MEDICAL STUDIES.--PUBLIC EMPLOYMENTS.--CONNEXION WITH SHAFTESBURY.
Locke, at the time of his father's death and his entrance on college
office, was in his twenty-ninth year. At the election of college
officers on Christmas Eve, 1662, he was transferred from the Greek
Lectureship to the Lectureship in Rhetoric, and, on the 23rd of
December in the following year, he was again transferred to another
office. This office was the Censorship of Moral Philosophy (the
Senior Censorship); the Censorship of Natural Philosophy (the Junior
Censorship) he appears never to have held. On the 23rd of December,
1665, he is no longer in office, being now merely one of the twenty
senior M.A. students, called "Theologi," who were bound to be in
priests' orders. Of the manner in which Locke discharged his duties
as a lecturer we have no record. He seems also to have served in the
capacity of tutor to several undergraduates at this period, but of his
relations to his pupils we, unfortunately, know next to nothing.
How is it that Locke, holding a clerical studentship, was not a
clergyman? The disturbed condition of the Church and the Universities
during the last quarter of a century had probably led to great laxity
in the enforcement of college statutes and by-laws. Moreover, for a
time, it would seem, he seriously contemplated taking the step of
entering holy orders, and the authorities of his college would probably
be unwilling to force upon him a hasty decision. At length, however, he
finally abandoned this idea, deciding in favour of the profession of
physic. In the ordinary course he would have forfeited his studentship,
but he was fortunate to obtain a royal dispensation (by no means an
uncommon mode of intervention at that time), retaining him in his
place, "that he may still have further time to prosecute his studies."
This dispensation is dated Nov. 14, 1666.
Meanwhile, Locke had paid his first visit to the Continent. The
occasion of it was an embassy to the Elector of Brandenburg, whose
alliance or neutrality it was sought to obtain in the then pending war
with Holland. Sir Walter Vane was head of the embassy, and Locke, who
probably owed his nomination to the interest of his old schoolfellow,
William Godolphin, was appointed secretary. They left England in
the middle of November, 1665, and arrived at Cleve, the capital of
Brandenburg, on the 30th of the same month (Dec. 9, N.S.). Here they
remained for two months, the mission coming to nothing, in consequence
of the English Government being unable or unwilling to advance the
money which the Elector required as the price of his adhesion. The
state-papers addressed by the Ambassador to the Government at home
are mainly in Locke's handwriting; but far more interesting than
these are the private letters addressed by Locke to his friends,
Mr. Strachey, of Sutton Court, near Bristol, and the celebrated
Robert Boyle. These are full of graphic touches descriptive of the
manners and peculiarities of the people among whom he found himself.
Like a conscientious sight-seer, he availed himself of the various
opportunities of observing their eating and drinking, attended their
devotions--whether Catholic, Calvinist, or Lutheran--submitted himself
to be bored by poetasters and sucking theologians, and consoled himself
for the difficulty of finding a pair of gloves by noting the tardiness
of German commerce. Though he had "thought for a while to take leave
of all University affairs," he found himself ridden pitilessly by an
"academic goblin."
"I no sooner was got here, but I was welcomed with a divinity
disputation. I was no sooner rid of that, but I found myself up to
the ears in poetry, and overwhelmed in Helicon." "But my University
goblin left me not so; for the next day, when I thought I had been
rode out only to airing, I was had to a foddering of chopped hay or
logic, forsooth! Poor _materia prima_ was canvassed cruelly; stripped
of all the gay dress of her forms, and shown naked to us, though, I
must confess, I had not eyes good enough to see her. The young monks
(which one would not guess by their looks) are subtle people, and
dispute as eagerly for _materia prima_ as if they were to make their
dinner on it, and, perhaps, sometimes it is all their meal, for which
others' charity is more to be blamed than their stomachs.... The
truth is, here hog-shearing is much in its glory, and our disputing
in Oxford comes as far short of it as the rhetoric of Carfax does
that of Billingsgate."
