“THE LINKAGE IS DIRECT," Carl Becker tells us in his book The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Ideas, "Jefferson copied Locke, and Locke quoted Hooker.”* The natural law scholar, A. P. d'Entreves classifies Hooker as a "sixteenth-century Anglican example of seventeenth-century Catholic scholasticism," and we may be assured that some of this scholarship influenced the Declaration of Independence and its notion of the "pursuit of happiness."
In his famous work, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Richard Hooker presents a classical and Christian understanding of the natural law, beginning with the notion of eternal law:
Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.16.2.
Hooker's definition of natural law is one based upon our nature, most fundamentally upon that part of our nature that is most specifically of man: reason. It is the natural moral law built upon practical reason which tells us what is virtuous and which informs us of the good.
It is within this context of an immutable eternal law arising from God the Creator and the providential governance of God which, for man consists of the natural law, that one must understand Richard Hooker's eudaimonistic and Aristotelian notion of happiness.
Happiness, therefore is that estate whereby we attain, so far as possibly may be attained, the full possession of that which simply for itself is to be desired, and contains in it after an eminent sort the contentation [i.e., satisfaction] of our desires, the highest degree of all our perfection.
Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.11.3.
Ultimately, for Hooker as for the entirety of the natural law tradition before him, happiness required a finis ultimus, a final end, which was our unification with god. Therefore, all things of this earth, all goods, were to be intrinsically ordered toward this final end.
To the extent Locke relied upon the "judicious Hooker" for his ideas (and there is debate among scholars as to how devoted to Hooker's thought Locke was), and those ideas influenced the American colonialists directly through Hooker or indirectly through Sidney and Locke and others who relied upon Hooker, these "sixteenth-century Anglican" reformulations of "seventeenth-century Catholic scholasticism" crept into the parchment signed by our founding fathers from John and Sam Adams to Oliver Wolcott. It would not have crept there were the thought not in their minds.
Unquestionably, to the extent informed by Hooker, the "pursuit of happiness" would have understood there to be an objective order, one based upon reason, in the entirety of the cosmos, one found there as a result of a God that created the world and that governed it through His Providence. Man, that creature of God endowed with reason, participated in that eternal law through the natural law, a law based upon reason. In its essentials it was immutable and unchanging and it guided man to right and wrong. It defined the scope of virtue. It urged him to do good and avoid evil and allowed him to see the good and distinguish it from evil. It involved participation in an objective moral order, the conformity with which was what ultimately led to man's happiness. Freedom was intended to allow man to pursue that happiness within the confines of that objective moral order. Ultimately, that order guided man to the God who, out of nothing, had formed it, much like he had formed man out of the dust of the earth.
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*Carl L. Becker, The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Ideas (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co. 1922), 79. We have treated Richard Hooker extensively in prior postings on this blog. This series, entitled "Law, Sit up Higher: Richard Hooker and the Natural Law," may be accessed by referencing the labels "Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity," or "Richard Hooker."
In his famous work, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Richard Hooker presents a classical and Christian understanding of the natural law, beginning with the notion of eternal law:
But if we will give judgment of the laws under which we live, first let that law eternal be always before our eyes, as being of principal force and moment to breed in religious minds a dutiful estimation of all laws, the use and benefit whereof we see; because there is no doubt but that laws apparently good, are (as it were) things copies out of the very tables of that high everlasting law, even as the book of that law has said concerning itself "by me Kings reign," and "by me Princes decree justice."
Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.16.2.
Richard Hooker
Hooker's definition of natural law is one based upon our nature, most fundamentally upon that part of our nature that is most specifically of man: reason. It is the natural moral law built upon practical reason which tells us what is virtuous and which informs us of the good.
Law rational therefore, which men commonly used to called the law of nature, meaning thereby the law which human nature knows itself in reason universally bound unto, which also for that cause may be termed most fitly the law of reason: this law, I say, comprehends all those things which men by the light of their natural understanding evidently know, or at leastwise may know, to be beseeming or unbeseeming, virtuous or vicious, good or evil for them to do.Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.8.9.
It is within this context of an immutable eternal law arising from God the Creator and the providential governance of God which, for man consists of the natural law, that one must understand Richard Hooker's eudaimonistic and Aristotelian notion of happiness.
Happiness, therefore is that estate whereby we attain, so far as possibly may be attained, the full possession of that which simply for itself is to be desired, and contains in it after an eminent sort the contentation [i.e., satisfaction] of our desires, the highest degree of all our perfection.
Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.11.3.
Ultimately, for Hooker as for the entirety of the natural law tradition before him, happiness required a finis ultimus, a final end, which was our unification with god. Therefore, all things of this earth, all goods, were to be intrinsically ordered toward this final end.
“[I]t is not the possession of any good thing [that] can make them happy which have it, unless they enjoy the thing wherewith they are possessed. Then are we happy therefore when fully we enjoy God, as an object wherein the powers of our souls are satisfied even with everlasting delight: so that although we be men, yet by being unto God united we live as it were the life of God.Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I.11.2.
To the extent Locke relied upon the "judicious Hooker" for his ideas (and there is debate among scholars as to how devoted to Hooker's thought Locke was), and those ideas influenced the American colonialists directly through Hooker or indirectly through Sidney and Locke and others who relied upon Hooker, these "sixteenth-century Anglican" reformulations of "seventeenth-century Catholic scholasticism" crept into the parchment signed by our founding fathers from John and Sam Adams to Oliver Wolcott. It would not have crept there were the thought not in their minds.
Unquestionably, to the extent informed by Hooker, the "pursuit of happiness" would have understood there to be an objective order, one based upon reason, in the entirety of the cosmos, one found there as a result of a God that created the world and that governed it through His Providence. Man, that creature of God endowed with reason, participated in that eternal law through the natural law, a law based upon reason. In its essentials it was immutable and unchanging and it guided man to right and wrong. It defined the scope of virtue. It urged him to do good and avoid evil and allowed him to see the good and distinguish it from evil. It involved participation in an objective moral order, the conformity with which was what ultimately led to man's happiness. Freedom was intended to allow man to pursue that happiness within the confines of that objective moral order. Ultimately, that order guided man to the God who, out of nothing, had formed it, much like he had formed man out of the dust of the earth.
___________________________________________
*Carl L. Becker, The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Ideas (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co. 1922), 79. We have treated Richard Hooker extensively in prior postings on this blog. This series, entitled "Law, Sit up Higher: Richard Hooker and the Natural Law," may be accessed by referencing the labels "Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity," or "Richard Hooker."
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