Thomas Hobbes

English philosopher

• Born: April 5, 1588
• Birthplace: Westport, Wiltshire, England
• Died: December 4, 1679
• Place of death: Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, England

A pioneer of modern political principles, Hobbes wrote Leviathan, the English language’s first great work of political philosophy.

Early Life

In his autobiography, Thomas Hobbes (HOBZ) tells a story, possibly apocryphal, regarding the circumstances of his birth and the relation of those circumstances to his political ideas. His mother, Hobbes says, was much alarmed by the approaching Spanish Armada, and her disquiet led to his premature birth on April 5, 1588. Thus, Hobbes claimed, he was born with an especially keen aversion to violence; he and fear were born twins. If his mother’s timidity explains his reverence for peace, however, what explains the ardor and stubbornness with which Hobbes later developed and presented his political theory? The personality of Hobbes’s father may present the answer. A “choleric man,” Hobbes’s father was a vicar who abandoned his family after taking part in a brawl in the doorway of his church.

Along with an older brother and sister, Hobbes was reared in the household of his uncle, Francis Hobbes. At the age of four, Thomas was sent to school at the Westport church, where he proved to be an able student. Subsequently, his education was put into the hands of Robert Latimer, a classicist with an extraordinary knack for teaching. Latimer took special pains to develop Hobbes’s natural abilities. In 1603, Hobbes set off for Magdalen Hall, Oxford. He was put off by Oxford’s archaic curriculum, however, and as a result, he did not always attend lectures. Instead, he chose to haunt bookshops in search of materials that would better stimulate and satisfy his curiosity.

After receiving a bachelor’s degree in 1608, Hobbes took a position as tutor in the household of William Cavendish, who later became the second earl of Devonshire. This arrangement was an extraordinarily happy one and an important one for Hobbes’s further intellectual development: The Devonshire house was far more stimulating an environment than Oxford had been, and Hobbes thrived there, deepening his study of various subjects within the liberal arts. In 1610, Hobbes accompanied his pupil on a tour of Europe, where he studied French and Italian. Back in England, Hobbes continued his explorations of the life of the mind, making the acquaintance of Francis Bacon in the early 1620’s. A significant figure in the history of science, Bacon championed the inductive method. Hobbes’s irreverence for Scholasticism was probably reinforced by Bacon’s.

In 1629, Hobbes completed an English translation of Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War. Some Hobbes scholars have concluded that this work was selected because of the suspicion it casts on democracy. While there is little evidence to support this theory, the translation does tend to indicate that Hobbes was primarily a classicist at this point in his life. His intellectual focus, however, was about to undergo the first of two important changes.

Devonshire had died in 1628, after which Hobbes left the Cavendish household. In 1629, though, Hobbes again traveled to Europe, this time as a companion to the son of Sir Gervase Clifton. It was on this trip, according to seventeenth century author John Aubrey’s Lives of Eminent Men (1813; also known as Brief Lives, 1898), that Hobbes fell “in love with geometry.” This not only altered the course of Hobbes’s intellectual efforts but also was to have a substantial effect on the form in which he later chose to express his political ideas. In 1630, Hobbes was called back into the service of Devonshire, this time as tutor to the third earl. In 1633, Hobbes again was able to visit Europe, where he renewed his interest in geometry and science and where he reportedly met briefly with Galileo.

In 1637, Hobbes returned to an England that was on the eve of a bitter and bloody civil war, its government and guiding political beliefs about to undergo more than a half-century of ferment. These historical events again shifted the focus of Hobbes’s work, combining with his background and personality to make him both a notorious and a respected political theorist.

Life’s Work

The political strife in England led Hobbes to proceed with what was to be the third part of an all-embracing work of natural philosophy and ethics. The Elements of Law, Natural and Politic (1640) was circulated in manuscript form by Hobbes. Written in Latin, the work begins with a theory of humankind, moving on to a discussion of the citizen. Given the unruliness of human nature, Hobbes concluded, human beings could live together in peace only if they submitted to an absolute sovereign. In the context of the time, this seems to make Hobbes a clear monarchist, but Hobbes based his defense of absolutism not on divine right but rather on expediency and consent. Expediency causes men to enter into a contract with the sovereign in which they exchange most of their natural freedom for the security of stable (that is to say, absolute) government. Thus, Hobbes put forward a version of social contract theory.

