Saturday, September 13, 2014

Natural liberty is the idea that men are given a liberty by god when they are born, namely life and the pursuit of happiness. This natural liberty is also mentioned in the declaration of independence where it says  "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." (Declaration of independence). This idea is further explained in John Winthrop speech on liberty. He explains that this is the liberty that a man shares with a beast. This means that we are both given the liberty of life and the pursuit of happiness, One can also go further and say that what separates a man and a beast is civil or moral liberty, which is the moral values that society wants one to uphold. this is also explained by John Winthrop as the covenant between man and his lord. If a person only shows natural liberty with out civil liberty he is branded as a "savage" in society. My personal opinion is that someone without civil liberty is not a savage but a man without the knowledge of equal rights therefore it is not his fault to be branded as a savage. Rather it is societies fault that he isn't educated about his civil rights therefore not allowing him to have that trait. 

2 comments:

  1. i liked how you incorporated evidence to support your claim. i would also like to add that in our religion and in the quran it says that, what separates us from any other creation is the power of will, which links to the natural liberty and john winthrop compares those of natural liberty to savages. savages act as if they dont have the power of will, so he categorizes them as such.

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