2.

the good:
a. pleasure and pain.
According to locke happiness is associated with good, and that good is in obtaing pleasure. Human person
should strive for getting pleasure. Locke’ moral theory is based on Hedonism for whom pleasure is important.
For locke ideas come by two means they are: sensation and reflection. And he rejects the concept of innate
ideas. And he says all ideas come to us through sense experience and reflection.Locke describes sensation as the
“great source” of all our ideas and as wholly dependent on the contact between our sensory organs and the
external world. The other source of ideas, reflection or “internal sense,” is dependent on the mind’s reflecting on
its own operations, in particular the “satisfaction or uneasiness arising from any thought” (Essay, II.i.4). What’s
more, Locke states that pleasure and pain are joined to almost all of our ideas both of sensation and of reflection
(Essay, II.vii.2). This means that our mental content is organized, at least in one way, by ideas that are associated
with pleasure and ideas that are associated with pain. That our ideas are associated with pains and pleasures seems
compatible with our phenomenal experience: the contact between the sense organ of touch and a hot stove will
result in an idea of the hot stove annexed by the idea of pain, or the act of remembering a romantic first kiss
brings with it the idea of pleasure. And, Locke adds, it makes sense to join our ideas to the ideas of pleasure and
pain because if our ideas were not joined with either pleasure of pain, we would have no reason to prefer the
doing of one action over another, or the consideration of one idea over another. If this were our situation, we
would have no reason to act—either physically or mentally (Essay, II.viii.3). That pleasure and pain are given this
motivational role in action entails that Locke endorses hedonism: the pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of
pain are the sole motives for action.
he notes that the things that we describe as evil are no more than the things that are annexed to the idea of pain,
and the things that we describe as good are no more than the things that are annexed to the idea of pleasure. In
other words, the presence of good or evil is nothing other than the way a particular idea relates to us—either
pleasurably or painfully. Now the argument arises if such is the case for Ram breaking the promises of Sita would
be pleasurable in the other hand for Sita Ram keeping the promises would be pleasurable. Here what is good for
Ram is bad for Sita. So in this case we would be blind to judge what is morally good and what is not.Locke
blocks this kind of consequence for his view by introducing a distinction between “happiness” and “true
happiness.” Here he speaks of correct use of our intellectual powers.
Now we need to ask this question what is true happiness for Locke?
while Locke equates pleasure with good, he is careful to distinguish the happiness that is acquired as a result of
the satisfaction of any particular desire and the true happiness that is the result of the satisfaction of a
particular kind of desire. Drawing this distinction allows Locke to hold that the pursuit of a certain sets of
pleasures or goods is more worthy than the pursuit of any pleasure.The pursuit of true happiness, according to
Locke, is equated with “the highest perfection of intellectual nature” (Essay, II.xxi.51). And, indeed, Locke takes
our pursuit of this true happiness to be the thing to which the vast majority of our efforts should be oriented. To
do this, he says that we need to try to match our desires to “the true instrinsick good” that is really within things.
He says we need to use our intellect to find out which is better good and which is long lasting. And not doing
things for the sake of doing. While doing things we must be conscious of what we are doing.
3. The Law of Nature
a. Existence
In the Essay, the concepts of laws and lawmakers do not receive much treatment beyond Locke’s affirmation that
God has decreed laws and that there are rewards and punishments associated with the respect or violation of these
laws (Essay, I.iii.6; I.iii.12; II.xxi.70; II.xxviii.6). The two most important questions concerning the role of laws
in a system of ethics remain unanswered in the Essay: (1) how do we determine the content of the law? This is the
epistemological question. And (2) what kind of authority does the law have to obligate? This is the moral
question. Locke spends much time considering these questions in a series of nine essays written some thirty years
before the Essay, which are known under the collected title Essays on the Law of Nature (hereafter: Law).

The first essay in the series treats the question of whether there is a “rule of morals, or law of nature given to us.”
The answer is unequivocally “yes” (Law, Essay I, page 109; hereafter: Law, I: 109). The reason for this positive
answer, in short, is because God exists. Locke appeals to a kind of teleological argument to support the claim of
God’s existence, saying that given the organization of the universe, including the organized way in which animal
and vegetable bodies propagate, there must be a governing principle that is responsible for the patterns we see on
earth. And, if we extend this principle to the existence of human life, Locke claims that it is reasonable to believe
that there is a pattern or a law that governs behavior. This law is to be understood as moral good or virtue and,
Locke states, it is the decree of God’s will and is discernable by “the light of nature.” Because the law tells us
what is and is not in conformity with “rational nature,” it has the status of commanding or prohibiting certain
behaviors (Law, I: 111; see also Essay, IV.xix.16). Because all human beings possess, by nature, the faculty of
reason, all human beings, at least in principle, can discover the natural law.

