SIGNIFICANT QUOTES FOR JOHN LOCKE'S
SECOND TREATISE
1
...it is impossible that the rulers now on earth should make any
benefit, or derive any...authority from...Adam's private dominion and paternal
jurisdiction.
4 To
understand political power right, and derive it from its original, we must
consider, what state all men are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfect
freedom to order their actions...as they see fit, within the bounds of the law
of nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any other man.
6
The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges
everyone: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but
consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another
in his life, liberty, or possessions....
7
...the execution of the law of nature is...put into every man's hands, whereby
every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that law to such a
degree, as may hinder its violation....
13 I
easily grant that civil government is the proper remedy for the inconveniences
of the state of nature, which must certainly be great, where men may be judges
in their own case....
19
Men living together according to reason, without a common superior on earth,
with authority to judge between them, is properly the state of nature.
21 To
avoid this state of war (...wherein every least difference is apt to end,
where there is no authority to decide between contenders) is one great reason
of men's putting themselves into society, and quitting the state of nature....
27
Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every
man has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but
himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say, are
properly his. Whatsoever then he removes out of the state that nature hath
provided, and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with, and joined to it
something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property.
31 As
much as any one can make use of to any advantage of life before it spoils, so
much he may by his labour fix a property in: whatever is beyond this, is more
than his share, and belongs to others. Nothing was made by God for man to
spoil or destroy.
32 As
much land as a man tills, plants, improves, cultivates, and can use the
product of, so much is his property. He by his labour does, as it were,
inclose it from the common.
33
Nor was this appropriation of any parcel of land, by improving it, any
prejudice to any other man, since there was still enough, and as good left....
34
God gave the world...to the use of the industrious and rational....
40
...if we will rightly estimate things as they come to our use, and cast up the
several expenses about them, what in them is purely owning to nature, and what
to labour, we shall find, that in most of them ninety-nine hundredths are
wholly to be put on the account of labor.
50
...it is plain, that men have agreed to a disproportionate and unequal
possession of the earth, they having, by a tacit and voluntary consent, found
out a way how a man may fairly possess more land than he himself can use the
product of, by receiving in exchange for the overplus gold and silver, which
may be hoarded up without injury to any one; these metals not spoiling or
decaying in the hands of the possessor.
55
Children, I confess, are not born in this full state of equality, though they
are born to it.
73
But if they will enjoy the inheritance of their ancestors, they must take it
on the same terms their ancestors had it, and submit to all the conditions
annexed to such a possession.
89
Where-ever therefore any number of men are so united into one society, as to
quit every one his executive power of the law of nature, and to resign it to
the public, there and only there only is a political or civil society.
96
...it is necessary the body should move that way whither the greater force
carries it, which is the consent of the majority....
123 If
a man in the state of nature be so free...why will he part with his freedom?
...To which it is obvious to answer, that though in the state of nature he
hath such a right, yet the enjoyment of it is very uncertain, and constantly
exposed to the invasion of others.... This makes him willing...to join in
society with others, who are already united, or have a mind to unite, for the
mutual preservation of their lives, liberties and estates, which I call by the
general name, property.
131
And so whoever has the legislative or supreme power of any common-wealth, is
bound to govern by established standing laws, promulgated and known to the
people, and not by extemporary decrees; by indifferent and upright judges, who
are able to decide controversies by those laws; and to employ the force of the
community at home, only in the execution of such laws, or abroad to prevent or
redress foreign injuries, and secure the community from inroads and invasion.
And all this to be directed to no other end, but the peace, safety, and public
good of the people.
199
...the exercise of power beyond right [is when]...the governor, however
intitled, makes not the law, but his will, the rule; and his commands and
actions are not directed to the preservation of the properties of his people,
but the satisfaction of his own ambition, revenge, covetousness, or any other
irregular passion.
207
...where the injured party may be relieved, and his damages repaired by appeal
to law, there can be no pretence for force, which is only to be used where a
man is intercepted from appealing to the law....
208
...[it is] impossible for one, or a few oppressed men to disturb the
government, where the body of the people do not think themselves concerned on
it, as for a raving mad-man, or heady mal-content to overturn a well-settled
state; the people being as little apt to follow the one, as the other.
212
When any one, or more, shall take upon them to make laws, whom the people have
not appointed so to do, they make laws without authority, which the people are
not therefore bound to obey....
219
There is one way more whereby such a government may be dissolved, and that is,
when he who has the supreme executive power, neglects and abandons that
charge, so that the laws already made can no longer be put into execution.
...When there is no longer the administration of justice, for the securing of
men's rights, nor any remaining power within the community to direct the
force, or provide for the necessities of the public, there certainly is no
government left....
220
...men can never be secure from tyranny, if there be no means to escape it
till they are perfectly under it: and therefore it is, that they have not only
a right to get out of it, but to prevent it.
225
...revolutions happen not upon every little mismanagement in public affairs.
Great mistakes in the ruling part, many wrong and inconvenient laws, and all
the slips of human frailty, will be born by the people without mutiny or
murmur. But if a long train of abuses, prevarications and artifices, all
tending the same way, make the design visible to the people...it is not to be
wondered, that they should then rouse themselves....
230
The examples of particular injustice, or oppression of here and there an
unfortunate man, moves them not. But if they universally have a persuasion,
grounded upon manifest evidence, that designs are carrying on against their
liberties...who is to be blamed for it? ...But whether the mischief hath
oftener begun in the people’s wantoness, and a desire to cast off the lawful
authority of their rulers, or in the rulers insolence...I leave it to
impartial history to determine. This I am sure, whoever, either ruler or
subject, by force goes about to invade the rights of either prince or people,
and lays the foundation for overturning the constitution and frame of any just
government, is highly guilty of the greatest crime, I think, a man is capable
of, being to answer for all those mischiefs of blood, rapine, and desolation,
which the breaking to pieces of governments bring on a country. And he who
does it, is justly to be esteemed the common enemy and pest of mankind, and is
to be treated accordingly.