included. The 1690 edition text is free of copyright.  

This text is in the PUBLIC DOMAIN, posted to Wiretap 1 Jul 94.

             TWO TREATISES OF GOVERNMENT

                   BY IOHN LOCKE

            SALUS POPULI SUPREMA LEX ESTO

              LONDON PRINTED MDCLXXXVIIII

      REPRINTED, THE SIXTH TIME, BY A. MILLAR, H.

      WOODFALL, 1.  WHISTON AND  B. WHITE, 1. RI-

      VINGTON, L. DAVIS AND  C. REYMERS, R. BALD-

      WIN,  HAWES  CLARKE  AND  COLLINS; W. IOHN-

      STON,  W. OWEN, 1.  RICHARDSON, S. CROWDER,

      T.  LONGMAN,  B.  LAW,   C.  RIVINGTON,  E.

      DILLY,  R. WITHY, C. AND R. WARE, S, BAKER,

         T. PAYNE, A. SHUCKBURGH, 1. HINXMAN

                     MDCCLXIIII

 

           TWO  TREATISES OF GOVERNMENT.

           IN THE FORMER THE FALSE PRIN-

           CIPLES AND  FOUNDATION OF SIR

           ROBERT  FILMER  AND  HIS FOL-

           LOWERS   ARE   DETECTED   AND

                    OVERTHROWN.

           THE  LATTER IS  AN ESSAY CON-

           CERNING  THE  TRUE  ORIGINAL

           EXTENT  AND  END  OF  CIVIL

                    GOVERNMENT.

                1764 EDITOR'S NOTE

The present Edition of this Book has not only been collated with 
the first three Editions, which were published during the 
Author's Life, but also has the Advantage of his last Corrections 
and  Improvements, from a Copy delivered by him to Mr. Peter 
Coste, communicated  to  the  Editor,  and  now lodged in Christ 
College, Cambridge.

                             PREFACE

Reader, thou hast here the beginning and end of a discourse 
concerning government; what fate has otherwise disposed of the 
papers that should have filled up the middle, and were more than 
all the rest, it is not worth while to tell thee.  These, which 
remain, I hope are sufficient to establish the throne of our 
great restorer, our present King William; to make good his title, 
in the consent of the people, which being the only one of all 
lawful governments, he has more fully and clearly, than any 
prince in Christendom; and to justify to the world the people of 
England, whose love of their just and natural rights, with their 
resolution to preserve them, saved the nation when it was on the 
very brink of slavery and ruin.  If these papers have that 
evidence, I flatter myself is to be found in them, there will be 
no great miss of those which are lost, and my reader may be 
satisfied without them: for I imagine, I shall have neither the 
time, nor inclination to repeat my pains, and fill up the wanting 
part of my answer, by tracing Sir Robert again, through all the 
windings and obscurities, which are to be met with in the several 
branches of his wonderful system.  The king, and body of the 
nation, have since so thoroughly confuted his Hypothesis, that I 
suppose no body hereafter will have either the confidence to 
appear against our common safety, and be again an advocate for 
slavery; or the weakness to be deceived with contradictions 
dressed up in a popular stile, and well-turned periods: for if 
any one will be at the pains, himself, in those parts, which are 
here untouched, to strip Sir Robert's discourses of the flourish 
of doubtful expressions, and endeavour to reduce his words to 
direct, positive, intelligible propositions, and then compare 
them one with another, he will quickly be satisfied, there was 
never so much glib nonsense put together in well-sounding 
English.  If he think it not worth while to examine his works all 
thro', let him make an experiment in that part, where he treats 
of usurpation; and let him try, whether he can, with all his 
skill, make Sir Robert intelligible, and consistent with himself, 
or common sense.  I should not speak so plainly of a gentleman, 
long since past answering, had not the pulpit, of late years, 
publicly owned his doctrine, and made it the current divinity of