At a dinner, described with a good deal of humour, with the Franciscan
friars, he was still pursued by his Oxford recollections:
"The prior was a good plump fellow, that had more belly than brains;
and methought was very fit to be reverenced, and not much unlike some
head of a college."
One circumstance Locke noticed much to the advantage of the foreigners,
namely, their good-natured toleration for each other's opinions.
Writing to Boyle, he says--
"The distance in their churches gets not into their houses. They
quietly permit one another to choose their way to heaven; for I
cannot observe any quarrels or animosities amongst them upon the
account of religion. This good correspondence is owing partly to the
power of the magistrate, and partly to the prudence and good-nature
of the people, who, as I find by inquiring, entertain different
opinions without any secret hatred or rancour."
And though, like most Englishmen, of decided Protestant convictions,
travelling on the Continent for the first time, Locke indulged in a
good deal of merriment at the Catholic ceremonies, he pays, in one
of his letters to Strachey, a cheerful tribute to the personal worth
of the Catholic priests. He had not met, he says, with any people so
good-natured or so civil, and he had received many courtesies from
them, which he should always gratefully acknowledge.
* * * * *
Locke returned to England towards the end of February, 1665-66, and
was at once offered the post of secretary to the Earl of Sandwich, who
was on the point of setting out as ambassador to Spain. He wavered for
a short time, but, though doubtful whether he had not "let slip the
minute that they say every one has once in his life to make himself,"
he finally declined the offer. Before settling down again in Oxford,
he spent a few weeks in Somersetshire, paying probably, amongst other
visits, one he had promised himself to Strachey at Sutton Court, "a
greater rarity than my travels have afforded me; for one may go a long
way before one meets a friend." During his stay in Somersetshire, he
attempted to try some experiments in the Mendip lead-mines with a
barometer which had been sent to him for the purpose by Boyle. But the
miners and their wives made a successful resistance. "The sight of
the engine and my desire of going down some of their gruffs gave them
terrible apprehensions. The women, too, were alarmed, and think us
still either projectors or conjurors."
At the beginning of May, Locke was again in his rooms in Oxford. He
seems to have lost no time in setting to work afresh on the studies
which might qualify him to exercise the profession of medicine. In his
letters to Boyle, he makes frequent reference to chemical experiments
and to collecting plants for medical purposes.
It is an unexplained circumstance that, notwithstanding a letter to
the Hebdomadal Board from Lord Clarendon, then Chancellor of the
University, signifying his assent to a dispensation, enabling Locke to
accumulate the degrees of Bachelor and Doctor in Medicine, he never
took those degrees. The obstacle may have arisen from himself, or,
more probably, it may have been due to some sinister influence on the
Hebdomadal Board preventing the assent of that body to the required
decree. Any way, it is curious that eleven days after the date of Lord
Clarendon's letter is dated the dispensation from the Crown (already
referred to on page 13), enabling him to retain his studentship,
notwithstanding his neglect to enter holy orders.
* * * * *
During the summer of 1666, we are introduced to one of the
turning-points in Locke's life--his first acquaintance with Lord
Shaftesbury, or, as he then was, Lord Ashley. Of the chequered career
or the enigmatical character of this celebrated nobleman it is no
part of my task to speak. It is enough to say that, as an advocate
of religious toleration and an opponent alike of sacerdotal claims
in the Church and absolutist principles in the State, he appealed to
Locke's warmest and deepest sympathies. The acquaintance was made
through David Thomas, an Oxford physician, and the occasion of it was
Lord Ashley's coming to Oxford to drink the Astrop waters. The duty of
providing these waters (Astrop being a village at some distance from
Oxford) seems to have been entrusted by Thomas to Locke, but, there
having been some miscarriage, Locke waited on Lord Ashley to excuse the
delay. "My lord," says Lady Masham, "in his wonted manner, received
him very civilly, accepting his excuse with great easiness, and, when
Mr. Locke would have taken his leave of him, would needs have him to
stay supper with him, being much pleased with his conversation. But
if my lord was pleased with the company of Mr. Locke, Mr. Locke was
yet more so with that of my Lord Ashley." The result of this short
and apparently accidental interview was the beginning of an intimate
friendship, which seems never afterwards to have been broken, and which
exercised a decisive influence on the rest of Locke's career.
