Leviathan
Alter reading the
background information, match the main principles of Thomas Hobbes'
Leviathan with the actual excerpt. Write out the principles
in full phrases.
The Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes is a major dissertation on political
philosophy. In its entirety, it also includes ideas on metaphysics,
ethics, and epistemology. The name Leviathan is a biblical term describing
an all‑powerful sea monster. The following excerpts summarize
the main arguments for the theory of the social contract.
Political Philosophy
Principles of Leviathan
¥
description of life for an individual who has to protect himself ¥
People band together for mutual protection. ¥
Rulers should be given absolute power. ¥
Self‑preservation is basic to human life. ¥
The value of the state is the ability to protect its individuals. ¥
By giving absolute power to the ruler, security of the state is maintained. ¥
description of man in the precarious state of nature ¥
definition of the social contract
Excerpt 1‑Leviathan, Chapter 13
Nature hath made men
so equal in the faculties of the body and mind, as that. though there
be found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body or of quicker
mind than another, yet when all is reckoned together the difference
between man and man is not so considerable as that one man can thereupon
claim to himself any benefit to which another may not pretend as well
as he.
Main principle described:
Excerpt 2‑Leviathan, Chapter 13
Men live without other
security than what their own strength and their own invention shall
furnish them withal. In such condition, there is no place for industry,
because the fruit thereof is uncertain, and consequently no culture
of the earth; no navigation nor use of the commodities that may be imported
by sea: no commodious building; no instruments of moving and removing
such things as require much force, no knowledge of the face of the earth:
no account of time, no arts, no letters, no society, and, which is worst
of all, continual fear and danger of violent death, and the life of
man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.
Main principle described:
Excerpt 3‑Leviathan, Chapter 14
Again, one of the contractors
may deliver the thing contracted for on his part, and leave the other
to perform his part at some determinate time after, and in the meantime
be trusted: and then the contract on his part is called 'pact' or 'covenant';
or both parts may contract now to perform hereafter; in which cases
he that is to perform in time to come, being trusted, his performance
is called 'keeping of promise,' or faith, and the failing of performance,
if it be voluntary, 'violation of faith . . . . Main principle described:
Excerpt 4‑Leviathan, Chapter
17
The only way to erect...
a common power, as may be able to defend [human beings) from the invasion
of foreigners and the injuries of one another, and thereby to secure
them in such sort as that, by their own industry, and by the fruits
of the earth, they may nourish themselves and live contentedly; is,
to confer all their power and strength upon one man, or upon one assembly
of men, that may reduce all their wills, by plurality of voices, unto
one will: which is as much as to say, to appoint one man, or assembly
of men, to bear their person; and everyone to own and acknowledge himself
to be author of whatsoever he that so beareth their person, shall act,
or cause to be acted in those things which concern the common peace
and safety; and therein to submit their wills, everyone to his will,
and their judgments, to his judgment.
Main principle described:
Excerpt 5‑Leviathan, Chapter 17
And he that carrieth
this person, is called sovereign, and [is] said to have sovereign power;
and everyone besides, his subject.
Main principle described:
Excerpt 6‑Leviathan, Chapter 14
When he seeth men proceed
against him by violence whether they intend his death or not. And lastly
the motive and end for which this renouncing and transferring of right
is introduced is nothing else buy the security of a man's person in
his life and in the means of so preserving life, as not be weary of
it.
Main principle described:
Excerpt 7‑Leviathan, Chapter 17
The final cause (purpose),
end, or design of men who naturally love liberty and dominion over others,
in the introduction of that restraint upon themselves in which we see
them live in commonwealths, is the foresight of their own preservation,
and of a more contented life thereby. .
Main principle described:
Excerpt 8‑Leviathan, Chapter 14
From this fundamental
law of Nature by which men are commanded to endeavour peace, is derived
this second law, 'that a man be willing, when others are so too, as
far‑forth as for peace and defence of himself he shall think
it necessary, to lay down this right to all things, and be contented
with so much liberty against other men as he would allow other men against
himself.'
Main principle described: |