Notwithstanding his retirement to Oates, and his incessant literary activity, Locke never lost his interest in politics, and, as the friend and admirer of men like Monmouth, Somers, and Clarke, he must always have exercised a considerable influence on the policy of the Whig party. In the spring of 1695 he seems to have taken a primary share in determining a measure which for a time divided the Houses of Lords and Commons, and which must have enlisted his warmest sympathies. This was the repeal of the Licensing Act. The English Press had never been wholly free, and the Act of Charles II., which was still in force, was peculiarly stringent. Occasion had been taken by the Commons, when it was proposed, in the session of 1694-95, to renew certain temporary statutes, to strike out this particular statute from the list. The Lords dissented, and re-inserted it. The Commons refused to accept the amendment. A conference of both Houses took place, Clarke of Chipley being the leading manager on the part of the Commons, and the result was that the Lords waived their objections. The paper of reasons tendered by the Commons' managers on this occasion is said, by a writer in the Craftsman for Nov. 20, 1731, to have been drawn up by Locke. As Clarke was one of his most intimate friends, and as the Reasons correspond pretty closely with a paper of criticisms on the Act written by Locke, this statement is probably true, so far at least as concerns their substance. The arguments employed are mainly practical, consisting of objections in detail, and pointing out inconveniences, financial and otherwise, which resulted from the operation of the Act. But these arguments, "suited to the capacity of the parliamentary majority," did, as Macaulay has remarked, what Milton's Areopagitica had failed to do, and a vote, "of which the history can be but imperfectly traced in the Journals of the House, has done more for liberty and for civilization than the Great Charter or the Bill of Rights." Locke's paper of criticisms, which is published in extenso in Lord King's Life, asks very pertinently "why a man should not have liberty to print whatever he would speak, and be answerable for the one, just as he is for the other, if he transgresses the law in either." He then offers a suggestion, to take the place of the licensing provisions:—"Let the printer or bookseller be answerable for whatever is against law in the book, as if he were the author, unless he can produce the person he had it from, which is all the restraint ought to be upon printing." It appears from this paper that the monopoly of the Stationers' Company had become so oppressive that books printed in London could be bought cheaper at Amsterdam than in St. Paul's Church Yard. Except for the few monopolists, the book-trade had been ruined in England. But then, he reflects, "our ecclesiastical laws seldom favour trade, and he that reads this Act with attention will find it upse" (that is, highly) "ecclesiastical."

