The First Treatise of Government

In Patriarcha and elsewhere, Sir Robert Filmer argues that monarchical authority is derived from fatherly authority, that God vested monarchical authority in Adam, and that this authority descended to Adam’s heirs by the principle of fatherhood. Locke devotes large portions of First Treatise to refuting these arguments.

The first problem with fatherhood is that Filmer never explains its relevance to political authority. Locke therefore describes Filmer’s fatherhood as “this strange kind of domineering phantom” (7) that somehow attaches itself to every figure, Biblical or otherwise, who acquires absolute power. Anticipating the obvious objection that Adam was not a father at creation and therefore could not have been absolute monarch of the world by right of fatherhood, Filmer insists that Adam nonetheless had the possibility of becoming a father and therefore was a monarch “in habit” (21) before siring any heirs. Locke devotes two full pages to mocking this argument, which makes Adam, he asserts, “no king at all” (23).

A more serious analysis follows from Filmer’s claim that Adam enjoyed “private dominion, by donation” over the world (25). Locke refutes this claim by citing Biblical passages that show Eve’s equal share in dominion: “a joint grant to two” (33).