This type of philosophy did not please the Royalists any more than it did Parliamentarians. The latter rejected Hobbes, because his theory supported absolute monarchy. The former understood all too well the dangerous implications of social contract theory, for consent, unlike divine right, can be withdrawn. Thus, when the momentum toward civil war began to increase in 1640, Hobbes quickly exiled himself to the safety of Paris, “the first of all that fled,” as he himself put it. In Paris, Hobbes took up the relatively safe project of writing “objections” to the work of René Descartes—but his political pen had been far from quieted.

In the year the First English Civil War finally broke out, Hobbes published the first edition of De Cive (1642, revised edition 1647; Philosophical Rudiments Concerning Government and Society , 1651), in which he argued that, rightly understood, a Christian state and a Christian church were united under the leadership of the sovereign. Hobbes was responding to a world in which religious radicalism had become a source of acute political strife. To Hobbes, the stewardship of religion by the secular ruler was a safeguard against religious fanaticism, holy wars, and even intolerance. In 1647, an expanded version of De Cive was published, and in 1650 the manuscript of The Elements of Law, Natural and Politic was published in two parts, Human Nature (1650) and De Corpore Politico (1650; of the body politic).

The following year, Hobbes published the centerpiece of his political philosophy, Leviathan (1651). Wonderfully written in the brash, colorful English of the day, Leviathan is remarkably consistent with Hobbes’s earlier political treatises. Like them, it seeks to establish his political theory on a scientific basis, proceeding from point to point nearly in the manner of a geometric proof. Nor had Hobbes’s substantive position changed: He still argued that absolute rule was needed in order to ensure civil peace, but also that the sovereign’s power was based on consent. Where Leviathan broke new ground was in its unforgettably graphic portrayal of the “state of nature” (that is, the situation that precedes and leads to the social contract) and the addition of two lengthy sections in which Hobbes complements his secular arguments with an examination of the political principles suggested by Scripture and by true Christianity.

Life in the state of nature, according to Hobbes, is “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.” Everywhere there is the fear of violent death. Indeed, the state of nature is actually a state of war, with each man the potential enemy of every other. There is equality in the state of nature, but it is an equality based on mortality, since even the strongest can be overcome by force or guile. There is also an abundance of liberty, since man has a right to anything he can take and hold. With this natural liberty, however, comes acute insecurity: One’s possessions (and indeed one’s very life) are constantly in jeopardy. Given these conditions, humans are not likely to prosper or grow comfortable enough to develop and enjoy the arts, letters, and other advantages afforded by civilization.

It is this bleak picture, Hobbes asserts, that demonstrates the need for voluntary submission to an absolute sovereign. Man’s fear of violent death propels him toward a state of peace. Natural laws, based in reason, show how peace can be achieved—that is, by entering into a contractual relationship with an absolute sovereign. The establishment of such a common power alone can ensure civil peace. In Hobbes’s view, stability could be achieved only where sovereignty was undivided and absolute. Otherwise, civil authority would come undone, and the brutishness of the state of nature would reassert itself.

To this justification of absolute rule, rooted in human psychology and rational argument, Hobbes added two lengthy sections based on Scripture. In “Of a Christian Commonwealth,” he argues that a theologically pure city of God is not possible in this life and a truly Christian commonwealth is that which effectively preserves peace. In “The Kingdom of Darkness,” Hobbes cites scriptural evidence to refute the arguments of those who would in fact subordinate civil peace to theological purity, using the metaphor of darkness to suggest both the absence of truth and the presence of Satan. Thus, Hobbes argues for a secular state with a minimalist public religion aimed at ensuring popular allegiance to the sovereign, who in turn ensures civil peace.

