John Locke
John Locke (1632-1704) was an English philosopher, the father of modern materialism and empiricism, born in Wrington, Somerset. He studied medicine, but did not practise it, and gave himself up to a literary life, much of it spent in the family of the celebrated Earl of Shaftesbury, both at home with it and abroad.His great work is his "Essay on the Human Understanding" in 1690, which was preceded by "Letters on Toleration," published before the expulsion of James II, and followed by the "Treatise on Government" the same year, and "Thoughts on Education" in 1693. His "Essay" was written to show that all our ideas were derived from experience, that is, through the senses and reflection on what they reveal, and that there are no innate ideas. "Locke," says Prof. Saintsbury, "is eminently" (that is, before all his contemporaries) "of such stuff as dreams are not made of" - is wholly a prosaic practical man and Englishman.
Wisdom & Quotes
- All men are liable to error; and most men are, in many points, by passion or interest, under temptation to it.
- No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience.
- Wherever law ends, tyranny begins.
- All wealth is the product of labour.
- A sound mind in a sound body is a short but full description of a happy state in this world.
- Virtue is harder to be got than knowledge of the world; and, if lost in a young man, is seldom recovered.
- Truth, like gold, is not less so for being newly brought out of the mine.
- To love truth is the principal part of human perfection in this world, and the seed-plot of all other virtues.
Madame de La Fayette