An Enlightenment Legacy

Abstract

It should not surprise us to learn that Locke spent the last morning before his death on the afternoon of 28 October 1704 listening to Damaris Masham read the Psalms, or that the night before the entire Masham family had met in his room for evening prayers. He was said to have reminded those present that the continued practice of their duties, together with a regular and attentive reading of Holy Scriptures, would bring them happiness in this world and ‘possession of eternal felicity in the other’. In one of his last letters written before his death, Locke told the Deist Anthony Collins that the vanity of this life was only compensated by ‘the consciousness of doeing well and in the hopes of an other life’. Locke composed an epitaph for his gravestone which stated that his virtues, if any, were too slight to serve as an example to others; at any rate, the best examples were to be found in the Gospels. He was buried, following the instructions in his will, in the churchyard of High Laver, Essex, near the Masham home at Oates. He requested an unadorned wooden coffin and a small private ceremony, and both of these entreaties were, to the best of our knowledge, honoured by his nephew and closest living relative, Peter King.