ABSTRACT
Far from Locke's 'rationality argument' being the 'main line of argument' that Locke advances for toleration in the Letter, is in fact one of three 'considerations' that Locke advances to this end. This chapter addresses these and a range of other issues. It considers Locke's response to Proast's charge that, in advancing his case for toleration, Locke also advances scepticism and a relativism concerning matters of religion. These were charges which, highly stigmatic in late seventeenth-century England, Locke sought to deny, though ultimately, seeks to show, without the success he would have wished. The chapter will then address the competing views of those within the secondary literature concerning whether Locke does advance scepticism as a basis for toleration and evaluate these against my own account which insists that this is so. It focuses the 'moral challenge' which toleration poses for both Locke and Proast, in terms of their respective commitments to Christianity.