On September 2 of this year broke out the Great Fire of London, which
raged without intermission for three days and nights. Under the date
of September 3 we find in Locke's "Register," which was afterwards
published in Boyle's _General History of the Air_, this curious
entry:--"Dim reddish sunshine. This unusual colour of the air, which,
without a cloud appearing, made the sunbeams of a strange red dim
light, was very remarkable. We had then heard nothing of the fire of
London; but it appeared afterwards to be the smoke of London, then
burning, which, driven this way by an easterly wind, caused this odd
phenomenon." The Register, in which this entry is made begins on June
24, 1666, and contains, with many intermissions, the observations made
by Locke, in Oxford and London, up to June 30, 1683, on the readings
of the "thermoscope," the "baroscope," and the "hygroscope," together
with the direction of the wind and the state of the weather. It not
only affords valuable evidence of Locke's whereabouts at different
times, but also shows the interest which he took in physical research.
In the early summer of 1667, Locke appears to have taken up his
residence with Lord Ashley in London, and "from that time," according
to Lady Masham, "he was with my Lord Ashley as a man at home, and
lived in that family much esteemed, not only by my lord, but by all
the friends of the family." His residence in Lord Ashley's family was,
however, probably broken by occasional visits to Oxford.
To this period of Locke's life may be assigned the unpublished _Essay
concerning Toleration_, which, with so much other valuable matter,
is now for the first time accessible to the general reader in Mr.
Fox-Bourne's _Life_. This _Essay_, it is not improbable, was written
at the suggestion, or for the guidance of Lord Ashley, and so may
have been widely circulated amongst the advocates of "toleration" and
"comprehension"--words which were at that time in the mouth of every
man who took any interest in religion or politics. As I shall have to
speak expressly of the published _Letters on Toleration_, which were
written about twenty years later, and which contain substantially the
same views as this earlier _Essay_, I shall not here detain the reader
further than by giving him the general conclusions at which Locke had
now arrived. These may be stated summarily under three heads: first,
"all speculative opinions and religious worship have a clear title
to universal toleration," and in these every man may use "a perfect
uncontrollable liberty, without any guilt or sin at all, provided
always that it be all done sincerely and out of conscience to God,
according to the best of his knowledge and persuasion;" secondly,
"there are some opinions and actions which are in their natural
tendency absolutely destructive to human society--as, that faith may
be broken with heretics; that one is bound to broach and propagate any
opinion he believes himself; and such like; and, in actions, all manner
of frauds and injustice--and these the magistrate ought not to tolerate
at all;" thirdly, another class of opinions and actions, inasmuch as
their "influence to good or bad" depends on "the temper of the state
and posture of affairs," "have a right to toleration so far only as
they do not interfere with the advantages of the public, or serve any
way to disturb the government." The practical result of the discussion
is, that while "papists" should not "enjoy the benefit of toleration,
because where they have power they think themselves bound to deny
it to others," the "fanatics," as the various classes of Protestant
Dissenters were then called, should be at least "tolerated," if not
"comprehended" in the national Church. Indeed, as to "comprehension,"
Locke lays down the general principle that "your articles in
speculative opinions should be few and large, and your ceremonies in
worship few and easy--which is latitudinism."