Locke offers five reasons for thinking that such a natural law exists. He begins by noting that it is evident that
there is some disagreement among people about the content of the law. However, far from thinking that such
disagreement casts doubt on the existence of the law, he takes the presence of disagreement about the law
as evidence that such a true and objective law exists. Disagreements about the content of the law confirm that
everyone is in agreement about the fundamental character of the law—that there are things that are by their nature
good or evil—but just disagree about how to interpret the law (Law, I: 115). The existence of the law is further
reinforced by the fact that we often pass judgment on our own actions, by way of our conscience, leading to
feelings of guilt or pride. Because it is not possible, according to Locke, to pronounce a judgment without the
existence of a law, the act of conscience demonstrates that such a natural law exists. Third, again appealing to a
kind of teleological argument, Locke states that we see that laws govern all manner of natural operations and that
it makes sense that human beings would also be governed by laws that are in accordance with their nature (Law, I:
117). Fourth, Locke states that without the natural law, society would not be able to run the way that it does. He
suggests that the force of civil law is grounded on the natural law. In other words, without the natural law,
positive law would have no moral authority. Elsewhere, Locke underlines this point by saying that given that the
law of nature is the eternal rule for all men, the rules made by legislators must conform to this law (The Two
Treatises of Government, Treatise II, section 135, hereafter: Government, II.35). Finally, on Locke’s view, there
would be no virtue or vice, no reward or punishment, no guilt, if there were no natural law (Law, I: 119). Without
the natural law, there would be no bounds on human action. This means that we would be motivated only to do
what seems pleasurable and there would be no sense in which anyone could be considered virtuous or vicious.
The existence of the natural law, then, allows us to be sensitive to the fact that there are certain pleasures that are
more in line with what is objectively right. Indeed, Locke also gestures towards, but does not elaborate on, this
kind of thought in the Essay. He suggests that the studious man, who takes all his pleasures from reading and
learning will eventually be unable to ignore his desires for food and drink. Likewise, the “Epicure,” whose only
interest is in the sensory pleasures of food and drink, will eventually turn his attention to study when shame or the
desire to “recommend himself to his Mistress” will raise his uneasiness for knowledge (Essay, II.xxi.43).

So, Locke has given us five reasons to accept the existence of the law of nature that grounds virtuous and vicious
behavior. We turn now to how he thinks we come to know the content of the law.

b. Content
Locke suggests that there are two ways to determine the content of the law of nature: by the light of nature and by
sense experience.Locke is careful to note that by “light of nature” he does not mean something like an “inward
light” that is “implanted in man” and like a compass constantly leads human beings towards virtue. Rather, this
light is to be understood as a kind of metaphor that indicates that truth can be attained by each of us individually
by nothing more than the exercise of reason and the intellectual faculties (Law, II: 123). Locke uses a comparison
to precious metal mining to make this point clear. He acknowledges that some might say that his explanation of
the discovery of the content of the law by the light of nature entails that everyone should always be in possession
of the knowledge of this content. But, he notes, this is to take the light of nature as something that is stamped on
the hearts on human beings, which is a mistake (see Law, III, 137-145). While the depths of the earth might
contain veins of gold and silver, Locke says, this does not mean that everyone living on the stretch of land above
those veins is rich (Law, II: 135). Work must be done to dig out the precious metals in order to benefit from their
value. Similarly, proper use must be made of the faculties we have in order to benefit from the certainty provided
by the light of nature. Locke notes that we can come to know the law of nature, in a way, by tradition, which is to
say by the testimony and instruction of other people. But it is a mistake to follow the law for any reason other
than that we recognize its universal binding force. This can only be done by our own intellectual investigation
(Law, II: 129).

But what, exactly, is the light of nature? Locke acknowledges that it is difficult to answer this question—it is not
something stamped on the heart or mind, nor is it something that is exclusively learned by tradition or testimony.
The only option left for describing it, then, is that it is something acquired or experienced by sense experience or
by reason. And, indeed, Locke suggests that when these two faculties, reason and sensation, work together,
nothing can remain obscure to the mind. Sensation provides the mind with ideas and reason guides the faculty of
sensation and arranges “together the images of things derived from sense-perception, thence forming others
[ideas] and composing new ones” (Law, IV: 147). Locke emphasizes that reason ought to be taken to mean “the
discursive faculty of the mind, which advances from things known to thinks unknown,” using as its foundation
the data provided by sense experience (Law, IV: 149).

When directly addressing the question of how the combination of reason and sense experience allow us to know
the content of the law of nature, Locke states that two important truths must be acknowledged because they are
“presupposed in the knowledge of any and every law” (Law, IV: 151). First, we must understand that there is a
lawmaker who decreed the law, and that the lawmaker is rightly obeyed as a superior power (a discussion of this
point is also found in Government, I.81). Second, we must understand that the lawmaker wishes those to whom
the law is decreed to follow the law. Let us take each of these in turn.

Sense experience allows us to know that a lawmaker exists. To demonstrate this, Locke appeals, once again, to a
kind of teleological argument: by our senses we come to know the objects external world and, importantly, the
regularities with which they move and change. We also see that we human beings are part of the movements and
changes of the external world. Reason, then, contemplates these regularities and orders of change and motion and
naturally comes to inquire about their origin. The conclusion of such an inquiry, states Locke, is that a powerful
and wise creator exists. This conclusion follows from two observations: (1) that beasts and inanimate things
cannot be the cause of the existence of human beings because they are clearly less perfect than human beings, and
something less perfect cannot bring more perfect things into existence, and 2) that we ourselves cannot be the
cause of our own existence because if we possessed the power to create ourselves, we would also have the power
to give ourselves eternal life. Because it is obviously the case that we do not have eternal life, Locke concludes
that we cannot be the origin of our own existence. So, Locke says, there must be a powerful agent, God, who is
the origin of our existence (Law, IV: 153). The senses provide the data from the external world, and reason
contemplates the data and concludes that a creator of the observed objects and phenomena must exist. Once the
existence of a creator is determined, Locke thinks that we can also see that the creator has “a just and inevitable
command over us and at His pleasure can raise us up or throw us down, and make us by the same commanding
power happy or miserable” (Law, IV: 155). This commanding power, on Locke’s view, indicates that we are
necessarily subject to the decrees of God’s will. (A similar line of discussion is found in Locke’s The
Reasonableness of Christianity, 144–46.)