This question had hardly been settled before Locke had another opportunity of influencing legislation on a subject which absorbed much of his interest, and on which he had already employed his pen. Probably at no time in the history of our country has the condition of the coinage become so burning a question, or caused such wide-spread distress, as in the years immediately succeeding the Revolution. To understand the monetary difficulties occasioned by clipping the coin, it must be remembered that, at the time of which I am speaking, two kinds of silver money (if we neglect the imperfectly milled money which was executed between 1561 and 1663) were in circulation, hammered money with unmarked rims, and what was called milled money, from being made in a coining-mill, with a legend on the rim of the larger and graining on the rim of the smaller pieces. The latter kind of coins, too, had the additional advantage of being almost perfectly circular, while the shape of the former was almost always more or less irregular. The hammered money, it is plain, could be easily clipped or pared, whereas the milling was an absolute protection against this mode of fraud. Though milling, in much its present form, had been introduced into our mint in the year 1663, and then became the exclusive mode of coining, the old hammered money still continued to be legal tender; and, as the milled money was always worth its weight in silver, and the hammered money was generally current at something much above its intrinsic worth, the milled money was naturally melted down or exported abroad, leaving the hammered money in almost exclusive possession of the field. The milled money disappeared almost as fast as it was coined, and the hammered money was clipped and pared more and more, till it was often not worth half or even a third of the sum for which it passed. At Oxford, indeed, a hundred pounds' worth of the current silver money, which ought to have weighed four hundred ounces, was found to weigh only a hundred and sixteen. Every month the state of things was becoming worse and worse. The cost of commodities was constantly rising, and every payment of any amount involved endless altercations. In a bargain not only had the price of the article to be settled, but also the value of the money in which it was to be paid. A guinea, which at one place counted for only twenty-two shillings, would at another fetch thirty, and might have brought far more, had not the Government fixed that sum as the maximum at which it would be taken in the payment of taxes. Thus, all commercial transactions had become disarranged; no one knew what he was really worth, or what any commodity might cost him a few months hence. Macaulay, who has given a most graphic description of the financial condition of the country at this time, hardly exaggerates when he says, "It may be doubted whether all the misery which had been inflicted on the English nation in a quarter of a century by bad kings, bad ministers, bad parliaments, and bad judges, was equal to the misery caused in a single year by bad crowns and bad shillings." Almost from the moment of his return to England, Locke had felt the gravest anxiety on this subject. "When at my lodgings in London," says Lady Masham, speaking of the time immediately succeeding the Revolution, "the company there, finding him often afflicted about a matter which nobody else took any notice of, have rallied him upon this uneasiness as being a visionary trouble, he has more than once replied, 'We might laugh at it, but it would not be long before we should want money to send our servants to market with for bread and meat,' which was so true, five or six years after, that there was not a family in England who did not find this a difficulty." The letter on "Some Considerations of the Consequences of Lowering of Interest and Raising the Value of Money," the latter part of which dealt with this question, is dated as early as Nov. 7, 1691, and had been, in the main, as he tells us, put into writing about twelve months before. Here he not only points out the intolerable character of the grievances under which the nation was labouring, but also protests most emphatically against one of the proposed methods of remedying them, namely, "raising the value of money," as it was called; that is, depreciating the intrinsic value of the money coined, or raising the denomination, so, for instance, as to put into a crown-piece or a shilling, when coined, less than the customary amount of silver. To the consideration of this scheme, which at one time found much favour, we shall soon see that he had occasion to recur. Universal as were the complaints about the existing state of things, no active measures, if we except wholesale and frequent hangings for "clipping the coin," and increased measures of vigilance for the purpose of detecting the delinquents, were taken for stopping the evil, until the year 1695. Under the malign ascendancy of Danby, the Government had other views and objects than to ameliorate the condition of the people. But, in the years 1694 and 1695, other and more enlightened statesmen were gradually winning their way into the royal councils, or beginning to occupy a more important position in them. For at this period, we must recollect, the high officers of state were not all, as now, necessarily of one uniform political pattern. In April, 1694, immediately after the establishment of the Bank of England, Charles Montague, afterwards Lord Halifax, one of the greatest of English financiers, had been made Chancellor of the Exchequer. And, on occasion of the king's departure for the Continent in May, 1695, two of Locke's most intimate friends—Lord Keeper Somers and the Earl of Pembroke—were nominated among the seven Lords Justices, who were to govern the kingdom during William's absence. To discerning and judicious statesmen like Somers and Montague it must have been quite apparent that the penal laws for protecting the coinage were altogether inadequate to the purpose. The gains to be made were so large and so easily obtained, that men were ready to run the risk of the punishment. And, moreover, even if the crime were detected, the punishment was by no means certain or unattended with sympathy. Great as were the suffering and inconveniences inflicted on the people by these practices, the punishment of death appeared to many to be in excess of the offence. Juries were often unwilling to convict, and the disgrace incurred by the criminal was very different from that which attended the murderer or the ordinary thief. That wise financial legislation, and not the more stringent execution of the penal laws, was the true and only effectual mode of eradicating the disease, was at length recognized by the Government, and the new Lords Justices soon set about to devise the remedy. To Locke, who was well known to have been the author of the pamphlet which appeared on the subject in 1692, they naturally turned for advice. In the early part of October, while the king was on his way back from his successful campaign in the Netherlands, he was summoned up from Oates to confer with them. Writing to Molyneux the next month, and informing him of the fact, he adds, with characteristic modesty: "This is too publicly known here to make the mentioning of it to you appear vanity in me." Notwithstanding the subordinate part which Locke here seems to assign to himself, there can be no doubt that his share in the measures of the Government, as ultimately matured, was a principal, if not the principal, one. That legislative measures would now be taken, there was no longer any question. But the danger of which Locke was chiefly afraid was the raising the denomination of the coin, or, in other words, the legalized depreciation of the currency, a scheme against which he had formerly protested, and which was now officially recommended to the Government by one of their own subordinates, William Lowndes. Orders had been given to Lowndes, who, after many years of good service in a subordinate capacity, had recently been appointed Secretary to the Treasury, to collect statistics relating to the monetary condition of the country, and to report on the most practicable methods of re-coining the current silver money. In executing the former part of his task, he left no doubt as to the necessity of speedily applying some remedy. The silver coins brought into the Exchequer during three months of 1695 ought to have weighed 221,418 ounces. Their actual weight was 113,771 ounces, or barely over one-half. In consequence of the vitiating, diminishing, and counterfeiting of the current moneys, he says, "It is come to pass that great contentions do daily arise amongst the king's subjects in fairs, markets, shops, and other places throughout the kingdom, about the passing and refusing of the same, to the great disturbance of the public peace. Many bargains, doings, and dealings are totally prevented and laid aside, which lessens trade in general." The necessity of setting the price of commodities according to the value of the money to be received, is, he considers, "one great cause of raising the price, not only of merchandise, but even of edibles and other necessaries for the sustenance of the common people, to their great grievance." So far, his political economy was perfectly sound; but when he comes to discuss the question of re-coinage, he advocates, without any misgiving, a scheme for the depreciation of the currency to the extent of one-fifth. A crown-piece was henceforth to count as 6s. 3d., and the nominal value of half-crowns, shillings, and sixpences was to be raised proportionately. Locke, with his clearer mind, saw, of course, that this would only be for the state to do systematically and by law the very same thing for which the clippers were being hanged. It would be to legalize the disarrangement of all monetary transactions, and to deprive every creditor of one-fifth of his debts. Montague and Somers were as clear on this point as he was, and Somers at once urged him to reply. Locke had returned to Oates, in consequence of the sudden death of Mrs. Cudworth, on the 16th of November, and at once set about his answer.

