The writings of the High Church Tory pamphleteer Mary Astell(1666-1731) are a remarkable and underestimatcLi contribution to the c:onstitutional debates which ushcred iii the modem liberal democratic state. An interlocutor with Swift and Defoe，Astcll was perhaps the first systenlatic critic of Locke's entire corpus， something which has been overlooked in the considerable literature cvaluating the reception of Lockc's Two Trcatises on Govement. Astell' s politicaJ pamphlets Reflections upon Marriage，A Fair Way with the Dissentcrs and An Impartial Enquiry into the Origins of Rebellion ran to some five editions in her lifetime，but have never been reprinted in their cntirety.This new edition
makes accessible the major works of a fine English stylist and important political theorist .
Patricia Springborg is a Reader in the Department of Government at the University of Sydnev，New South Wales.She has held visituig appointments at the University of Pennsylvania， the University of California， Berkeley， and the Brookings Institution in Washington. Her publications include The Problem of Human Nccds (1981)， Royal Persons (1990)and Westem Republicanism and the Oriental Prince (1992).
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