As for the second truth, that the lawmaker, God, wishes us to follow the laws decreed, Locke states that once we
see that there is a creator of all things and that an order obtains among them, we see that the creator is both
powerful and wise. It follows from these evident attributes that God would not create something without a
purpose. Moreover, we notice that our minds and bodies seem well equipped for action, which suggests, “God
intends man to do something.” And, the “something” that we are made to do, according to Locke, is the same
purpose shared by all created things—the glorification of God (Law, IV: 157). In the case of rational beings,
Locke states that given our nature, our function is to use sense experience and reason in order to discover,
contemplate, and praise God’s creation; to create a society with other people and to work to maintain and preserve
both oneself and the community. And this, in fact, is the content of the law of nature—to preserve one’s own
being and to work to maintain and preserve the beings of the other people in our community. This injunction to
preserve oneself and to preserve one’s neighbors is also endorsed and stressed throughout Locke’s discussions of
political power and freedom (see Government, I.86, 88, 120; II.6, 25, 128).

c. Authority
Once we have knowledge of the content of the law of nature, we must determine from where it derives its
authority. In other words, we must ask why we are bound to follow the law once we are aware of its content.
Locke begins this discussion by reiterating that the law of nature “is the care and preservation of oneself.” Given
this law, he states that virtue should not be understood as a duty but rather the “convenience” of human beings. In
this sense, the good is nothing more than what is useful. Further, he adds, the observance of this law is not so
much an obligation but rather “a privilege and an advantage, to which we are led by expediency” (Law, VI: 181).
This indicates that Locke thinks that actions that are in conformity with the law are useful and practical. In other
words, it is in our best interest to follow the law. While this characterization of why we in fact follow the law is
compelling, there is nevertheless still an inquiry to be made into why we ought to follow the law.

Locke begins his treatment of this question by stating that no one can oblige us to do anything unless the one who
obliges has some superior right and power over us. The obligation that is generated between such a superior
power and those who are subject to it results in two kinds of duties: (1) the duty to pay obedience to the command
of the superior power. Because our faculties are suited to discover the existence of the divine lawmaker, Locke
takes it to be impossible to avoid this discovery, barring some damage or impediment to our faculties. This duty is
ultimately grounded in God’s will as the force by which we were created (Law, VI: 183). (2) The duty to suffer
punishment as a result of the failure to honor the first duty—obedience. Now, it might seem odd that it would be
necessary to postulate that punishment results from the failure to respect a law the content of which is only that
we must take care of ourselves. In other words, how could anyone express so little interest in taking care of
himself or herself that the fear of punishment is needed to motivate the actions necessary for such care? It is
worth quoting Locke’s answer in full:

[A] liability to punishment, which arises from a failure to pay dutiful obedience, so that those who refuse to be led
by reason and to own that in the matter of morals and right conduct they are subject to a superior authority may
recognize that they are constrained by force and punishment to be submissive to that authority and feel the
strength of Him whose will they refuse to follow. And so the force of this obligation seems to be grounded in the
authority of a lawmaker, so that power compels those who cannot be moved by warnings. (Law, VI: 183)

So, even though the existence, content, and authority of the law of nature are known in virtue of the faculties
possessed by all rational creatures—sense experience and reason—Locke recognizes that there are people who
“refuse to be led by reason.” Because these people do not see the binding force of the law by their faculties alone,
they need some other impetus to motivate their behavior. But, Locke thinks very ill of those who are in need of
this other impetus. He says the these features of the law of nature can be discovered by anyone who is diligent
about directing their mind to them, and can be concealed from no one “unless he loves blindness and darkness
and casts off nature in order that he may avoid his duty” (Law, VI: 189, see also Government, II.6).

d. Reconciling the Law with Happiness

The main lines of Locke’s natural law theory are as follows: there is a moral law that is (1) discoverable by the
combined work of reason and sense experience, and (2) binding on human beings in virtue of being decreed by
God. Now, in §1 above, we saw that Locke thinks that all human beings are naturally oriented to the pursuit of
happiness. This is because we are motivated to pursue things if they promise pleasure and to avoid things if they
promise pain. It has seemed to many commentators that these two discussions of moral principles are in tension
with each other. On the view described in Law, Locke straightforwardly appeals to reason and our ability to
understand the nature of God’s attributes to ground our obligation to follow the law of nature. In other words,
what is lawful ought to be followed because God wills it and what is unlawful ought to be rejected because it is
not willed by God. Because we can straightforwardly see that God is the law-giver and that we are by nature
subordinate to Him, we ought to follow the law. By contrast, in the discussion of happiness and pleasure in
the Essay, Locke explains that good and evil reduce to what is pleasurable and what is painful. While he does also
indicate that the special categories of good and evil—moral good and moral evil—are no more than the
conformity or disagreement between our actions and a law, he immediately adds that such conformity or
disagreement is followed by rewards or punishments that flow from the lawmaker’s will. From this discussion,
then, it is difficult to see whether Locke holds that it is the reward and punishment that binds human beings to act
in accordance with the law, or if it is the fact that the law is willed by God.

