Works

Second Treatise of Government

Citation Formats

General Reference

Philosophy Atlas. "Second Treatise of Government." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://dev-philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/works/second-treatise-of-government.

APA Style

Philosophy Atlas. (n.d.). Second Treatise of Government. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://dev-philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/works/second-treatise-of-government

BibTeX

@misc{philosophyatlas-second-treatise-of-government,
  author = {Philosophy Atlas},
  title = {Second Treatise of Government},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://dev-philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/works/second-treatise-of-government},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

The second and philosophically central part of John Locke's Two Treatises of Government (1689). Argues that humans in a state of nature possess natural rights to life, liberty and property, and that legitimate political authority arises only from the consent of the governed, who retain the right to resist a government that violates those rights.

Facts

Publication Year

1689 1

Original Language

English 1

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Two Treatises of Government

The Second Treatise of Government is the second and philosophically central of this work's two parts, already minted here as its own entity; this edge lets each page point at the other rather than silently overlapping.

Source Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy