to emerge after about a century of theological political thought in Europe. One of the most influential works during this burgeoning period was Niccolò Machiavelli's The Prince, written between 1511–12 and published in 1532, after Machiavelli's death. That work, as well as The Discourses, a rigorous analysis of the classical period, did much to influence modern political thought in the West. A minority (including Jean-Jacques Rousseau) would interpret The Prince as satire meant to imply the Medici after their recapture of Florence and their subsequent expulsion of Machiavelli from Florence. Though the work was written for the Medici family in order to perhaps influence them to free him from exile, Machiavelli supported the Republic of Florence rather than the oligarchy of the Medici family. At any rate, Machiavelli presents a pragmatic and somewhat consequentialist view of politics, whereby good and evil are mere means used to bring about an end, i.e. the maintenance of political authority. Thomas Hobbes, well known for his theory of the social contract, goes on to expand this view at the start of the 17th century during the English Renaissance. John Locke in particular exemplified this new age of political theory with his work Two Treatises of Government. In it Locke proposes a state-of-nature theory that directly complements his conception of how political development occurs and how it can be founded through contractual obligation. Locke stood to refute Sir Robert Filmer's paternally founded political theory in favor of a natural system based on nature in a particular given system. Age of Enlightenment During the Enlightenment period, new theories about what the human was and is and about the definition of reality and the way it was perceived, along with the discovery of other societies in the Americas, and the changing needs of political societies (especially in the wake of the English Civil War, the American Revolution and the French Revolution) led to new questions and insights by such thinkers as Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Montesquieu and John Locke. These theorists were driven by two basic questions: one, by what right or need do people form states; and two, what is the best form a state can take. These fundamental questions involved a distinction between the concepts of ‘state’ and ‘government’. It was decided that ‘state’ would refer to a set of enduring institutions through which power would be distributed and its use justified. The term ‘government’ would refer