One way to approach this problem is to suggest that Locke changed his mind. Because of the thirty-year gap
between Law and the Essay, we might be tempted to think that the more rationalist picture, where the law and its
authority are based on reason, was the young Locke’s view when he wrote Law. This view, the story would go,
was replaced by Locke’s more considered and mature view, hedonism. But this approach must be resisted
because both theories are present in early and late works. The role of pleasure and pain with respect to morality is
present not only in the Essay, but is invoked in Law (passage quoted at the end of §2c), and many other various
minor essays written in the years between Law and Essay (for example, ‘Morality’ (c.1677–78) in Political
Essays, 267–69). Likewise, the role of the authority of God's will is retained after Law, again evident in various
minor essays (for example, ‘Virtue B’ (1681) in Political Essays, 287-88), Government II.6), Locke’s
correspondence (for example, to James Tyrrell, 4 August 1690, Correspondence, Vol.4, letter n.1309) and even in
the Essay itself (II.xxviii.8). An answer to how we might reconcile these two positions is suggested when we
consider the texts where appeals to both theories are found side-by-side in certain passages.
In his essay OfEthick in General (c. 1686–88) Locke affirms the hedonist view that happiness and misery consist
only in pleasure and pain, and that we all naturally seek happiness. But in the very next paragraph, he states that
there is an important difference between moral and natural good and evil—the pleasure and pain that are
consequences of virtuous and vicious behavior are grounded in the divine will. Locke notes that drinking to
excess leads to pain in the form of headache or nausea. This is an example of a natural evil. By contrast,
transgressing a law would not have any painful consequences if the law were not decreed by a superior lawmaker.
He adds that it is impossible to motivate the actions of rational agents without the promise of pain or pleasure (Of
Ethick in General, §8). From these considerations, Locke suggests that the proper foundation of morality, a
foundation that will entail an obligation to moral principles, needs two things. First, we need the proof of a law,
which presupposes the existence of a lawmaker who is superior to those to whom the law is decreed. The
lawmaker has the right to ordain the law and the power to reward and punish. Second, it must be shown that the
content of the law is discoverable to humankind (Of Ethick in General, §12). In this text it seems that Locke
suggests that both the force and authority of the divine decree and the promise of reward and punishment are
necessary for the proper foundation of an obligating moral law.

A similar line of argument is found in the Essay. There, Locke asserts that in order to judge moral success or
failure, we need a rule by which to measure and judge action. Further, each rule of this sort has an “enforcement
of Good and Evil.” This is because, according to Locke, “where-ever we suppose a Law, suppose also some
Reward or Punishment annexed to that Law” (Essay, II.xxviii.6). Locke states that some promise of pleasure or
pain is necessary in order to determine the will to pursue or avoid certain actions. Indeed, he puts the point even
more strongly, saying that it would be in vain for the intelligent being who decrees the rule of law to so decree
without entailing reward or punishment for the obedient or the unfaithful (see also Government, II.7). It seems,
then, that reason discovers the fact that a divine law exists and that it derives from the divine will and, as such, is
binding. We might think, as Stephen Darwall suggests in The British Moralists and the Internal Ought, that if
reason is that which discovers our obligation to the law, the role for reward and punishment is to motivate our
obedience to the law. While this succeeds in making room for both the rationalist and hedonist strains in Locke’s
view, some other texts seem to indicate that by reason alone we ought to be motivated to follow moral laws.

One striking instance of this kind of suggestion is found in the third book of the Essay where Locke boldly states
that “Morality is capable of Demonstration” in the same way as mathematics (Essay, III.xi.16). He explains that
once we understand the existence and nature of God as a supreme being who is infinite in power, goodness, and
wisdom and on whom we depend, and our own nature “as understanding, rational Beings,” we should be able to
see that these two things together provide the foundation of both our duty and the appropriate rules of action. On
Locke’s view, with focused attention the measures of right and wrong will become as clear to us as the
propositions of mathematics (Essay, IV.iii.18). He gives two examples of such certain moral principles to make
the point: (1) “Where there is no Property, there is no Injustice” and (2) “No Government allows absolute
Liberty.” He explains that property implies a right to something and injustice is the violation of a right to
something. So, if we clearly see the intensional definition of each term, we see that (1) is necessarily true.
Similarly, government indicates the establishment of a society based on certain rules, and absolute liberty is the
freedom from any and all rules. Again, if we understand the definitions of the two terms in the proposition, it
becomes obvious that (2) is necessarily true. And, Locke states, following this logic, 1 and 2 are as certain as the
proposition that “a Triangle has three Angles equal to two right ones” (Essay, IV.iii.18). If moral principles have
the same status as mathematical principles, it is difficult to see why we would need further inducement to use
these principles to guide our behavior. While there is no clear answer to this question, Locke does provide a way
to understand the role of reward and punishment in our obligation to moral principles despite the fact that it seems
that they ought to obligate by reason alone.

Early in the Essay, over the course of giving arguments against the existence of innate ideas, Locke addresses the
possibility of innate moral principles. He begins by saying that for any proposed moral rule human beings can,
with good reason, demand justification. This precludes the possibility of innate moral principles because, if they
were innate, they would be self-evident and thus would not be candidates for justification. Next, Locke notes that
despite the fact that there are no innate moral principles, there are certain principles that are undeniable, for
example, that “men should keep their Compacts.” However, when asked why people follow this rule, different
answers are given. A “Hobbist” will say that it is because the public requires it, and the “Leviathan” will punish
those who disobey the law. A “Heathen” philosopher will say that it is because following such a law is a virtue,
which is the highest perfection for human beings. But a Christian philosopher, the category to which Locke
belongs, will say that it is because “God, who has the Power of eternal Life and Death, requires it of us” (Essay,
I.iii.5). Locke builds on this statement in the following section when he notes that while the existence of God and
the truth of our obedience to Him is made manifest by the light of reason, it is possible that there are people who
accept the truth of moral principles, and follow them, without knowing or accepting the “true ground of Morality;
which can only be the Will and Law of God” (Essay, I.iii.6). Here Locke is suggesting that we can accept a true
moral law as binding and follow it as such, but for the wrong reasons. This means that while the Hobbist, the
Heathen, and the Christian might all take the same law of keeping one’s compacts to be obligating, only the
Christian does it for the right reason—that God’s will requires our obedience to that law. Indeed, Locke states that
if we receive truths by revelation they too must be subject to reason, for to follow truths based on revelation alone
is insufficient (see Essay, IV.xviii).

