A Letter Concerning Toleration

ISBN-13: 9781554811250 / Angielski / Miękka / 2013 / 134 str.

John Locke & Kerry Walters

Opis

Locke argued that religious belief ought to be compatible with reason, that no king, prince or magistrate rules legitimately without the consent of the people, and that government has no right to impose religious beliefs or styles of worship on the public. Locke's defence of religious tolerance and freedom of thought was revolutionary in its time. Even today, his letter poses a challenge to religious intolerance, whether state-sponsored or originating from religious dogmatists.

Based on both Locke's original Latin and the seventeenth-century English translation of William Popple, this edition offers a reader-friendly version that remains loyal to the original text. In addition to a forty-page Introduction that situates the Letter in its historical and philosophical contexts, this edition includes excerpts from writings on religious toleration by William Penn, Baruch Spinoza, Pierre Bayle, and Samuel von Pufendorf, as well as generous selections from the famous Locke-Proast debates on religious toleration.

Spis treści

Acknowledgements
Introduction
John Locke: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text

A Letter Concerning Toleration

Appendix A: Additional Writings on Toleration and Religion by Locke

1. From An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689)
2. From The Reasonableness of Christianity (1695)

Appendix B: Locke’s Contemporaries on Religious Toleration

1. From William Penn, The Great Case of Liberty of Conscience Once More Briefly Debated and Defended (1670)
2. From Baruch Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise (1670)
3. From Pierre Bayle, A Philosophical Commentary on These Words of the Gospel, Luke 14:23, “Compel them to come in, that my house may be full” (1686)
4. From Samuel von Pufendorf, Of the Nature and Qualification of Religion in Reference to Civil Society (1687)

Appendix C: Locke and His Critics

1. From Thomas Long, The Letter for Toleration Deciphered, and the Absurdity and Impiety of an Absolute Toleration Demonstrated (1689)
2. From Jonas Proast, The Argument of the Letter Concerning Toleration, Briefly Considered and Answered (1690)
3. From Philanthropus [John Locke], A Second Letter Concerning Toleration (1690)

Suggestions for Further Reading