Enlightenment thinkers influenced America's Founders. What did Enlightenment thinker John Locke believe?
1 Answer
John Locke believed in natural law. that people had God given rights to life, liberty and property.
Explanation:
John Locke unlike the French Enlightenment thinkers was not antagonist toward belief in God. Like Thomas Jefferson whom John Locke greatly influenced, John Locke was a deist. As a deist John Locke believed that there was a higher power than the political force of government.
The natural laws like gravity as describe by Newton governed not only the movement of the planets but human behavior and yes how people should be governed, according to Locke.
John Locke famous statement on natural laws giving people the rights to life, liberty and property, was echoed by Thomas Jefferson in the American Declaration of Independence as Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
