Locke's Two Treatises and Essay: social contract and empiricism

Date

1689 (published; dated 1690)

Category

Culture, arts & philosophy

Region

England

Era

Early Modern

Significance

Returning to England after the Glorious Revolution, John Locke published in 1689-1690 two works that became foundational to the Enlightenment.

The Two Treatises of Government argued that legitimate authority rests on the consent of the governed, that people possess natural rights to life, liberty and property, and that a government violating its trust may rightfully be resisted. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding advanced empiricism, holding that the mind begins as a blank slate and that knowledge derives from experience rather than innate ideas. Together they reshaped political theory and epistemology, supplying the vocabulary of natural rights and the social contract. Locke's ideas profoundly influenced Montesquieu, the American Declaration of Independence and later liberal constitutionalism.

Empires active in 1689 (published; dated 1690)

• Mughal Empire
  1526 CE – 1857 CE
• Portuguese Empire
  1415 CE – 1999 CE
• Spanish Empire
  1492 CE – 1976 CE
• Solomonic dynasty
  1270 CE – 1974 CE
• Ottoman Empire
  1299 CE – 1922 CE
• Qing Dynasty
  1636 CE – 1912 CE

Related culture, arts & philosophy events

• Francis Bacon's Novum Organum and the scientific method
  1620
• The Enlightenment (Age of Reason)
  c. 1685–1815
• Voltaire's Lettres philosophiques popularises English liberty
  1733 (English) / 1734 (French)
• Descartes's Discourse on the Method and modern philosophy
  1637
• Construction of the Taj Mahal
  1632–1653
• Diderot and d'Alembert's Encyclopédie
  1751–1772 (first 17 text vols. + plates)

Further reading

The Story of Art

The wider story

The Story of Art

E. H. Gombrich

The best-selling art history ever written, from cave paintings to the modern age.

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