[gerard.casey]

I’m delighted to hear that you’ve started to enjoy the lectures.

You wrote: “I’ve always agreed with Locke about the natural goodness of man, as opposed to the natural depravity of man as taught by Augustine and the established church authorities.”

I don’t really want to go too far into theological issues but I think it is true to say that while some Christians hold that man is totally depraved (Calvinists in particular but also, to some extent, Lutherans), Catholics believe rather that man’s intellect is darkened and his will weakened without that amounting to total depravity. (Of course, I’m speaking of original Calvinism and Lutheranism, not necessarily of any current descendant of those varieties of Christianity.)

The original thirteen states came into being in a variety of ways but the end result in each was a system in which, to a greater or lesser degree, you can find the characteristic notes of the state: the claim to monopolise force and the right to tax its citizens. On this topic, may I recommend Murray Rothbard’s Conceived in Liberty (4 volumes) which is (or at least used to be) available on the Ludwig von Mises Institute website.

I hope you continue to enjoy the lectures.

Best wishes,

Gerard Casey