This must have been one of the quietest and happiest periods of Locke's
life. He seems to have been unobtrusively pursuing his studies, and
gradually making the acquaintance of the great world and of public
affairs through the facilities which his residence with Lord Ashley
afforded him. Both his own occupations and his relations to the Ashley
family appear to have been of a very miscellaneous kind. Medicine,
philosophy, and politics engaged his attention by turns. To Lord Ashley
and his family he was at once general adviser, doctor, and friend. In
June, 1668, after consulting various other medical men, he performed
on Lord Ashley a difficult operation for the purpose of removing an
"imposthume in the breast," and is said thus to have saved his life.
To the only child, Anthony Ashley, he acted as tutor. But, by the
time the youth was seventeen, Locke was entrusted with a far more
delicate business than his tuition. This was no less than finding him
a wife. After other young ladies had been considered and rejected,
Locke accompanied his charge on a visit to the Earl of Rutland, at
Belvoir Castle, and negotiated a match with the Earl's daughter, the
Lady Dorothy Manners. The match seems to have been a happy one; and
Locke continued his services of general utility to the Ashley family by
acting on more than one occasion as Lady Dorothy's medical attendant.
On the 26th of February, 1670-71, he assisted at the birth of a son
and heir, Anthony, who subsequently became third Earl of Shaftesbury,
and who, as the author of the _Characteristics_, occupies a position
of no inconsiderable importance in the history of English philosophy.
It is on the evidence of this Earl of Shaftesbury that we learn the
share taken by Locke in effecting the union of his father and mother.
"My father was too young and inexperienced to choose a wife for
himself, and my grandfather too much in business to choose one for
him." The consequence was, that "all was thrown upon Mr. Locke, who
being already so good a judge of men, my grandfather doubted not of his
equal judgment in women. He departed from him, entrusted and sworn, as
Abraham's head servant 'that ruled over all that he had,' and went into
a far country 'to seek for his son a wife,' whom he as successfully
found."
Though so much of Locke's time seems to have been spent on medical
studies and practice, he possessed no regular qualification. In
1670 another attempt had been made, but in vain, to procure him the
Doctor of Medicine's degree from the University of Oxford. Lord Ashley
successfully enlisted the good services of the Duke of Ormond, the
Chancellor of the University; but on learning the opposition of Dean
Fell and Dr. Allestree, Locke desired his patron to withdraw the
application. Both now and on the former occasion, alluded to above (p.
16), the opposition was probably based on Locke's tendencies, known or
suspected, to liberal views in religion; nor would the connexion with
Lord Ashley be at all likely to mitigate the sternness of the college
and university authorities. It had, of course, all along been open to
him to proceed to the Doctor's degree in the ordinary way, by attending
lectures and performing exercises; and whether he was prevented from
doing so by the tediousness of the process, by the hope of attaining
the degree through a shorter and easier method, or by a certain amount
of indecision as to whether after all he would adopt the medical
profession, we cannot say. Afterwards, we shall see, he proceeded to
the degree of Bachelor of Medicine, but whether in the ordinary course,
or by dispensation, is not known.
As connected with Locke's medical pursuits, I may here mention his
friendship with Sydenham. We do not know when the acquaintance
commenced, but Sydenham writing to Boyle, so early as April 2, 1668,
speaks of "my friend Mr. Locke." That Sydenham entertained great
respect for the medical skill and judgment of Locke--who appears to
have accompanied him in his visits to his patients, and, in turn, to
have availed himself of Sydenham's assistance in attending the Ashley
household--there can be no doubt. Writing to Mapletoft, their common
friend, and a physician of some eminence, in 1676, he says: "You
know how thoroughly my method [of curing fevers] is approved of by
an intimate and common friend of ours, and one who has closely and
exhaustively examined the subject--I mean Mr. John Locke, a man whom,
in the acuteness of his intellect, in the steadiness of his judgment,
and in the simplicity, that is, in the excellence, of his manners, I
confidently declare to have amongst the men of our own time few equals
and no superior." A number of notes and papers, still extant, attest
the interest which Locke now took in medical studies, and the hopes
with which he looked forward to improvements in medical practice. That
the sympathy between him and Sydenham was very close, is evident from
the writings of both.