This tract, which formed a pamphlet of more than a hundred pages, was submitted to the Lords Justices, printed, and published before the end of December. It was entitled Further Considerations concerning Raising the Value of Money, and simplified and enforced the arguments contained in a previous pamphlet which Locke had also drawn up for the use of the Lords Justices earlier in the year, under the title, Some Observations on a Printed Paper, entitled, For Encouraging the Coining Silver money in England, and after for keeping it here. Meanwhile, Montague had, under the sanction of a committee of the whole House, introduced his resolutions into the House of Commons, and there can be little doubt that, in drawing up these, he and the Lords Justices had been assisted by Locke. Any way, the resolutions embodied in the main the opinions which Locke had been so instrumental in impressing on those in authority. The old standard value of the silver pieces was to be retained both as to weight and fineness, the point for which he had fought so persistently. The clipped pieces were, after a certain day, only to be received in payment of taxes, or in loans to the Exchequer; after a further day, they were to cease to be legal tender altogether. All the hammered money, as it came into the mint in payment of loans or taxes, was to be re-coined as milled money, and the loss to be borne by the Exchequer. When the resolution that the old standard was to be retained was put to the House, it was challenged, and an amendment moved by those who were of Lowndes' opinion that the word "both" be omitted. On a division, there were 225 for retaining the word, and 114 against. The House thus, by a large majority, affirmed what all economists would now regard as an elementary principle of finance. A Bill embodying the resolution was soon passed, but, in consequence of difficulties with the Lords, had to be dropped. A fresh Bill was introduced on the 13th of January, substantially embodying the same provisions as the old Bill, and was hurried through its various stages so fast that it received the Royal Assent on the 21st of January, 1695-96. Up to the 4th of May, 1696, the clipped money was to be received in payment of taxes, and up to the 24th of June, for loans or other payments into the Exchequer. But after the 10th of February ensuing, it was to cease to be legal tender in ordinary payments. Thus, in spite of much temporary inconvenience caused by the scarcity of money during the time of transition, the silver coinage of the country was, once for all, put upon a sound basis. Late as Locke's pamphlet appeared, it probably helped to facilitate the passage of the Bill through the two Houses, as the reiterated statement of his opinions had undoubtedly contributed in very large measure to shape and confirm the action of the government. It may be mentioned that the loss to the Exchequer, estimated as 1,200,000l., was made up by the imposition of a house tax and window tax, the former of which still continues, while the latter existed within the memory of many men now only of middle age.

