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John Locke's The Second Treatise Of Civil Government

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John Locke's The Second Treatise Of Civil Government
John Locke’s The Second Treatise of Civil Government 1690 Summary

Locke sets out to describe how a civil government can exist and dissolve based on the laws of nature regarding men. Men are naturally free. Men are born and can gain life, health, liberty, and possessions in which they are free to reign over themselves. He argues that those who take away these rights from people should be punished.
There are two states: state of nature and state of equality. A state of equality leads to a community, a society, and then eventually a government. Men are either to stay in their laborious and inconvenient state of nature or to give up their powers to unite into a society. Men have certain risks in being in the state of nature as well. Even though

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