Locke: Philosophy in an Hour. Paul Strathern
Dr. Busby as “the founder of the public school system.”
John Locke was a frail youngster, and the prospect of an encounter with Dr. Busby doubtless stimulated his dormant intellectual faculties to the full. As one of the brightest scholars at Westminster, Locke would certainly have got to know the precocious Dryden, who was already publishing poetry before he left school. Dryden appears to have learned something from his Royalist headmaster’s survival technique – in a school that stood in the very shadow of Parliament, during a time when the king was executed just across Parliament Square in Whitehall. At the age of twenty-six Dryden was to write a heroic tribute to Oliver Cromwell. Two years later, when the monarchy was restored, Dryden composed an equally mellifluous celebration of Charles II, and was later rewarded with the post of poet laureate. While poet laureate he composed a paean to the Anglican church; but when the Catholic James II ascended to the throne he changed his mind, became a Roman Catholic, and wrote an epic celebration of Catholicism. Unfortunately this time he was caught, because a few years later the Protestant King William assumed the throne, and Dryden was stripped of his poet laureateship. All this is far too interesting to have anything to do with John Locke, but it serves to illustrate the frequent (and often dangerous) shifts of political fortune that were to take place during his lifetime.
Unlike the great poet, Locke was to regard his principles as something more than a weather vane. Even so, Locke’s principles were to undergo several transformations. The first of these took place during his schooldays at Westminster. Locke had been brought up in a staunchly Parliamentarian home, but at school he found himself making friends with a number of Royalists among the pupils. These encounters, as well as his dislike of Parliamentarian excesses (such as the execution of the king), led him to a more sympathetic view of the Royalists. Learning from experience and toleration – two qualities for which Locke was to become renowned – were already apparent.
Yet in other ways Locke was a slow starter. He may have been bright at school, but he showed no signs of intellectual giantism. Indeed, he didn’t leave Westminster until he was twenty (the age at which his contemporary Gottfried Leibniz was already being offered a professorship). In 1652 Locke enrolled as an undergraduate at Christ Church College, Oxford. Education at Oxford University remained in the medieval era. Undergraduates were required to address their tutors and each other in Latin when in college. The curriculum was limited to the study of the classics, logic, and metaphysics. Despite the new philosophy of Descartes and recent widespread advances in science and mathematics, Aristotle and scholasticism reigned supreme. Undergraduates had the worst of both worlds, for even the time-honored benefits of a medieval education had been abolished. A short while earlier the bordellos and low-life taverns of Oxford had been closed down by the aptly titled vice-chancellor of the university.
The menu of nonstop classics and scholasticism was so boring that even Locke was driven to seek intellectual nourishment elsewhere. He began taking an interest in chemical experiments and medicine. Experimental science had recently been introduced to Oxford by John Wilkins, but it remained a fringe interest. It was viewed with much the same intellectual disdain as present-day universities tend to regard ESP or economics, and its introduction to Oxford had long been opposed. (The fact that Wilkins was Cromwell’s brother-in-law may well have helped in overcoming this opposition.)
Locke was introduced to medicine by his former schoolfriend Richard Lower. Medical knowledge was still largely based on Aristotle and the ancient Greek authorities, such as Galen and Hippocrates; but some felt the need to extend this knowledge by scientific investigation and experiment. These had already led to great advances in the study of anatomy – such as William Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of the blood. (As a result of this, Locke’s friend Lower undertook a daring experiment – daring for his patient as much as for himself – and became the first man to perform a successful blood transfusion.) Even so, for practical purposes medicine remained largely at the sawbones and leeches stage. Locke read avidly of the latest developments but refrained from taking up medical carpentry as a hobby.
By the late 1650s the Commonwealth was being run by the Puritan element, and the country was beginning to suffer from the postrevolutionary religious fanaticism that has now become the norm, even after atheist revolutions. The English have always been very good at being boring, and several times in their history have emerged for considerable periods as undisputed world masters in the field. This was one of them. Under the Puritans all conspicuous signs of enjoyment were rigorously banned. Even Christmas was banned, despite what it celebrated. Citizens were expected to work all day and spend the rest of their time conforming. Life was given over to Puritan indoctrination, the thought police, informers (on the likes of wicked Christmas pudding eaters), and long sessions spent studying the principles of Markism, Lukism, and Johnism. Until in the end even the English had had enough, and decided to invite Charles II to take over. They preferred to be ruled by a drunkard who lived with a prostitute, rather than do without Christmas pudding.
Meanwhile Locke’s father had fallen seriously ill. Locke learned that he was being treated by the celebrated Irish doctor Edmund Meara, and wrote to his father expressing his confidence that he was in safe hands and would soon recover. This is curious as Dr. Meara was already notorious for having denounced Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of the blood as a hoax, and had written a virulent pamphlet attacking Locke’s pioneering medical friend Lower. As a result of Dr. Meara’s attentions, Locke’s father soon got worse, and within a few months he was dead. Although Locke did travel to Somerset before the end (and even called in a new doctor), his behaviour here remains inexplicable. Could he have harboured some (perhaps unconscious) resentment against his father? Locke’s father had been strict at home but could well have lost authority when he was temporarily ruined by the civil war. In later life Locke always referred to his father respectfully, but as it was his habit to keep his deeper feelings to himself we can only speculate.
As a result of his father’s death Locke inherited a parcel of land and some cottages. The rent from these provided him with an income on which he could have lived modestly for the rest of his life. But Locke had no wish to become a gentleman. By now he had graduated and become a don at Christ Church. The Restoration had brought with it a new libertarianism, and Locke took advantage of this – in his own prudent fashion. He began casting his eyes around at the ladies (who wished to be known as such in those days, and usually behaved like them – except at the royal court and in Restoration comedies).
To judge from the portraits we have of Locke, he was an oddly handsome man, in a rather austere, distinguished manner. This may have been offset by his constant poor health. He appears to have suffered from asthma since childhood. Some have attributed this to psychosomatic causes, and indeed there may have been tensions in his childhood home. A good-looking mother of lower social standing married to an unambitious, sometimes impecunious man ten years her senior, who spent long periods away fighting in the civil war, hardly seems a recipe for domestic bliss. But asthma didn’t stop John Locke’s roving eye. Unfortunately Locke had been brought up in a Parliamentary household that espoused Puritan ways. Although he had by now transferred his sympathies to the Royalists, he never fully abandoned his former allegiance. At heart, something of the Puritan ethic remained – both in his behaviour and in his choice of ladies. He would write them long, amorous letters, and they would reply in equally amorous fashion. I quote from a typical example:
“Worthy Sir,
You are not able to imagine with what content and satisfaction I read over your civil and most obliging letter. …
I am sorry to hear that you rode out of your way, and repent with grief that I should be the cause of it, for I assure you that it was my prayers that you might have a happy journey. …”
And so on, ending: “I remain, your cordial friend. …”
Locke replied a week later: “That my returns are not so quick as yours is owing to an impossibility of finding that ecstasy your excellent letter first put me into, for which a week’s time is but little to recover myself.”
Unsurprisingly, not much came of these often prolonged dalliances, which were sometimes daringly conducted with more than one lady at a time.
But Locke may well have been a little disingenuous about the reasons for his weeklong delay in replying