Q0248

John Locke

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

As far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person.
Thinker John Locke
School Empiricism
Source Essay II.27.9
Theme Humanity
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Essay II.27.9, within the tradition of Empiricism. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of humanity, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In John Locke's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: John Locke. (n.d.). As far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0248

MLA: John Locke. “As far as this consciousness can be extended….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0248.

Chicago: John Locke. “As far as this consciousness can be extended….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0248.

Same thinker

More from John Locke

  1. Whence has it all the materials of reason and knowledge? To this I answer, in one word, from experience.
  2. The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it…Reason…teaches all mankind…that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.
  3. Where there is no law, there is no freedom.
  4. Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper, void of all characters.
  5. Being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.

All quotations by John Locke

Same theme

More on humanity

  1. Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, always as an end and never merely as a means.
  2. Man is a sacred thing to man.
  3. There are more things to admire in men than to despise.
  4. In choosing himself, man chooses all men.
  5. Sincerity is the Way of Heaven; making oneself sincere is the way of human beings.

Browse the humanity theme