Now, to determine the role of pain and pleasure in this story, we turn to Locke’s discussion of the role of pain and
pleasure in general. He says that God has joined pains and pleasures to our interaction with many things in our
environment in order to alert us to things that are harmful or helpful to the preservation of our bodies (Essay,
II.vii.4). But, beyond this, Locke notes that there is another reason that God has joined pleasure and pain to
almost all our thoughts and sensations: so that we experience imperfections and dissatisfactions. He states that the
kinds of pleasures that we experience in connection to finite things are ephemeral and not representative of
complete happiness. This dissatisfaction coupled with the natural drive to obtain happiness opens the possibility
of our being led to seek our pleasure in God, where we anticipate a more stable and, perhaps, permanent
happiness. Appreciating this reason why pleasure and pain are annexed to most of our ideas will, according to
Locke, lead the way to the ultimate aim of the enquiry in human understanding—the knowledge and veneration of
God (Essay, II.vii.5–6). So, Locke seems to be suggesting here that pain and pleasure prompt us to find out about
God, in whom complete and eternal happiness is possible. This search, in turn, leads us to knowledge of God,
which will include the knowledge that He ought to be obeyed in virtue of His decrees alone. Pleasure and pain,
reward and punishment, on this interpretation, are the means by which we are led to know God’s nature, which,
once known, motivates obedience to His laws. This mechanism supports Locke’s claim that real happiness is to
be found in the perfection of our intellectual nature—in embarking on the search for knowledge of God, we
embark on the intellectual journey that will lead to the kind of knowledge that brings permanent pleasure. This at
least suggests that the knowledge of God has the happy double-effect of leading to both more stable happiness
and the understanding that God is to be obeyed in virtue of His divine will alone.

But given that all human beings experience pain and pleasure, Locke needs to explain how it is that certain people
are virtuous, having followed the experience of dissatisfaction to arrive at the knowledge of God, and other
people are vicious, who seek pleasure and avoid pain for no reason other than their own hedonic sensations.

4. Power, Freedom, and Suspending Desire

a. Passive and Active Powers
In any discussion of ethics, it is important not only to determine what, exactly, counts as virtuous and vicious
behavior, but also the extent to which we are in control of our actions. This is important because we want to be
able to adequately connect behavior to agents in order to attribute praise or blame, reward or punishment to an
agent, we need to be able to see the way in which she is the causal source of her own actions. Locke addresses
this issue in one of the longest chapters of the Essay—“Of Power.” In this chapter, Locke describes how he
understands the nature of power, the human will, freedom and its connection to happiness, and, finally, the
reasons why many (or even most) people do not exercise their freedom in the right kind of way and are unhappy
as a result. It is worth noting here that this chapter of the Essay underwent major revisions throughout the five
editions of the Essay and in particular between the first and second edition. The present discussion is based on the
fourth edition of the Essay (but see the “References and Further Reading” below for articles that discuss the
relevance of the changes throughout all five editions).

Locke states that we come to have the idea of “power” by observing the fact that things change over time. Finite
objects are changed as a result of interactions with other finite objects (for example fire melts gold) and we notice
that our own ideas change either as a result of external stimulus (for example the noise of a jackhammer interrupts
the contemplation of a logic problem) or as a result of our own desires (for example hunger interrupts the
contemplation of a logic problem). The idea of power always includes some kind of relation to action or change.
The passive side of power entails the ability to be changed and the active side of power entails the ability to make
change. Our observation of almost all sensible things furnishes us with the idea of passive power. This is because
sensible things appear to be in almost constant flux—they are changed by their interaction with other sensible
things, with heat, cold, rain, and time. And, Locke adds, such observations give us no fewer instances of the idea
of active power, for “whatever Change is observed, the Mind must collect a Power somewhere, able to make that
Change” (Essay, II.xxi.4). However, when it comes to active powers, Locke states that the clearest and most
distinct idea of active power comes to us from the observation of the operations of our own minds. He elaborates
by stating that there are two kinds of activities with which we are familiar: thinking and motion. When we
consider body in general, Locke states that it is obvious that we receive no idea of thinking, which only comes
from a contemplation of the operations of our own minds. But neither does body provide the idea of the beginning
of motion, only of the continuation or transfer of motion. The idea of the beginning of motion, which is the idea
associated with the active power of motion, only comes to us when we reflect “on what passes in our selves,
where we find by Experience, that barely by willing it, barely by a thought of the Mind, we can move the parts of
our Bodies, which were before at rest” (Essay, II.xxi.4). So, it seems, the operation of our minds, in particular the
connection between one kind of thought, willing, and a change in either the content of our minds or the
orientation of our bodies, provides us with the idea of an active power.
b. The Will