What people wished to believe privately was of no interest to Hobbes, nor should it be of interest to the state in his eyes. This position challenged both Papists and Presbyterians, who argued that ecclesiastical authority ought to be supreme. To Hobbes, however, religion was too great a source of social conflict and schism to be elevated to a station of sovereignty. Though religion is interestingly absent from Hobbes’s portrayal of the state of nature, it certainly did play a prominent role in the English Civil War. Such divisiveness, Hobbes believed, must be minimized by keeping public religion under the control of civil authority.

Hobbes closed Leviathan with a section titled “Review and Conclusions,” in which he handled the tricky question of where one’s allegiance belongs, should a sovereign be successfully overthrown or conquered. For Hobbes, obligation ended when the sovereign could no longer honor his side of the contract. At this point, a new contract comes into force with the newly established sovereign. Some observers have accused Hobbes of taking this position because of the imminent victory of Oliver Cromwell over the Royalists. Indeed, Hobbes did return to England shortly after Cromwell came to power, despite the fact that he had maintained close contact with Charles II while both were in France. Nevertheless, Hobbes’s position regarding conquest is consistent with the rest of his political theory. The establishment and maintenance of stable political authority is the first priority for Hobbes. Forming a resistance movement to prolong conflict instead of allowing for the emergence of a new order clearly contravenes the goal of civil peace.

In any case, Hobbes’s return to England was harmonious and remained so after the restoration of the English monarchy under Charles II in 1660. To be sure, Hobbes had his enemies; he was accused of being an atheist, and “Hobbism” became a term of abuse, denoting the worst kind of freethinking and godlessness. Nevertheless, Charles II extended to Hobbes the protection of the Crown and the security of a very decent pension. For his part, Hobbes avoided writing openly on politically sensitive topics, though he continued to answer personal charges and wrote extensively on mathematics and philosophy.

Not surprisingly, Hobbes did return to political themes in his writing on occasion, most conspicuously in a dialogue entitled Behemoth: The History of the Causes of the Civil Wars of England (1679), but he allowed this and other political works to be suppressed in order to avoid a new round of accusations. Instead, notorious at home and a celebrity abroad, Hobbes kept what was for him a low profile, constantly writing, engaging in lively discourse over the philosophical issues of the day, and, late in his life, returning to the classics to produce translations of Greek poet Homer’s epics, the Iliad (c. 750 b.c.e.; English translation, 1611) and the Odyssey (c. 725 b.c.e.; English translation, 1614). Hobbes died at Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire on December 4, 1679.

Significance

Hobbes failed to establish an authoritative methodology for political discourse, and his defense of absolutism was soon neutralized by various constitutional theorists, John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government (1690), and the course of English history. Hobbes’s legacy is nevertheless substantial, however, in terms of both his general approach to political theory and his conclusions about human nature and political institutions. Many college courses in modern political philosophy begin with Hobbes, who was a distinctively modern thinker, especially by virtue of his fundamentally secular methodology. Hobbes based his political theory on observation and reason rather than revelation or metaphysics. As such, he can be seen as a founding father of modern political inquiry and social science in general.

Also distinctly modern is Hobbes’s emphasis on individualism and self-interest, or egoism. For Hobbes, a convincing political prescription must recognize the essential selfishness of human nature and also be consistent with the dictates of rational, or “enlightened,” self-interest. In fact, Hobbes utilizes self-interest as an ordering principle of his argument. This formula for human harmony serves as the basis for contemporary free market economics and liberal democracy (or, as it is called by some, interest-group liberalism). It is the foundation of the dominant and pervasive ideology of the United States and other Western nations: liberal individualism. Hobbes can also be linked to the development of utilitarianism and legal positivism, solidifying his status as a source of many disparate branches of modern thought.

All this, however, refers primarily to Hobbes’s approach to questions of human conduct rather than to his conclusions. Have his answers become completely obsolete? There is no doubt that absolutism has gone out of vogue. Indeed, the concept of absolutism has been relegated to the junk heap of history, with authoritarianism, totalitarianism, corporatism, and other designations (some more or less scientific, others clearly ideological) being put forward. Hobbes’s absolutism was both conceptually and practically tame compared to modern-day dictatorships. Hobbes was speaking of a form of government with natural limitations. His sovereign, bereft of contemporary propaganda devices and free of modern political religion, lacked both the power and the incentive to exercise totalitarian control. Alas, the natural limits on power assumed by Hobbes are no longer operative, if they ever were. (Elizabeth I, for example, may have lacked the power to enforce full modern totalitarian rule, but she clearly did not lack the desire, were it but possible.)

