A Research Note and Query on the Dating of Locke's Two Treatises

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A Research Note and Query on the Dating of Locke's Two Treatises Author(s): George T. Menake Source: Political Theory, Vol. 9, No. 4 (Nov., 1981), pp. 547-550Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/190688Accessed: 28-06-2015 17:17 UTC

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A RESEARCH NOTE AND QUERY ON THE DATING OF LOCKE'S TWO TREATISES

GEORGE T MENAKE AMontclair State College

OME BACKGROUND COMMENTS are necessary to place this "Note" in context. As a result of Peter Laslett's scholarship, particularly his critical edition of Locke's Two Treatises,' it is now widely accepted that Locke wrote this work some years prior to the Glorious Revolution rather than after it. However, at least as early as 1888, it was claimed that the First Treatise belonged to the period 1680-1685.2 For reasons spelled out in his Introduction,3 Laslett suggests the winter of 1679-1680 as the period of authorship. Thus he concludes that the "Two Treatises is an Exclusion Tract, not a Revolution Pamphlet."4 In fact, Laslett's dating of the Two Treatises has been frequently termed "the new orthodoxy."

The period of authorship is extremely important, since it might help to uncover Locke's purpose in writing the Two Treatises, and thus better reveal the meaning this text had for Locke. Some scholars have been unsatisfied with Laslett's dating of the authorship, particularly of the Second Treatise. R.W.K. Hinton suggests that the first draft of the Second Treatise can be dated to 1673-1675 and was largely inspired by the royal abuses of power of that period.5 More recently, in a paper delivered at a Symposium on John Locke (March 21-23, 1980) at the Folger Shakespeare Library, and also in a later version, Richard Ashcraft questioned Laslett's dating of the authorship of the Second Treatise.6 Ashcraft associates the- Second Treatise with Shaftesbury's plan of insurrection against Charles II, following the latter's dissolution of the Oxford Parliament in March 1681.

I come now to the finding and query. It appears that Laslett might have been mistaken in key aspects of his chronological reckoning. He notes that Filmer's Patriarcha was purchased by Locke on January 22, 1680.7 Laslett reminds us that Locke used this edition, as the latter states

POLITICAL THEORY, Vol. 9 No. 4, November 1981 547-550 ? 1981 Sage Publications, Inc.

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548 POLITICAL THEORY / NOVEMBER 1981

in the Preface to the 1698 edition of Two Treatises. Locke wrote, "And that a bare Quotation of Pages always means Pages of his Patriarcha Edit. 1680." Two copies of this edition are contained in the collection of the New York Public Library at 42nd St. and Fifth Ave., New York City. Each of these copies makes reference in the Preface to the 1680 edition of Filmer's Patriarcha. Indeed, Patriarcha: or the Natural Power of Kings by the learned Sir Robert Filmer, baronet, was first published by Walter Davis, bookbinder, in Amen-Corner, near Pater-noster-row, London, in 1680 (although of course it had been written at least a third of a century earlier, Filmer having died in 1653). Another edition of Patriarcha with a publication date of 1680 exists, this one with Richard Chiswell listed as the publisher. This later edition, however, may not have been published until 1684.8 Finally, there is a second edition, based on a more accurate manuscript, published by Edmund Bohun in 1685.

It should be remembered that in the seventeenth century, the English year began on March 25th. They had not yet adopted the Gregorian calendar which was in use on the continent. This situation was not changed until an Act of Parliament of 1750-1751, when it was decided that the next year, 1752, would begin on January 1.9 Thus, if the date of 1680 on the original published edition of Patriarcha by Davis is correct, according to the then current English dating system, then the Patriarcha was most probably published sometime on or after March 25, 1680, the first day of the New Year. Of course, the date 1680 could be incorrect.'0 However, as far as I know, there is no evidence that this is so. If the above reckoning is accurate, Locke could not have published Patriarcha on January 22, 1680 as Laslett notes."I And he does not mean January 22, 1681 new style (i.e., post-1752 calendar), because he then discusses subsequent events of 1680, when on June 2 we are told that Locke purchased the printed version of James Tyrrell's Patriarcha Non Mon- archa. 12 Yet even here the dating may be incorrect. In the footnote on p. 60, in reference to a letter of Tyrrell to Petyt in which Filmer's Patriarcha is referred to, Laslett writes, "Jan. 12th, obviously 1680." This in fact may have been a letter of January 12, 1681. After all, Patriarcha Non Monarcha has a publication date of 1681.13

