Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan (Clarendon Edition of the Works of Thomas Hobbes) [Hardcover]

Being a free Kindle edition there is no introduction and no notes - but you do get the full text. The only difference from the original is that there are fewer capitals and italics. Hobbes used them for emphasis very much more than a modern writer would, and their pruning in this edition makes the text easier to read.

Modern political philosophy begins with Hobbes. Before Hobbes, writers for centuries had accepted the divine right of kings or did not think much about the origins of government. Hobbes provides reasons as to how and why men come together to form government. He starts with the assumption that that the organised state is a choice. The alternative is the "state of nature", where there is both a "right" of nature and "laws" of nature. Hobbes uses these terms in a very individual way. The "right of nature" is "the Liberty each man hath, to use his own power...for the preservation of his own Life". The "laws of nature" dictate that each person should seek to live with others in peace, and should only retain the right to as much liberty as he is willing to permit others. These "laws" are found by reason, and are utilitarian rather than moral. Hobbes is simply saying that if men think about their situation, reason tells them that giving up their natural rights in exchange for others doing likewise is the best means of self-preservation, even though it is contrary to human nature.

On human nature Hobbes is cynical. Reason suggests advantages stem from co-operation, but this is outweighed by instinct. Men are fundamentally competitive and selfish. They are also roughly equal in ability so no one person can impose his will on others, and so the most one can hope for is to protect oneself from others. Life in the state of nature is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short." Men are therefore driven to create government via a pact with others to give up their natural rights to a sovereign authority, which may be either an individual or an oligarchy (Hobbes prefers the former). Hobbes uses the concept of a "social contract". It is not an historical event but a logical device to describe the ongoing basis of consent to government. Hobbes' view of human nature is such that he allocates absolute power to the sovereign. Limited government, he believed, is unworkable for men are too prone to division and selfishness, and "a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand." Hobbes was influenced by the religious and political divisions preceding the English Civil War. Hobbes wishes the sovereign to have the power of censorship, including the ability to prevent discussion of religion because he believed that such discussion leads to conflict. Anybody seeking to preach a new religion should be treated as a criminal.

Is there an ultimate right of rebellion against the absolute ruler? The answer is to be found in the nature of the social contract. Men give up their natural right to self-preservation to a sovereign in order to to better achieve it. If a situation arises where the sovereign cannot ensure that safety then society is dissolved. Can any action by the sovereign be challenged? Yes, if a man is conscripted into military service (an obvious threat to life) in circumstances where the survival of the state is not threatened. If the survival of the state is threatened then so are the lives of its citizens, and in these circumstances the sovereign can impose conscription. Hobbes adds that even in this case a citizen should have the right to replace himself with a volunteer if one is available.

"Leviathan" is not an easy book, not helped by the fact that the English is that of a man born just 24 years after Shakespeare. However, it is an important work that makes a good study companion to Locke's "Second Treatise", which argues for limited government.

Thomas Hobbes (1588 - 1679) was born in England, a country that endured great political turmoil during his life. Having lived through that, Hobbes' main aim was to inquire into the basis of order. The question he asked himself was "What kind of political authority will prevent the return of chaos?". And the answer to that question is in this book, "Leviathan" (1651).

The Levianthan is the personification of total power, an authority without limits, created by men who realise that absolute power given to a powerfull ruler (or to an assembly) is their only way out of the dangers of the state of nature. The name that the author chose for his monarch is quite telling: the Leviathan is a sea monster that appears in the Bible and symbolizes power. This kind of monarch seems like an extreme solution for the problem of anarchy, but it is the only one that Hobbes found. Without the Leviathan, life is 'solitary, nasty, brutish, and short.'

Of course, this book includes many more things than those I have already mentioned. For instance, it explains quite well Hobbes opinion regarding human nature (man is naturally a wolf to men), the state of nature (perpetual war of all against all), the origin of political institutions and the relationship between reason and force (pacts without swords are merely words), among other things.

On the whole, I think this book is a classic of Political Philosophy, and I recommend it as such. Despite that, I think a word of caution is in order, so you will be prepared for what you will find when you tackle "Leviathan". Truth to be told, sometimes Hobbes' prose is too dry, and in some chapters you will need to plod through some rather arid pages. Moreover, this book isn't written in modern English, what makes it more difficult to understand. Those are the reasons why I give this book four stars instead of five...

Notwithstanding that, I believe that "Leviathan" is well-worth the effort of reading it, simply because it has some interesting concepts that you should be aware of, even if you don't agree with them. The only way to discuss in a level play field with someone who has totally different ideas is to understand his arguments thoroughly, even if his position seems thoroughly strange to you. I invite you to do that with Hobbes, reading "Leviathan".

Belen Alcat

There are numerous books on Thomas Hobbes but this one by Noel Malcolm is masterly and comprehensive. It is based on an analysis of Hobbes surviving letters and papers.
The author also includes the shorter Latin version of his great work:'Leviathan' which Hobbes published in 1668 some 17 years after the English version was published.

Hobbes was born in 1588. His father was a cleric and an alcoholic. He wrote in his autobiography that:'fear and I were born twins together'. Fear is ever present in Leviathan. Hobbes
grapples in the book with the problem of life without political authority and life with it. Malcolm reminds us that when Hobbes wrote Leviathan Europe was riddled with political and religious strife. There were no tolerant, liberal, democracies with freedom of political expression and religious worship. Absolute monarchs were in charge all over Europe.

Hobbes description of life in the state of nature as 'solitary, poor, nasty,brutish and short' is well known.We would do well to remember that this is still true for some 30% of the world's population today.

As Malcolm points out Hobbes was hated by many in England. He was blamed for the Great Fire of 1666 and the plague of 1667. He was regarded by many as an atheist because he insisted, as a scientific materialist, that God was a physical God.

In Leviathan his central thesis is that life in the state of nature is unspeakably bad and in order to avoid the collapse of civil society into the state of nature we must submit ourselves to an all powerful absolute ruler or a sovereign assembly. Understandably this was greeted with anger and shock at the time. Less understandably was Lord Dacre's more recent analysis of Leviathan as leading to 'despotism'. But then Lord Dacre made other errors about writings that were far worse.

Today war, violence, revolution, and political instability are commonplace throughout the world. Hobbes was in fear of all of these. That is why he stresses the role of force in human affairs, recognising that it can be used for good and ill.

Leviathan is a brilliant philosophical tract that has never dated. Hobbes was a formidable thinker. When he died in 1679 aged 91 he had very few friends in his country of birth. Thanks to Noel Malcolm's magnificent work-all 2,355 pages of it-we should now be able to recognise more clearly that Hobbes suggested cure for the many ills of mankind bears close study.