Nevertheless, there is a profound validity to Hobbes’s political theory. There are, first, some political situations that resemble the Hobbesian state of nature enough to recommend Hobbes’s conclusions. True, in these instances, there is usually the confusion of faction and fanaticism, and there is—almost without exception—a family structure, all elements not present in Hobbes’s conception of the state of nature, but these complexities do not contravene the clear need for a well-established common power to maintain peace and order as a prerequisite for further political progress. As Hobbes pointed out, a minimum of civil order is a prerequisite for a liberty that is truly secure.

There is also something universal about Hobbes’s realism. Indeed, there is even a discernible Hobbesian element in American politics, reflected, for example, in the 1787-1788 series of papers known as The Federalist, in which James Madison wrote (in number 51) that government is “the greatest of all reflections of human nature,” since “if men were angels, no government would be necessary.” Like many other American statesmen, Madison feared tyranny and sought an effective form of limited government as a safeguard, but, like Hobbes, Madison also feared anarchy and lawlessness. Without effective government, the vicious side of human nature would create a situation in which neither property nor individuals were secure. Thus, while he did not demonstrate the need for absolute government, Hobbes did provide a powerful argument for the necessity of stable government, given the dark side of human nature.

Hobbes’s Major Works

1642

• De Cive (revised 1647; Philosophical Rudiments Concerning Government and Society, 1651)

1650

• Human Nature

1650

• De Corpore Politico

1651

• Leviathan

1656

• The Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity, and Chance

1679

• Behemoth: The History of the Causes of the

Bibliography

Bowle, John. Hobbes and His Critics: A Study in Seventeenth Century Constitutionalism. London: Jonathan Cape, 1951. Reprint. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1969. Gives a detailed account of the response to Hobbes’s theory of absolutism from those who, laying the groundwork for the Glorious Revolution, were formulating mechanisms and principles aimed at imposing legal limitations on government.

Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan. Baltimore: Pelican Classics, 1968. A handsome, unabridged edition of Hobbes’s most famous political work. Includes a detailed introductory essay by C. B. Macpherson and reproduces the illustration on the title page of the 1651 edition.

Mace, George. Locke, Hobbes, and the “Federalist Papers”: An Essay on the Genesis of the American Political Heritage. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1979. A controversial work, in which Mace argues that The Federalist reflects a more Hobbesian than Lockean view. Places both Locke and Hobbes in the context of the founding of the United States.

Macpherson, C. B. The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke. New York: Oxford University Press, 1962. Macpherson argues that both Hobbes and Locke reflected the possessive individualist premises of emerging capitalist society, mistaking these premises for eternal principles of human nature. The book, therefore, constitutes a critique of Hobbes’s realism about human nature.

Martinich, A. P. Hobbes: A Biography. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. A more recent scholarly biography, providing extensive detail about Hobbes’s life, writings, and times.

Sorrell, Tom, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. A collection of essays that show the wide range of Hobbes’s intellectual preoccupations, including science and mathematics as well as political theory.

Sullivan, Vickie B. Machiavelli, Hobbes, and the Formation of a Liberal Republicanism in England. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Sullivan argues that Hobbes and other seventeenth and eighteenth century writers were more liberal in their defense of republicanism than is commonly believed.

Tuck, Richard. Hobbes: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. In this 148-page book, Tuck re-evaluates Hobbes’s philosophy, maintaining that Hobbes was not a pessimist but was passionately concerned with the refutation of skepticism.

Wolin, Sheldon. The Politics of Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought. Boston: Little, Brown, 1960. Expanded ed. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2004. A popular and stylish textbook on the history of political philosophy, Wolin’s work devotes a lengthy chapter to Hobbes. Hobbes is seen as a prophet of modern society, in which impersonal rules and competition between interests have come to replace notions of a close-knit political community.