John Locke FRS was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the “Father of Liberalism”. Profoundly inspirational John Locke quotes will encourage growth in life, make you wiser and broaden your perspective.
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Famous John Locke Quotes
The discipline of desire is the background of character. John Locke
Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours. John Locke
No man’s knowledge here can go beyond his experience. John Locke
I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. John Locke
The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it. John Locke
New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not common. John Locke
Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has a right to, but himself. John Locke
The only defense against the world is a thorough knowledge of it. John Locke
As people are walking all the time, in the same spot, a path appears. John Locke
We are like chameleons, we take our hue and the color of our moral character, from those who are around us. John Locke
Fortitude is the guard and support of the other virtues. John Locke
Parents wonder why the streams are bitter, when they themselves poison the fountain. John Locke
Things of this world are in so constant a flux, that nothing remains long in the same state. John Locke
Being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions. John Locke
We are like chameleons, we take our hue and the color of our moral character, from those who are around us. John Locke
Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him. John Locke
To love our neighbor as ourselves is such a truth for regulating human society, that by that alone one might determine all the cases in social morality. John Locke
To love truth for truth’s sake is the principal part of human perfection in this world, and the seed plot of all other virtues. John Locke
An excellent man, like precious metal, is in every way invariable; A villain, like the beams of a balance, is always varying, upwards and downwards. John Locke
Revolt is the right of the people. John Locke
The reason why men enter into society is the preservation of their property. John Locke
No man’s knowledge here can go beyond his experience. John Locke
Where there is no property there is no injustice. John Locke
There is frequently more to be learned from the unexpected questions of a child than the discourses of men. John Locke
To prejudge other men’s notions before we have looked into them is not to show their darkness but to put out our own eyes. John Locke
So that, in effect, religion, which should most distinguish us from beasts, and ought most peculiarly to elevate us, as rational creatures, above brutes, is that wherein men often appear most irrational, and more senseless than beasts themselves. John Locke
The improvement of understanding is for two ends first, our own increase of knowledge; secondly, to enable us to deliver that knowledge to others. John Locke
The Bible is one of the greatest blessings bestowed by God on the children of men. It has God for its Author, salvation for its end, and truth without any mixture for its matter. It is all pure, all sincere; nothing too much; nothing wanting! John Locke
Our incomes are like our shoes; if too small, they gall and pinch us; but if too large, they cause us to stumble and to trip. John Locke
To prejudge other men’s notions before we have looked into them is not to show their darkness but to put out our own eyes. John Locke
What worries you, masters you. John Locke
All wealth is the product of labor. John Locke
A sound mind in a sound body, is a short, but full description of a happy state in this World he that has these two, has little more to wish for; and he that wants either of them, will be little the better for anything else. John Locke
The great question which, in all ages, has disturbed mankind, and brought on them the greatest part of their mischiefs has been, not whether be power in the world, nor whence it came, but who should have it. John Locke
Government has no other end, but the preservation of property. John Locke
Our Business here is not to know all things, but those which concern our conduct. Locke John
I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. John Locke
For where is the man that has incontestable evidence of the truth of all that he holds, or of the falsehood of all he condemns; or can say that he has examined to the bottom all his own, or other men’s opinions? The necessity of believing without knowledge, nay often upon very slight grounds, in this fleeting state of action and blindness we are in, should make us more busy and careful to inform ourselves than constrain others. John Locke
I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. John Locke
What worries you masters you. John Locke
There is frequently more to be learned from the unexpected questions of a child than the discourses of men. John Locke
Reverie is when ideas float in our mind without reflection or regard of the understanding. John Locke
Reverie is when ideas float in our mind without reflection or regard of the understanding. John Locke
Few men think, yet all will have opinions. Hence men’s opinions are superficial and confused. John Locke
All men are liable to error; and most men are, in many points, by passion or interest, under temptation to it. John Locke
The acts of the mind, wherein it exerts its power over simple ideas, are chiefly these three 1. Combining several simple ideas into one compound one, and thus all complex ideas are made. 2. The second is bringing two ideas, whether simple or complex, together, and setting them by one another so as to take a view of them at once, without uniting them into one, by which it gets all its ideas of relations. 3. The third is separating them from all other ideas that accompany them in their real existence this is called abstraction, and thus all its general ideas are made. John Locke
It is one thing to show a man that he is in an error, and another to put him in possession of the truth. John Locke
A sound mind in a sound body, is a short, but full description of a Happy state in this World he that has these two, has little more to wish for; and he that wants either of them, will be little better for anything else. John Locke
Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours. John Locke
Fortitude is the guard and support of the other virtues. John Locke
We should have a great fewer disputes in the world if words were taken for what they are, the signs of our ideas only, and not for things themselves. John Locke
Men being, as has been said, by nature, all free, equal and independent, no one can be put out of this estate, and subjected to the political power of another, without his own consent. John Locke
The dread of evil is a much more forcible principle of human actions than the prospect of good. John Locke
I pretend not to teach, but to inquire; and therefore cannot but confess here again,that external and internal sensation are the only passages I can find of knowledge to the understanding. These alone, as far as I can discover, are the windows by which light is let into this dark room. For, methinks, the understanding is not much unlike a closet wholly shut from light, with only some little openings left, to let in external visible resemblances, or ideas of things without which, would they but stay there, and lie so orderly as to be found upon occasion, it would very much resemble the understanding of a man, in reference to all objects of sight, and the ideas of them. John Locke
I have spent more than half a lifetime trying to express the tragic moment. John Locke
New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common. John Locke
One unerring mark of the love of truth is not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant. John Locke
Whosoever will list himself under the banner of Christ, must, in the first place and above all things, make war upon his own lusts and vices. It is in vain for any man to usurp the name of Christian, without holiness of life, purity of manners, benignity and meekness of spirit. John Locke
The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom. For in all the states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom. John Locke
But what if he neglect the care of his soul? I answer What if he neglect the care of his health or of his estate, which things are nearlier related to the government of the magistrate than the other? Will the magistrate provide by an express law that such a one shall not become poor or sick? Laws provide, as much as is possible, that the goods and health of subjects be not injured by the fraud and violence of others; they do not guard them from the negligence or ill husbandry of the possessors themselves. No man can be forced to be rich or healthful whether he will or no. Nay, God Himself will not save men against their wills. John Locke
All mankind being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions. John Locke
There are a thousand ways to Wealth, but only one way to Heaven. John Locke
Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him. John Locke
As usurpation is the exercise of power, which another hath a right to; so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which no body can have a right to. And this is making use of the power any one has in his hands, not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private separate advantage. 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. John Locke
New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common. John Locke
No peace and security among mankind let alone common friendship can ever exist as long as people think that governments get their authority from God and that religion is to be propagated by force of arms. John Locke
The Bible is one of the greatest blessings bestowed by God on the children of men. It has God for its author; salvation for its end, and truth without any mixture for its matter. It is all pure. John Locke
In transgressing the law of nature, the offender declares himself to live by another rule than that of reason and common equity. John Locke
It is of great use to the sailor to know the length of his line, though he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the ocean. John Locke
The most precious of all possessions is power over ourselves. John Locke
There cannot be greater rudeness than to interrupt another in the current of his discourse. John Locke
Personal Identity depends on Consciousness not on Substance. John Locke
Parents wonder why the streams are bitter, when they themselves have poisoned the fountain. John Locke
It is ambition enough to be employed as an under labourer in clearing the ground a little, and removing some of the rubbish which lies in the way to knowledge. John Locke
It is easier for a tutor to command than to teach. John Locke
He that will not set himself proudly at the top of all things, but will consider the immensity of this fabric, and the great variety that is to be found in this little and inconsiderable part of it which he has to do with, may be apt to think that, in other mansions of it, there may be other and different intelligent beings, of whose faculties he has as little knowledge or apprehension as a worm shut up in one drawer of a cabinet hath of the senses or understanding of a man; such variety and excellency being suitable to the wisdom and power of the Maker. John Locke
Where all is but dream, reasoning and arguments are of no use, truth and knowledge nothing. John Locke
For it will be very difficult to persuade men of sense that he who with dry eyes and satisfaction of mind can deliver his brother to the executioner to be burnt alive, does sincerely and heartily concern himself to save that brother from the flames of hell in the world to come. John Locke
Our deeds disguise us. People need endless time to try on their deeds, until each knows the proper deeds for him to do. But every day, every hour, rushes by. There is no time. John Locke
The power of the legislative, being derived from the people by a positive voluntary grant and institution, can be no other than what that positive grant conveyed, which being only to make laws, and not to make legislators, the legislative can have no power to transfer their authority of making laws, and place it in other hands. John Locke
I attribute the little I know to my not having been ashamed to ask for information, and to my rule of conversing with all descriptions of men on those topics that form their own peculiar professions and pursuits. John Locke