Great as is the debt which philosophy owes to Locke's Essay, constitutional theory to his treatises on government, the freedom of religious speculation to his Letters on Toleration, and the ways of "sweet reasonableness" to all these, and indeed to all his works, it would form a nice subject of discussion whether mankind at large has not been more benefited by the share which he took in practical reforms than by his literary productions. It would undoubtedly be too much to affirm that, without his initiative or assistance, the state of the coinage would never have been reformed, the monopoly of the Stationers' Company abolished, or the shackles of the Licensing Act struck off. But had it not been for his clearness of vision, and the persistence of his philanthropic efforts, these measures might have been indefinitely retarded or clogged with provisos and compromises which might have robbed them of more than half their effects. A generation ago it was the fashion in many circles to speak contemptuously of the writers and statesmen of William's reign, and even now but scant and grudging justice is often done to them. The admirers of mystical philosophy and romantic politics may, however, fairly be challenged to show that their heroes, whether in letters or action, have borne equal fruit with the vigorous understanding and plain, direct, practical common-sense of men like Halifax, Somers, and Locke. It has already been stated that soon after his return to England Locke was appointed a Commissioner of Appeals, a post which, though not entirely without duties, seems to have taken up but little of his time. One of his letters to Clarke shows the difficulty of forming a quorum, and perhaps illustrates the fact that when the duties of an office are slight, they are generally neglected altogether. But towards the end of the year 1695 the government, now virtually under the leadership of Somers, determined to revive the council of trade and plantations of which, it will be recollected, Locke had been Secretary when Shaftesbury's counsels were in the ascendant at the court of Charles II., as far back as the year 1673. At first there were some difficulties with the king, but ultimately; on the 15th of May, 1696, he was induced to issue the patent appointing and defining the duties of a commission. Besides the great officers of state, there were to be certain paid commissioners, with a salary of 1000l. a year, of whom Locke was one. His name was inserted in the first draft of the commission without his express consent, and he appears, as we can well understand, to have accepted the office only with extreme reluctance. Writing to Molyneux, who had congratulated him on the appointment, he says with evident sincerity:

"Your congratulation I take as you meant, kindly and seriously, and, it may be, it is what another would rejoice in; but 'tis a preferment I shall get nothing by, and I know not whether my country will, though that I shall aim at with all my endeavours. Riches may be instrumental to so many good purposes, that it is, I think, vanity rather than religion or philosophy to pretend to contemn them. But yet they may be purchased too dear. My age and health demand a retreat from bustle and business, and the pursuit of some inquiries I have in my thoughts makes it more desirable than any of those rewards which public employments tempt people with. I think the little I have enough, and do not desire to live higher or die richer than I am. And therefore you have reason rather to pity the folly, than congratulate the fortune, that engages me in the whirlpool."