The power to stop, start, or continue an action of the mind or of the body is what Locke calls the will. When the
power of the will is exercised, a volition (or willing) occurs. Any action (or forbearance of action) that follows
volition is considered voluntary. The power of the will is coupled with the power of the understanding. This latter
power is defined as the power of perceiving ideas and their agreement or disagreement with one another. The
understanding, then, provides ideas to the mind and the will, depending on the content of these ideas, prefers
certain courses of action to others. Locke explains that the will directs action according to its preference—and
here we must understand “preference” in the most general sense of inclination, partiality, or taste. In short, the
will is attracted to actions that promise the procurement of pleasing things and/or the distancing from displeasing
things. The technical term that Locke uses to describe that which determines the will is uneasiness. He elaborates,
stating that the reason why any action is continued is “the present satisfaction in it” and the reason why any action
is taken to move to a new state is dissatisfaction (Essay, II.xxi.29). Indeed, Locke affirms that uneasiness, at
bottom, is really no more than desire, where the mind is disturbed by a “want of some absent good” (Essay,
II.xxi.31). So, any pain or discomfort of the mind or body is a motive for the will to command a change of state so
as to move from unease to ease. Locke notes that it is a common fact of life that we often experience multiple
uneasinesses at one time, all pressing on us and demanding relief. But, he says, when we ask the question of what
determines the will at any one moment, the answer is the most pressing uneasiness (Essay, II.xxi.31). Imagine a
situation where you are simultaneously experiencing discomfort as a result of hunger and the anxiety of being
under-prepared for tomorrow’s philosophy exam. On Locke’s view the most intense or the most pressing of these
uneasinesses will determine your will to command the action that will relieve it. This means that no matter how
much you want to stay at the library to study, if hunger comes to be the more pressing than the desire to pass the
exam, hunger will determine the will to act, commanding the action that will result in the procurement of food.

While Locke states that the most pressing uneasiness determines the will, he adds that it does so “for the most
part, but not always.” This is because he takes the mind to have the power to “suspend the execution and
satisfaction of any of its desires” (Essay, II.xxi.47). While a desire is suspended, Locke says, our mind, being
temporarily freed from the discomfort of the want for the thing desired, has the opportunity to consider the
relative worth of that thing. The idea here is that with appropriate deliberation about the value of the desired thing
we will come to see which things are really worth pursuing and which are better left alone. And, Locke states, the
conclusion at which we arrive after this intellectual endeavor of consideration and examination will indicate what,
exactly, we take to be part of our happiness. And, in turn, by a mechanism that Locke does not describe in any
detail, our uneasiness and desire for that thing will change to reflect whether we concluded that the thing does,
indeed, play a role in our happiness or not (Essay, II.xxi.56). The problem is that there is no clear explanation for
how, exactly, the power to suspend works. Despite this, Locke nowhere indicates that suspension is an action of
the mind that is determined by anything other than volition of the will. We know that Locke takes all acts of the
will to be determined by uneasiness. So, suspending our desires must be the result of uneasiness for something.
Investigating how Locke understands human freedom and judgment will allow us to see what, exactly, we are
uneasy for when we are determined to suspend our desires.

c. Freedom
When the nature of the human will is under discussion, we often want to know the extent of this faculty’s
freedom. The reason why this question is important is because we want to see how autonomously the will can act.
Typically, the question takes the form of: is the will free? Locke unequivocally denies that the will is free,
implying, in fact, that it is a category mistake to ask the question at all. This is because, on his view, both the will
and freedom are powers of agents, and it is a mistake to think that one power (the will) can have as a property a
second power (freedom) (Essay, II.xxi.20). Instead, Locke thinks that the right question to pose is whether the
agent is free. He defines freedom in the following way:
[T]he Idea of Liberty, is the Idea of a Power in any Agent to do or forbear any particular Action, according to the
determination or thought of the mind, whereby either of them is preferr’d to the other; where either of them is not
in the Power of the Agent to be produced by him according to his Volition here he is not a Liberty, that Agent is
under Necessity. (Essay, II.xxi.8)

So, Locke considers that an agent is free in acting when her action is connected to her volition in the right kind of
way. That is, when her action (or forbearance of action) follows from her volition, she is free. And, her volition is
determined by the “thought of the mind” that indicates which action is preferred.

Notice here that Locke takes an agent to be free in acting when she acts according to her preference—this means
that her actions are determined by her preference. This plainly shows that Locke does not endorse a kind of
freedom of indifference, according to which the will can choose to command an action other than the thing most
preferred at a given moment. This is the kind of freedom most often associated with indeterminism. Freedom,
then, for Locke, is no more than the ability to execute the action that is taken to result in the most pleasure at a
given moment. The problem with this way of defining freedom is that it seems unable to account for the kinds of
actions we typically take to be emblematic of virtuous or vicious behavior. This is because we tend to think that
the power of freedom is a power that allows us to avoid vicious actions, perhaps especially those that are
pleasurable, in order to pursue a righteous path instead. For instance, on the traditional Christian picture, when we
wonder about why God would allow Adam to sin, the response given is that Adam was created as a free being.
While God could have created beings that, like automata, unfailingly followed the good and the true, He saw that
it was all things considered better to create beings that were free to choose their own actions. This decision was
made despite the fact that God foresaw the sinful use to which this freedom would be put. This traditional view
explains Adam’s sin in the following way: Adam knew that it was God’s commandment that he was not to eat of
the tree of knowledge. Adam also knew that following God’s commandment was the right thing to do. So, in the
moment where he was tempted to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge, he knew it was the wrong thing to do, but
did it anyway. This is because, the story goes, and in that moment he was free to decide whether to follow the
commandment or to give in to temptation. Of his own free choice, Adam decided to follow temptation. This
means that in the moment of original sin, both following God’s commandment and eating the fruit were live
options for Adam, and he chose the fruit of his own agency.