But, meanwhile, he was also busy with other pursuits. One of these was
the administration, under Ashley, and the other "lords proprietors," of
the colony of Carolina. In 1663 this colony had been granted by Charles
the Second to eight "lords proprietors," of whom Ashley was one. Locke,
when he went to live in Ashley's family, appears to have become, though
without any formal appointment, a sort of chief secretary and manager
to the association. A vast amount of miscellaneous business seems to
have been transacted by him in this capacity; but what to us would be
most interesting, if we could determine it, would be the share he took
in drawing up the document entitled "The Fundamental Constitutions of
Carolina," issued on the 1st of March, 1669-70. Many of the articles,
embodying, as they do, a sort of modified feudalism, must have been
distasteful to Locke, and it is hardly possible to suppose that he
was the originator of them. But perhaps we may trace his hand in the
articles on religion, between which and his views, as stated in his
unpublished papers written before and his published works written
after this time, there is a large amount of correspondence. No man was
to be permitted to be a freeman of Carolina unless he acknowledged a
God, and agreed that God was to be publicly and solemnly worshipped.
But within these limits any seven persons might constitute a church,
provided that they upheld the duty of every man, if called on, to bear
witness to the truth, and agreed on some external symbol by which such
witness might be signified. Any one, however, who did not belong to
some such communion was to be regarded as outside the protection of
the law. The members of one church were not to molest or persecute
those of another; and no man was to "use any reproachful, reviling, or
abusive language against the religion of any church or profession, that
being the certain way of disturbing the peace, and of hindering the
conversion of any to the truth." Amongst the miscellaneous provisions
in this code is one strictly forbidding any one to plead before a court
of justice for money or reward; and another, enacting that "every
freeman of Carolina shall have absolute power and authority over his
negro slaves, of what opinion or religion soever."
In 1668 Locke was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, and in 1669
and 1672 was placed on the Council, but he never appears to have taken
much part in the proceedings of the society. On the other hand, there
seem to have been certain less formal meetings of a few friends,
constituting possibly a sort of club, in the discussions of which
he took a more active share. It was at one of these meetings that
the conversation took place which led to Locke's writing his famous
_Essay_ (see page 127). According to a marginal note made by Sir James
Tyrrell in his copy of the first edition, now in the British Museum,
the discussion on this occasion turned on "the principles of morality
and revealed religion." The date of this memorable meeting was,
according to the same authority, the winter of 1673; but according to
Lady Masham, it was 1670 or 1671. Any way, there is an entry on the
main subject of the _Essay_ in Locke's Common-place Book, beginning
"Sic cogitavit de intellectu humano Johannes Locke, anno 1671." In
this brief entry the origin of all knowledge is referred to sense, and
"sensible qualities" are stated to be "the simplest ideas we have, and
the first object of our understanding"--a theory which, as we shall
hereafter see, was supplemented in the _Essay_ by the addition to
the ultimate sources of knowledge of simple ideas of reflection. The
_Essay_ itself was not published till nearly twenty years after this
date, in 1690.
Locke's health had never been strong, and, in the years 1670-72 he
seems to have suffered much from a troublesome cough, indicative
of disease of the lungs. Connected with this illness was a short
journey which he made in France, in the suite of the Countess of
Northumberland, in the autumn of 1672. Soon after his return, his
patron, who had lately been created Earl of Shaftesbury, was appointed
to the highest office of the State, the Lord High Chancellorship of
England. Locke shared in his good fortune, and was made Secretary of
Presentations--that is, of the Chancellor's church patronage--with
a salary of 300_l._ a year. The modern reader, especially when he
recollects Locke's intimacy with Shaftesbury, is surprised to find
that he dined at the Steward's table, that he was expected to attend
prayers three times a day, and that, when the Chancellor drove out in
state, he was accustomed, with the other secretaries, to walk by the
side of the coach, while, as "my lord" got in and out, he "went before
him bareheaded." The distinctions of rank were, however, far more
marked in those days than at present, and the high officers of state
were still surrounded with much of the elaborate ceremonial which had
obtained in the times of the Tudors.