Could it be that the Journal Laslett consulted for the date of purchase of Patriarcha read only January 12, and that Laslett assumed this to be 1680 new style, when it was actually 1680 old style, and thus January 1681? In a letter of James Tyrrell to John Locke of June 24, 1681, Tyrrell says of a person called Lisis, "I have a book' for him." In footnote 1., DeBeer states "Identifiable as Tyrrell's Patriarcha Non Monarcha,



Menake / LOCKE'S TWO TREATISES 549

which is listed in the Term Catalogue for May: T.C. i.441. Locke paid for a copy for Tyrrell on 2 June: Journal (p. 64), L.L., no. 2999 (two entries)."'4 Not having access to the Journals of Locke, I must ask if this could be a reference to Tyrrell's work, published in 1681, and not 1680? If the reckoning I have outlined above corresponds accurately to the facts, then Locke did not obtain Patriarcha until January 22, 1681, new style.

This would be extremely important, if it is indeed the case, because then the First Treatise at least would belong to the very end of the exclusion crisis, the tumultuous week of the brief Oxford Parliament, and especially to the months thereafter, which witnessed desperate days for Whigs and Dissenters. After the dissolution of the Oxford Parliament, Locke's refutation of Filmer's support of monarchy and of royal prerogative was even more pressing than in 1680.15 Finally, if one could then argue persuasively (and I believe it can be done, although not here), that the Second Treatise was substantially written either at about the same time or indeed subsequent to the writing of the First Treatise, then neither treatise, except by way of retrospective reference, would relate to the exclusion crisis, but rather to political events immediately following in 1681-1682, including Shaftesbury's and the Council of Six's plan of insurrection. 16

NOTES

1. John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, 2nd Ed., ed. Peter Laslett (Cambridge: University Press, 1967).

2. See Thomas Fowler, Locke (AMS Press, 1888), pp. 60, 180. 3. Locke, Two Treatises, pp. 57-61. 4. Ibid, p. 61. 5. R.W.K. Hinton, "A Note on the Dating of Locke's Second Treatise," Political

Studies 22 (1974), pp. 471ff. and "On Recovering the Original of the Second Treatise," Locke Newsletter 8 (1977), pp. 69ff.

6. Richard Ashcraft, "Revolutionary Politics and Locke's Two Treatises of Govern- ment: Radicalism and Lockean Political Theory," Political Theory 8 (November 1980), pp. 429-486.

7. Locke, Two Treatises, p. 57. 8. See Gordon J. Schochet, "Sir Robert Filmer: Some New Bibliographical

Discoveries," The Library XXVI (1971), pp. 155-156. 9. See Fowler, Locke, pp. 112-113.

10. Ronald B. McKerrow, An Introduction to Bibliography (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1927), pp. 202-203 discusses false dating, noting it was "probably common in some classes of books" in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England.



550 POLITICAL THEORY / NOVEMBER 1981

11. Locke, Two Treatises, p. 57. 12. Ibid, p. 60. 13. See Library of Congress holding; also, in the Preface to the 1685 edition of

Patriarcha, Edward Bohun notes that Filmer's book gave alarm to "our Loyal Commonwealthsmen" and was followed in 1681 by Patriarcha Non Monarcha.

14. See The Correspondence of John Locke, ed. E. S. DeBeer (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976), p. 418.

15. See George Macaulay Trevelyan, England Under the Stuarts (London: Methuen & Co.), pp. 318-354.

16. Trevelyan, p. 349.

George T. Menake is presently Chairman and Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Montclair State College. He has published in the areas ofpoliticalphilosophy andpublic policy. Currently, he isfinishing a book entitled Plato in Dialogue, which was written under a year-long National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship.



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A Research Note and Query on the Dating of Locke's Two Treatises