John Locke

I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts.

flatter princes with an opinion, that they have a divine right to absolute power, let the laws by which they are constituted and are to govern, and the conditions under which they enter upon their authority, be what they will ; and their engagements to observe them ever so well ratified by solemn oaths and promises.

The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions:

It is evident the mind knows not things immediately, but only by the intervention of the ideas it has of them.

having by his fault forfeited his own life, by some act that deserves death; he, to whom he has forfeited it, may (when he has him in his power) delay to take it, and make use of him to his own service, and he does him no injury by it:

[M]an's power, and its way of operation, [is] muchwhat the same in the material and intellectual world. For the materials in both being such as he has no power over, either to make or destroy, all that man can do, is either to unite them together, or to set them by one another, or wholly separate them.

that every man should have as much as he could make use of, would hold still in the world, without straitening any body;

Personal Identity depends on Consciousness not on Substance

This shows, that the state of paradise was a state of immortality, of life without end; which he lost that very day that he eat: his life began from thence to shorten, and waste, and to have an end; and from thence to his actual death, was but like the time of a prisoner, between the sentence passed, and the execution, which was in view and certain.

He that will not set himself proudly at the top of all things, but will consider the immensity of this fabric, and the great variety that is to be found in this little and inconsiderable part of it which he has to do with, may be apt to think that, in other mansions of it, there may be other and different intelligent beings, of whose faculties he has as little knowledge or apprehension as a worm shut up in one drawer of a cabinet hath of the senses or understanding of a man; such variety and excellency being suitable to the wisdom and power of the Maker. — 1690

A Law cannot give to Bills that intrinsick Value, which the universal Consent of Mankind has annexed to Silver and Gold

God hath woven into the principles of human nature such a tenderness for their off-spring, that there is little fear that parents should use their power with too much rigour;

Beasts abstract not.

Perhaps then we shall stop pretending that we know everything, and shall be less bold in raising questions and getting
into confusing disputes with others about things to which
our understandings are not suited — things of which we can’t
form any clear or distinct perceptions in our minds, or, as
happens all too often, things of which we have no notions at
all. If we can find out what the scope of the understanding
is, how far it is able to achieve certainty, and in what cases
it can only judge and guess, that may teach us to accept our
limitations and to rest content with knowing only what our
human condition enables us to know.

If anyone maintain that men ought to be compelled by fire and sword to profess certain doctrines, and conform to this or that exterior worship, without any regard had unto their morals; if anyone endeavour to convert those that are erroneous unto the faith, by forcing them to profess things that they do not believe and allowing them to practise things that the Gospel does not permit, it cannot be doubted indeed but such a one is desirous to have a numerous assembly joined in the same profession with himself; but that he principally intends by those means to compose a truly Christian Church is altogether incredible.