He was a philosopher who laid most of the groundwork for the European Enlightenment and the Constitution of the United States. Locke’s family was a part of the Church of England but was leaning towards to Puritanism a movement which was made to purify the Church which was said to have influenced Locke’s later life and his thinking. From a young age Locke did not like the idea of having a king to have a birth right to rule.
He was raised in Pensford a small town near Bristol, where Locke’s father worked as a lawyer, small landowner also fighting on the Parliamentarian side during the civil war. After the civil war ended in 1646, Locke’s father was able to get his son who was academically talented, a place at the elite private school in London called Westminster school.
At the age of 14 Locke was sent to a boarding school, although he did very well at the school, he did not enjoy it and later on in life he attacked boarding schools for their corporal punishments for bad behavior of students in his work “Some Thoughts Concerning Education” (1693). Moving on Locke became a student and lecturer for Christ Church, Oxford between 1652 and 1667. Where he studied the standard curriculum of metaphysics logic and classics.
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Also studying medicine. In 1666, Locke met a parliamentarian who later became the first Earl of Shaftesbury named Anthony Ashley Cooper they became very good friends and later in 1667 Locke became the physician to the Shaftesbury household. Locke worked for them for the next two decades then when the Shaftesbury led a campaign which was to stop the Catholic duke of York from the succession of the throne in 1679. Which failed and they were forced to flee to Holland in 1682 where Locke followed. Only to return after the Glorious revolution placing William III on the throne.
When he returned to England, he published many of his most renowned works including his most famous work the “Essay Concerning Human Understanding” (1689) talking about a theory of human knowledge, identity and selfhood, later on became very influential to the Enlightenment. In its Locke suggested a different approach modeled on the rough ways of experimental science and with this approach greatly affected the Scientific revolution. And the three “Letters Concerning Toleration” (1689-92) his last published work. In that Locke thought that governments should give the people freedom of religion unless this belief was putting a threat against public order. Also, stating that not all beliefs were good and correct just the government should not be the one deciding which one is correct.
Also, the “Two Treaties of Government” (1690) which included political theories which was developed during his years at working for the Shaftsbury household. In it he famously writing that a man has three natural rights in life: life, liberty and property. Locke believed that societies form governments through mutual agreement therefore rejecting the divine right of kings.