To the period of Locke's excursion in France, or that immediately
succeeding it, we may refer a free translation--or rather,
adaptation--of three of the _Essais de Morale_ of Pierre Nicole, a
well-known Jansenist, and the friend of Pascal and Arnauld. These
_Essays_, which were translated for the use of the Countess of
Shaftesbury, were apparently not designed for publication, and, in
fact, were first given to the world by Dr. Hancock, in 1828. They are
mainly remarkable as affording evidence of the depth and sincerity of
Locke's religious convictions.
Routine and official duties now occupied much of his time, and must
have interfered sadly with his favourite studies. From discussing the
tangled and ambiguous politics of this period I purposely refrain; but
there is one official act, recorded of Locke at this time, which places
him in so incongruous a light that his biographer can hardly pass it
over in silence. At the opening of the Parliament which met on February
4, 1672-73, Shaftesbury, amplifying the King's Speech, made, though it
is said unwillingly and with much concern, his famous defence of the
Dutch war, and his attack on the Dutch nation, culminating in the words
"Delenda est Carthago." Locke, we are sorry to find, though the act was
a purely ministerial one, stood at his elbow with a written copy, to
prompt him in case of failure.
On the 9th of November, 1673, Shaftesbury, who had incurred the
displeasure of the king by his support of the Test Bill, and who was
now looked on as one of the principal leaders of the Anti-Catholic
party, was summarily dismissed from the Chancellorship. Locke, of
course, lost at the same time the Secretaryship of Presentations; but
he did not, as meaner men might have done, try to insinuate himself
into wealth and power through other avenues. "When my grandfather,"
says the third Earl of Shaftesbury, "quitted the Court, and began to
be in danger from it, Mr. Locke now shared with him in dangers, as
before in honours and advantages. He entrusted him with his secretest
negotiations, and made use of his assistant pen in matters that nearly
concerned the State and were fit to be made public."
Locke's connexion with the affairs of the colony of Carolina has
already been mentioned. Business of this kind, owing to his relations
with Shaftesbury, multiplied upon him, and on the 15th of October,
1673, shortly before Shaftesbury's fall, he was sworn in as Secretary
to the Council of Trade and Foreign Plantations, with a salary of
500_l._ a year. This office he retained, notwithstanding the fall of
his patron, till the dissolution of the Council on the 12th of March,
1674-75; but it appears that his salary was never paid.
On February 6, 1674-75, Locke proceeded to the degree of Bachelor of
Medicine, having already been appointed to, or more probably promised,
a Faculty Studentship at Ch. Ch., or, as Dean Prideaux, who had no love
for him, puts it, "having wriggled into Ireland's faculty place." It
is curious that his name does not appear in the Ch. Ch. books among
the Faculty Students till the second quarter of 1675, and during that
and the two subsequent quarters it is erased. The first time the name
occurs without an erasure is in the first quarter of 1676. That there
was much irregularity in the mode of appointing to College places at
this time is evident.
His studentship being now secure, Lord Shaftesbury having, for a
consideration in ready money, granted him an annuity of 100_l._ a
year, and his estates in Somersetshire, as well as one or two loans
and mortgages, bringing him in a modest sum in addition, Locke,
notwithstanding the non-payment of his salary as Secretary to the
Council of Trade and Plantations, must have been in fairly comfortable
circumstances. He was dispensed from the necessity of practising a
profession, and, being also relieved from the pressure of public
affairs, was free to follow his bent. It is probably to the leisure
almost enforced upon him by the weakness of his health, as well as by
the turn which public affairs had taken, and rendered possible by the
independence of his position, that we are indebted for the maturity of
reflection which forms so characteristic a feature of his subsequent
writings.