Locke’s Ciceronian Liberalism

Abstract

Few features of John Locke’s political thought have inspired more controversy than his doctrine of natural law. Although he bases his entire political project on it, Locke never completely elaborates the grounds and contents of the natural law in any of his published works. In this essay, I look to Locke’s unpublished Questions Concerning the Law of Nature. I argue that, read in light of Locke’s published works, the essay reveals the coherence of Locke’s doctrine of natural law. I further argue that this natural law is almost certainly consciously adopted by Locke from Cicero (and Cicero’s modern expositors, such as Hugo Grotius and Samuel Pufendorf). If persuasive, this argument helps to solve some of the problems of Lockean natural law, while also uncovering the unappreciated classical roots of Locke’s liberalism.