One thing and perhaps only one is clear and uncontroversial about Locke's Two Treatises of Government. It is a powerful attack on absolute monarchy, a call for limited', constitutional, parliamentary government and the rule of law. Are the qualities that people have in mind when they describe it as a founding text of ‘liberalism'. Beyond that, the interpretation of Locke's political ideas remains a subject of tierce controversy. In particular, commentators are divided about how radically democratic Locke was whether, for example, his political ideas came close to the Levellers or, on the contrary, represented the interests of the Whig aristocracy. Another major subject of debate has to do with Locke's position in relation to the rise of capitalism" whether capitalism' is a meaningful category at all in discussion of the seventeenth century and, if it is, whether Locke can be considered an advocate of those social and political changes we associate with capitalism in its early stages