The duties of the commission could hardly have been more widely defined than they were. It was to be at once a Board of Trade, a Poor-Law Board, and a Colonial Office. The commissioners were to inquire into the general condition of trade in the country, both internal and external, and "to consider by what means the several useful and profitable manufactures already settled in the kingdom may be further improved; and how, and in what manner, new and profitable manufactures may be introduced." They were also "to consider of some proper methods for setting on work and employing the poor of the kingdom, and making them useful to the public, and thereby easing our subjects of that burthen." Finally, they were to inform themselves of the present condition of the plantations, as the colonies were then called, not only in relation to commerce, but also to the administration of government and justice, as well as to suggest means of rendering them more useful to the mother country, especially in the supply of naval stores. Here, surely, was work enough for men far younger and more vigorous than Locke; but, having undertaken the duties of the office, he appears in no way to have spared himself. In the summer and autumn months he resided in London, and attended the meetings of the board personally, often day after day, and in the evening as well as the day-time. In the winter and spring his health compelled him to reside at Oates, but he was constantly sending up long minutes for the use of his colleagues. Mr. Fox Bourne, who has been carefully through the proceedings of the commission, informs us that Locke was altogether its presiding genius. He was a member of this board a little over four years, having been compelled by increasing ill-health, or, as the minutes of the council put it, "finding his health more and more impaired by the air of this city," to resign on the 28th of June, 1700. The king, we are told by Lady Masham, was most unwilling to receive his resignation, "telling him that, were his attendance ever so small, he was sensible his continuance in the commission would be useful to him, and that he did not desire he should be one day in town on that account to the prejudice of his health." Locke, however, was too conscientious to retain a place with large emoluments, of which he felt that he could no longer perform the duties to his own satisfaction. It is interesting to find that his successor was Matthew Prior, the poet.

When we have seen the wide powers of the commission, we hardly need feel surprise that its business was multifarious. It at once set to work to collect evidence of the state of trade in the colonies, of our commercial relations with foreign ports, of the condition of the linen and paper manufactures at home, of the number of paupers in the kingdom, and the mode of their relief, as well as to devise means for increasing the woollen trade and preventing the exportation of wool. Locke was specially commissioned "to draw up a scheme of some method of determining differences between merchants by referees that might be decisive without appeal." In the winter of 1696-97, finding that his work followed him to Oates, and being then apparently in a feebler state of health than usual, he made an ineffectual attempt to escape from his new employment, but Somers refused to hand in his resignation to the king. From a Letter to Molyneux we find that it was not simply his ill-health, but the "corruption of the age," which made him averse to continuing in office. And we can well understand how troublesome, and apparently hopeless, it must have been to deal with the various threatened interests of that time, when monopolies, patents, and pensions were regarded by the governing classes almost as a matter of course.

In the summer of 1697 the principal subject which engaged the attention of the commission was the best means of discouraging the Irish woollen manufacture, and of, at the same time, encouraging the Irish linen manufacture. Each commissioner was invited to bring up a separate report. Three did so. Locke's was the one selected, and, with slight alterations, was signed by the other commissioners on the 31st of August, and forwarded almost immediately afterwards to the Lords Justices. This interesting state-document proceeds entirely upon the notions of protection to native industries which were then almost universally current among statesmen and merchants. The problems were to secure to England the monopoly of what was then regarded as its peculiar and appropriate manufacture, the woollen trade, and to assign to Ireland, in return for the restrictions imposed upon her, some compensating branch of industry. According to the ideas then commonly prevalent, the scheme was perfectly equitable to both countries. But, naturally, the interests of England are put in the foreground. The interests of the Irish people, however, were not to be neglected, and what Locke doubtless conceived as full compensation was to be given them for the loss of their woollen trade. "And since it generally proves ineffectual, and we conceive it hard to endeavour to drive men from the trade they are employed in by bare prohibition, without offering them at the same time some other trade which, if they please, may turn to account, we humbly propose that the linen manufacture be set on foot, and so encouraged in Ireland as may make it the general trade of that country as effectually as the woollen manufacture is, and must be, of England." Linen cloth and all other manufactures made of flax or hemp, without any mixture of wool, were to be exported to all places duty free, as indeed had already been provided by Act of Parliament with regard to England. One method by which Locke proposed to encourage the linen manufacture in Ireland runs so counter to modern notions with regard both to the education of the poor and to freedom of employment, that it may be interesting to the reader to see the suggestion at length:

"And, because the poorest earning in the several parts of the linen manufacture is at present in the work of the spinners, who therefore need the greatest encouragement, and ought to be increased as much as possible, that therefore spinning schools be set up in such places and at such distances as the directors shall appoint, where whoever will come to learn to spin shall be taught gratis, and to which all persons that have not forty shillings a year estate shall be obliged to send all their children, both male and female, that they have at home with them, from six to fourteen years of age, and may have liberty to send those also between four and six if they please, to be employed there in spinning ten hours in the day when the days are so long, or as long as it is light when they are shorter: provided always that no child shall be obliged to go above two miles to any such school."

Then there follow many other minute and paternal regulations of the same kind, the object of which was to turn the whole Irish nation into spinners, and to supply with linen not only "the whole kingdom of England," but foreign markets as well. The Irish authorities, however, were meanwhile preparing a scheme of their own, and, after controversies between the English and Irish officials, extending over more than two years, Locke's plan was finally laid aside in favour of that of Louis Crommelin. Besides the attempt to monopolize the woollen trade for England and the linen trade for Ireland, much of the time of the Council was devoted to schemes for the protection of native industries, by forbidding or throwing obstacles in the way of importation and exportation. But Locke and his colleagues were here only following the track marked out for them by the ordinary opinion of the time.

The main subject which occupied the attention of the Council in the autumn of 1697 was the employment of the idle or necessitous poor. From the beginning of its sessions, it had been collecting evidence on this subject, and, in September of this year, it was decided that each commissioner should draw up a scheme of reform, to be submitted to the Council. As had been the case with his report on the Irish linen manufacture, Locke's was the one selected. From a variety of causes, however, his suggestions were never carried into effect, and the various efforts of William's Government to deal with the gigantic problem of pauperism proved abortive.

Locke's paper of suggestions assumes as a datum what was always regarded at this time as an axiom of poor-law legislation, namely, that it is the duty of each individual parish to maintain and employ its own poor, having, as a set-off, the right of coercing the able-bodied to work. Pernicious and partial as this principle was, we should have more occasion for surprise if we found Locke contravening it than conforming to it. The merit of his paper is that it offers excellent suggestions for minimizing the evils necessarily attaching to the system then in vogue. The recent growth of pauperism he refers to "relaxation of discipline and corruption of manners, virtue and industry being as constant companions on the one side as vice and idleness are on the other. The first step, therefore," he continues, "towards the setting of the poor on work ought to be a restraint of their debauchery by a strict execution of the laws provided against it, more particularly by the suppression of superfluous brandy-shops and unnecessary ale-houses, especially in country parishes not lying upon great roads." He then proposes a series of provisions, sufficiently stringent, for the purpose of compelling the idle and able-bodied poor to work, stating that, upon a very moderate computation, above one-half of those who receive relief from the parishes are able to earn their own livelihoods. In maritime counties, all those not physically or mentally incapacitated, who were found begging out of their own parish without a pass, were to be compelled to serve on board one of his Majesty's ships, under strict discipline, for three years. In the inland counties, all those so found begging were to be sent to the nearest house of correction for a like period. But, besides the able-bodied paupers, there were a great number not absolutely unable or unwilling to do something for their livelihood, and yet prevented by age or circumstances from wholly earning their own living. For these he proposes to find employment in the woollen or other manufactures, so as, at all events, to diminish the cost of their maintenance to the public, and at the same time increase the industrial resources of the country. One of the most distinctive features of Locke's scheme was the proposal to set up working-schools for spinning or knitting, or some other industrial occupation, in each parish, "to which the children of all such as demand relief of the parish, above three and under fourteen years of age, whilst they live at home with their parents, and are not otherwise employed for their livelihood by the allowance of the overseers of the poor, shall be obliged to come." The children were to be fed at school, and this mode of relief was to take the place of the existing allowance in money paid to a father who had a large number of children, which, we are not surprised to learn, was frequently spent in the alehouse, whilst those for whose benefit it was given were left to perish for want of necessaries. The food of the children of the poor at that time, we are told, was seldom more than bread and water, and often there was a very scanty supply of that. Another advantage which Locke proposed to effect by the institution of these schools was the moral and religious instruction of the children. They would be obliged to come constantly to church every Sunday, along with their schoolmasters or dames, "whereby they would be brought into some sense of religion, whereas ordinarily now, in their idle and loose way of bringing up, they are as utter strangers both to religion and morality as they are to industry." One further provision of this scheme may be noticed, as offering some mitigation of the parochial system of relief which then obtained, namely, "that in all cities and towns corporate the poor's tax be not levied by distinct parishes, but by one equal tax throughout the whole corporation."

