Quotes from John Locke

He that denies any of the doctrines that Christ has delivered, to be true, denies him to be sent from God, and consequently to be the Messiah; and so ceases to be a Christian.

God is the place of spirits, as spaces are the places of bodies.

Good and evil, reward and punishment, are the only motives to a rational creature

The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be unlawful for them to do themselves.

I esteem it above all things necessary to distinguish exactly the business of civil government from that of religion and to settle the just bounds that lie between the one and the other.

'Tis true that governments cannot be supported without great charge, and it is fit everyone who enjoys a share of protection should pay out of his estate his proportion of the maintenance of it.

Action is the great business of mankind, and the whole matter about which all laws are conversant.

The necessity of pursuing true happiness is the foundation of all liberty- Happiness, in its full extent, is the utmost pleasure we are capable of.

What humanity abhors, custom reconciles and recommends to us.

Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company, and reflection must finish him.

Memory is the power to revive again in our minds those ideas which after imprinting have disappeared, or have been laid aside out of sight.

As usurpation is the exercise of power which another has a right to, so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which nobody can have a right to.

The improvement of the understanding is for two ends; first, for our own increase of knowledge; secondly, to enable us to deliver and make out that knowledge to others.

He that will have his son have respect for him and his orders, must himself have a great reverence for his son.

The body of People may with Respect resist intolerable Tyranny.

Logic is the anatomy of thought.

Curiosity in children is but an appetite for knowledge.

If by gaining knowledge we destroy our health, we labour for a thing that will be useless in our hands.

Knowledge being to be had only of visible and certain truth, error is not a fault of our knowledge, but a mistake of our judgment, giving assent to that which is not true.

Knowledge is grateful to the understanding, as light to the eyes.

It is ambition enough to be employed as an under-labourer in clearing the ground a little, and removing some of the rubbish that lies in the way to knowledge.

What worries you, masters you.

All mankind... being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.

He that will make good use of any part of his life must allow a large part of it to recreation.