Quotes By John Locke

The dread of evil is a much more forcible principle of human actions than the prospect of good.

A sound mind in a sound body, is a short, but full description of a happy state in this World: he that has these two, has little more to wish for; and he that wants either of them, will be little the better for anything else.

All wealth is the product of labor.

It is of great use to the sailor to know the length of his line, though he cannot with it fathom all the depths of the ocean.

It is easier for a tutor to command than to teach.

The reason why men enter into society is the preservation of their property.

Our incomes are like our shoes; if too small, they gall and pinch us; but if too large, they cause us to stumble and to trip.

I attribute the little I know to my not having been ashamed to ask for information, and to my rule of conversing with all descriptions of men on those topics that form their own peculiar professions and pursuits.

New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common.

Our deeds disguise us. People need endless time to try on their deeds, until each knows the proper deeds for him to do. But every day, every hour, rushes by. There is no time.

The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it.

The Bible is one of the greatest blessings bestowed by God on the children of men. It has God for its author; salvation for its end, and truth without any mixture for its matter. It is all pure.

Fashion for the most part is nothing but the ostentation of riches.

What worries you, masters you.

The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom. For in all the states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom.

Fortitude is the guard and support of the other virtues.

The improvement of understanding is for two ends: first, our own increase of knowledge; secondly, to enable us to deliver that knowledge to others.

As people are walking all the time, in the same spot, a path appears.

Government has no other end, but the preservation of property.

To prejudge other men's notions before we have looked into them is not to show their darkness but to put out our own eyes.

Parents wonder why the streams are bitter, when they themselves have poisoned the fountain.

Any one reflecting upon the thought he has of the delight, which any present or absent thing is apt to produce in him, has the idea we call love.

It is one thing to show a man that he is in an error, and another to put him in possession of the truth.

I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts.

Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has a right to, but himself.

Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him.

Where there is no property there is no injustice.

One unerring mark of the love of truth is not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant.

Reverie is when ideas float in our mind without reflection or regard of the understanding.

Things of this world are in so constant a flux, that nothing remains long in the same state.