Other Works
An Essay on the Poor Law
- Recommended edition: Political Essays, ed. Mark Goldie (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 182- 198.Excerpt: If the cause of this evil be well looked into, we humbly conceive it will be found to have proceeded neither from scarcity of provisions, nor from want of employment for the poor, since the goodness of God has blessed these times with plenty, no less… MoreSome Considerations of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, and Raising the Value of Money
- John Locke, "Some Considerations of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, and Raising the Value of Money" in The Works of John Locke in Nine Volumes, Vol. 4 (London: Rivington, 1824).Excerpt: The first thing to be considered is, “Whether the price of the hire of money can be regulated by law?” And to that I think, generally speaking, one may say, it is manifest it cannot. For since it is impossible to make a law that shall hinder a… MoreShort Observations On a Printed Paper, Entitled, For Encouraging the Coining Silver Money In England, and After For Keeping It Here
- John Locke, "Short Observations On a Printed Paper, Entitled, For Encouraging the Coining Silver Money In England, and After For Keeping It Here" in The Works of John Locke in Nine Volumes, Vol 4 (London: Rivington, 1824).Excerpt: The matter in short is this; England sending more consumable commodities to Spain than it receives from thence, the merchants, who manage their trade, bring back the overplus in bullion, which, at their return, they sell as a commodity. The chapmen,… More
Commentary
Anarchy, State, and Utopia
- Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State and Utopia (New York: Basic Books, 1977).Excerpt: “We slow down the dramatic pace of our tale in order to consider Locke’s views on parental ownership of children. Locke must discuss Filmer in detail, not merely to clear the field of some alternative curious view, but to show why that… MoreVirtue, Commerce, and History: Essays on Political Thought and History, Chiefly in the Eighteenth Century
- JGA Pocock, Virtue, Commerce, and History: Essays on Political Thought and History, Chiefly in the Eighteenth Century (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985).This book collects essays by Professor Pocock concerned principally with the history of British political thought in the eighteenth century. Several of the essays have been previously published (though they have not all been widely available), and several… MoreProperty and Political Theory
- Alan Ryan, Property and Political Theory (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985).A philosophical analysis (not a history of ideas) of the relationship between work and property among a number of key western thinkers, concentrating upon how property is justified or criticized, and how it has been related to notions of citizenship. Ryan… MorePolitics and Vision
- Sheldon Wolin, Politics and Vision (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006).Sheldon Wolin’s Politics and Vision inspired and instructed two generations of political theorists after its appearance in 1960. It culminates in Wolin’s remarkable argument that the United States has invented a new political form,… More“The Charitable John Locke”
- Steven Forde, "The Charitable John Locke," Review of Politics, 71 (2009), 428-458.Locke’s political philosophy, like any that centers on individual rights such as property rights, raises the question whether human beings have any duty to charity, or economic assistance, to the needy. Locke’s works contain some strong statements… MoreThe Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke
- C.B. MacPherson, The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962).This seminal work by political philosopher C.B. Macpherson was first published by the Clarendon Press in 1962, and remains of key importance to the study of liberal-democratic theory half-a-century later. In it, Macpherson argues that the chief difficulty of… MoreJohn Locke: Problems and Perspectives
- John Locke: Problems and Perspectives, ed. John Yolton (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011).Originally published in 1969, the impetus for this collection came from a conference on the Thought of John Locke held at York University, Toronto in 1966. Written in the co-operative spirit of the conference, the essays collected here were intended to… More