The anxiety of the king to retain Locke on the Commission has already been mentioned. It would appear that they were in not infrequent conference, and we know that the king entertained a very high opinion both of his integrity and of his political capacity. A good deal of mystery attaches to one of their interviews, but the explanation of it proffered by Mr. Fox Bourne possesses, at any rate, considerable plausibility. One bitter January morning, in the winter of 1697-98, while Locke was at Oates, he received a pressing summons from the king to repair to Kensington. He was at the time suffering more than ordinarily from the bronchial affection to which he was constantly subject, and Lady Masham attempted to dissuade him from running the risk of the journey, but in vain. When he returned, the only account that he would give of the interview was that "the king had a desire to talk with him about his own health, as believing that there was much similitude in their cases." It appears, however, from a letter addressed by Locke to Somers a few days after his return to Oates, that the king had offered him some important employment, and that he had excused himself on the ground of his weak health, and his inexperience in that kind of business, the business being such as required "skill in dealing with men in their various humours, and drawing out their secrets." Mr. Fox Bourne forms the reasonable conjecture that Locke had been asked to go as right-hand man to William Bentinck, Earl of Portland, who had just been nominated as special ambassador to the Court of France. The peace of Ryswick had been ratified in the previous November, and the mission to Louis XIV. was, of course, one requiring great tact and sagacity. William had strongly urged Locke, some years before, to represent him on another very important mission, the one to the Elector of Brandenburg, and it may be that, on the present occasion, no fitter person occurred to him. Any way, the employment was one which would have advanced Locke in riches and honour; but as such, glad as he might have been to serve his country disinterestedly to the best of his power, it had no attractions for him. "He must have a heart strongly touched with wealth or honours who, at my age, and laboring for breath, can find any great relish for either of them."

On one occasion Locke accompanied the king, the latter going incognito to a meeting of the Society of Friends, where they listened to the famous Quaker preacheress, Rebecca Collier. Locke afterwards sent her a parcel of sweetmeats, with a very complimentary letter, and is said to have found the meeting so agreeable that it removed his objections to a female ministry.

With his resignation of the Commissionership of the Board of Trade, in the summer of 1700, Locke's public life comes to an end. His friend Somers had been sacrificed to the incessant and malignant attacks of the Tories, and dismissed from the Chancellorship, in the previous spring; and to those statesmen who were inspired by a sincere and simple desire for the well-being of their country the political outlook had become anything but cheerful. The condition of Locke's health was quite a sufficient reason for his desiring to be relieved of the anxieties of office; but we can hardly doubt that, on other grounds as well, he was glad to escape from so intricate a maze as the field of politics bade fair soon to become.