Now, on Locke’s system, a different explanation obtains. Given his definition of freedom, it is difficult, at least
prima facie, to see how Adam could be blamed for choosing the fruit over the commandment. For, according to
Locke, an agent acts freely when her actions are determined by her volitions. So, if Adam’s greatest uneasiness
was for the fruit, and the act of eating the fruit was the result of his will commanding such action based on his
preference, then he acted freely. But, on this understanding of freedom, it is difficult to see how, exactly, Adam
can be morally blamed for eating the fruit. The question now becomes: is Adam to be blamed for anticipating
more pleasure from the consumption of the fruit than from following God’s command? In other words, was it
possible for Adam to alter the intensity of his desire for the fruit? It seems that on Locke’s view, the answer must
be connected to one of the powers he takes human beings to possess—the power to suspend desires. And, in
certain passages of the Essay, Locke implies that suspending desires and freedom are linked, suggesting that
while agents are acting freely whenever their volitions and actions are linked in the right kind of way, there is,
perhaps, a proper use of the power to act freely.

d. Judgment
Locke asserts that the “highest perfection of intellectual nature” is the “pursuit of true and solid happiness.” He
adds that taking care not to mistake imaginary happiness for real happiness is “the necessary foundation of our
liberty.” And, he writes that the more closely we are focused on the pursuit of true happiness, which is our
greatest good, the less our wills are determined to command actions to pursue lesser goods that are not
representative of the true good (Essay, II.xxi.51). In other words, the more we are determined by true happiness,
the more we will to suspend our desires for lesser things. This suggests that Locke takes there to be a right way to
use our power of freedom. Locke indicates that there are instances where it is impossible to resist a particular
desire—when a violent passion strikes, for instance. He also states, however, that aside from these kinds of
violent passions, we are always able to suspend our desire for any thing in order to give ourselves the time and the
emotional distance from the thing desired in which to consider the worth of thing relative to our general goal: true
happiness. True happiness, or real bliss, on Locke’s view, is to be found in the pursuit of things that are true
intrinsic goods, which promise “exquisite and endless Happiness” in the next life (Essay, II.xxi.70). In other
words, true good is something like the Beatific Vision.

Now, Locke admits that it is a common experience to be carried by our wills towards things that we know do
not play a role in our overall and true happiness. However, while he allows that the pursuit of things that promise
pleasure, even if only a temporary pleasure, represents the action of a free agent, he also says that it is possible for
us to be “at Liberty in respect of willing” when we choose “a remote Good as an end to be pursued” (Essay,
II.xxi.56). The central thing to note here is that Locke is drawing a distinction between immediate and remote
goods. The difference between these two kinds of goods is temporal. For instance, acting to obtain the pleasure of
intoxication is to pursue an immediate good while acting to obtain the pleasure of health is to pursue a remote
good. So, we can suppose here that Locke is suggesting that forgoing immediate goods and privileging remote
goods is characteristic of the right use of liberty (but see Rickless for an alternative interpretation). If this is so, it
is certainly not a difficult suggestion to accept. Indeed, it is fairly straightforwardly clear that many immediate
pleasures do not, in the end, contribute to overall and long-lasting happiness.

The question now, and it is a question that Locke himself poses, is “How Men come often to prefer the worse to
the better; and to chase that, which, by their own Confession, has made them miserable” (Essay, II.xxi.56). Locke
gives two answers. First, bad luck can account for people not pursuing their true happiness. For instance, someone
who is afflicted with an illness, injury, or tragedy is consumed by her pain and is thus unable to adequately focus
on remote pleasures. Quoting Locke’s second answer “Other uneasinesses arise from our desire of absent good;
which desires always bear proportion to, and depend on the judgment we make, and the relish we have of any
absent good; in both which we are apt to be variously misled, and that by our own fault” (Essay, II.xxi.57).

Here Locke states that our own faulty judgment is to blame for our preferring the worse to the better. This is
because, on his view, the uneasiness we have for any given object is directly proportional to the judgments we
make about the merit of the things to which we are attracted. So, if we are most uneasy for immediate pleasures, it
is our own fault because we have judged these things to be best for us. In this way, Locke makes room in his
system for praiseworthiness and blameworthiness with respect to our desires: absent illness, injury, or tragedy, we
ourselves are responsible for endorsing, through judgment, our uneasinesses. He continues, stating that the major
reason why we often misjudge the value of things for our true happiness is that our current state fools us into
thinking that we are, in fact, truly happy. Because it is difficult for us to consider the state of true, eternal
happiness, we tend to think that in those moments when we enjoy pleasure and feel no uneasiness, we are truly
happy. But such thoughts are mistaken on his view. Indeed, as Locke says, the greatest reason why so few people
are moved to pursue the greatest, remote good is that most people are convinced that they can be truly happy
without it.

