After 1750 politics superseded philosophy; and whereas the keenest English minds had been employed upon the theoretical “study of mankind” in literature and philosophy, they now became engaged in practical political questions. Political parties developed. The Court was arrayed against the families of the Revolution, the American trouble, and the Wilkite agitations were looming large. England was sucked into the political maelstrom that was involving all Europe. Instead of deistic controversies with the theological orthodoxy, dangerous political questions were appearing. Instead of Hume’s Essay and Butler’s Analogywe have Burke’s speeches, Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, Junius’s Letters, and political pamphlets. In the first half of the period Bolingbroke had left politics for philosophy; in the second half Priestley left his laboratory for politics. The great change in English intellectual interests is shown in Hume himself. In 1752 he turned from philosophy, because there was so little interest in the subject, to the writing of his history of England. Theology was paralyzed; deism was no longer ridiculed; orthodoxy slumbered in its victory. The only philosophic tones came from France, where Voltaire, the Encyclopædists, and Rousseau were carrying out a movement that had its origin in England; and, on the other hand, from Scotland and its reactionary school. But the political movement always remained political in England, because its institutions were not inflexible and because the English people are by nature constitutional. In England there has never been a revolution, in the true sense, but England’s progress has always been controlled by tradition. Even the revolution in the English colonies in America was caused by an abridgment of constitutional rights, and not by political theory, although the formal Declaration of Independence was framed under the influence of French philosophers.
John Locke, Life and Writings (1632–1704).[37] The life of Locke falls into four periods.
1. Student Life (1632–1666). Locke passed his first fourteen years at home, which were the troublesome years of the Civil War. The next six years were spent at the Westminster School in London. The last fourteenyears of this period were spent, first as student and then as lecturer in Oxford. He took his Oxford degrees in 1660, the year of the Restoration and the year in which the British Royal Society was founded at Oxford. His dislike for the classics, which was begun at the Westminster School, was confirmed by his Oxford studies. Consequently, during the years of his perfunctory lecturing at Oxford (1660–1666), his main interest was in physics. He was engaged in chemical, meteorological, and especially medical observations. He was also engaged in an amateur medical practice, in partnership with an old physician.
The first turning point in his life came in 1666, when he was called to attend the first Lord Shaftesbury, who had fallen ill at Oxford. This accidental meeting was the beginning of a lasting friendship with the Shaftesbury family, sustained by their common love for political, religious, and intellectual liberty. The first Lord Shaftesbury was the most notable statesman in the reign of Charles II; the third Lord Shaftesbury was the greatest of English ethical scholars. Locke was the trusted friend and beneficiary of the first Lord Shaftesbury, the tutor of the second, and influenced, more than any one else, the ethical productions of the third. Locke wrote some notes in this period on the Roman Commonwealth, an essay on toleration, and made records of physical observations.
2. As Politician (1666–1683). During these seventeen years Locke’s outward fortunes were intimately connected with the political career of Shaftesbury. He held public office. He was made a member of the Royal Society in 1668. The winter of 1670–1671 was important for his intellectual fortunes and marks anotherturning point in his life. It was then that he started the inquiry that led to his famous Essay.[38] The Essay was in the process of development during the next nineteen years. He passed four years in retirement and in study in France (1675–1679). He also at this time first conceived his Essays on Government. Shaftesbury fled to Holland in November, 1682, and Locke a few months later followed him.
3. As Philosophical Author (1683–1691). The year 1689 divides this period into two important parts. The first part (1683–1689) is not only the period of his exile in Holland, but it is the time in which he is composing and completing his three most important literary works,—Essay on the Human Understanding, the two Treatises on Government, the three Epistles on Tolerance. During the second part (1689–1691) he published these, which was the time immediately following his return to England. Newton’s Principia was published in 1687, and Locke’s Essay in 1690—the one the foundation of modern physical science, the other the beginning of modern psychology. The appearance of these two works together with the Revolution in 1688 makes this point of time an important one in the history of the world.
4. As Controversialist (1691–1704). Locke then began to write upon almost every conceivable subject,—the coining of silver money, the raising of the value of money, the culture of olives, etc. He was also very busy in defending his philosophy against attacks. For him, until 1700 the period was one of controversy. At that time he retired from all activity, and after four years of failing health died in 1704. His period of productionwas confined to the eleven years between 1689 and 1700.