The cause of our mistaken judgments is the fact that it is very difficult for us to compare present and immediate
pleasures and pains with future or remote pleasures and pains. In fact, Locke likens this difficulty to the trouble
we typically experience in correctly estimating the size of distant objects. When objects are close to us, it is easy
to determine their size. When they are far away, it is much more difficult. Likewise, he says, for pleasures and
pains. He notes that if every sip of alcohol were accompanied by headache and nausea, no one would ever drink.
But, “the fallacy of a little difference in time” provides the space for us to mistakenly judge that the alcohol
contributes to our true happiness (Essay, II.xxi.63). We experience this difficulty of judging remote pleasures and
pains due to the “weak and narrow Constitution of our Minds” (Essay, II.xxi.64). The condition of our minds
makes it easy for us to think that there could be no greater good than the relief of being unburdened of a present
pain. In order to correct this problem and convince a man to judge that his greatest good is to be found in a remote
thing, Locke says that all we must do is convince him that “Virtue and Religion are necessary to his Happiness”
(Essay, II.xxi.60). Locke explains that a “due consideration will do it in most cases; and practice, application, and
custom in most” (Essay, II.xxi.69). The suggestion is that contemplation and deliberation alone may be sufficient
to correct our problem of considering all immediate pleasures and pains to be greater than any future ones. And, if
that does not work, practice and habit can also correct this problem. By practice and exposure, we can, according
to Locke, change the agreeableness or disagreeableness of things. It seems, then, that the power to suspend desire
must be the power to reject immediate pleasures in favor of the pursuit of remote or future pleasures. However, it
seems that in order to suspend in this way, we must already have judged that these immediate pleasures are not
representative of the true good. For, without this kind of prior judgment, it seems that we would not be in a
position to suspend in the way that is required. This is because absent the prior judgment, there would be no
reason for the uneasiness we felt for the perceived good to not determine the will. The question to resolve now is
how to get ourselves into a position where we are uneasy for the remote, true good and can suspend our desires
for immediate pleasures. In other words, we must determine how we can come to seriously judge immediate
pleasures to not have a part in our true happiness.

5. Living the Moral Life

In order to behave in a way that will lead us to the greatest and truest happiness, we must come to judge the
remote and future good, the “unspeakable,” “infinite,” and “eternal” joys of heaven to be our greatest and thus
most pleasurable good (Essay, II.xxi.37–38). But, on Locke’s view, our actions are always determined by the
thing we are most uneasy about at any given moment. So, it seems, we need to cultivate the uneasiness for the
infinite joys of heaven. But if, as Locke suggests, the human condition is such that our minds, in their weak and
narrow states, judge immediate pleasures to be representative of the greatest good, it is difficult to see how,
exactly, we can circumvent this weakened state in order to suspend our more terrestrial desires and thus have the
space to correctly judge which things will lead to our true happiness. While in the Essay Locke does not say as
much as we might like on this topic, elsewhere in his writings we can get a sense for how he might respond to this
question.

In 1684, Locke was asked by his friend Edward Clarke, for advice about raising and educating his children. In
1693, Locke’s musings on this topic were published as Some Thoughts Concerning
Education (hereafter: Education). This text provides insight into the importance that Locke places on the
connection between the pursuit of true happiness and early childhood education in general. Locke begins his
discussion by noting that happiness is crucially dependent on the existence of both a sound mind and a sound
body. He adds that it sometimes happens that by a great stroke of luck, someone is born whose constitution is so
strong that they do not need help from others to direct their minds towards the things that will make them happy.
But this is an extraordinarily rare occurrence. Indeed, Locke notes: “I think I may say, that, of all the men we
meet with, nine parts of ten are what they are, good or evil, useful or not, by their education” (Education, §1). It is
the education we receive as young children, on Locke’s view, that determines how adept we are at targeting the
right objects in order to secure our happiness. He observes that the minds of young children are easily distracted
by all kinds of sensory stimuli and notes that the first step to developing a mind that is focused on the right kind
of things is to ensure that the body is healthy. Indeed, the objective in physical health is to get the body in the
perfect state to be able to obey and carry out the mind’s commands. The more difficult part of this equation is
training the mind to “be disposed to consent to nothing, but what may be suitable to the dignity and excellency of
a rational creature” (Education, §31). And Locke goes further still, stating that the foundation of all virtue is to be
placed in the ability of a human being to “deny himself his own desires, cross his own inclinations, and purely
follow what reason directs as best, though the appetite lean the other way” (Education, §33). The way to do this,
he says, is to resist immediately present pleasures and pains and to wait to act until reason has determined the
value of the desirable things in one’s environment.

Locke states that we must recognize the difference between “natural wants” and “wants of fancy.” The former are
the kinds of desires that must be obeyed and that no amount of reasoning will allow us to give up. The latter,
however, are created. Locke states that parents and teachers must ensure that children develop the habit of
resisting any kind of created fancy, thus keeping the mind free from desires for things that do not lead to true
happiness (Education, §107). If parents and teachers are successful in blocking the development of “wants of
fancy,” Locke thinks that the children who benefit from this success will become adults who will be “allowed
greater liberty” because they will be more closely connected to the dictates of reason and not the dictates of
passion (Education, §108). So, in order to live the moral life and listen to reason over passions, it seems that we
need to have had the benefit of conscientious care-givers in our infancy and youth (see also Government, II.63).
This raises the difficulty of how to connect an individual’s moral successes or failures with the individual herself.
For, if she had the bad moral luck of unthinking or careless parents and teachers, it seems difficult to see how she
could be blamed for failing to follow a virtuous path.

One way of approaching this difficulty is to recall that Locke takes the content of law of nature, the moral law
decreed by God, to be the preservation both of ourselves and of the other people in our communities in order to
glorify God (Law, IV). The dictate to help to preserve the other people in our community shifts some of the moral
burden from the individual onto the community. This means that it is every individual’s responsibility to do all
they can, all things considered, to preserve themselves and to ensure, to the best of their ability, that the children
in their communities are raised to avoid developing wants of fancy. In this way, children will develop the habit of
suspending their desires for terrestrial pleasures and focusing their efforts on attaining the true happiness that
results from acting to secure remote goods.