Summary

Thomas Hobbes argues for a social contract and rule by an absolute sovereign. Influenced by the English Civil War, Hobbes wrote that chaos or civil war-situations identified with a state of nature and the famous motto Bellum omnium contra omnes ("the war of all against all")-could only be averted by strong central government. He thus denied any right of rebellion toward the social contract, which would be later added by John Locke and conserved by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. (However, Hobbes did discuss the possible dissolution of the State. Since the social contract was made to institute a state that would provide for the "peace and defense" of the people, the contract would become void as soon as the government no longer protected its citizens. By virtue of this fact, man would automatically return to the state of nature until a new contract is made).

Author Biography

Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) was one of the founding fathers of modern philosophy. An Englishman, Hobbes was heavily influenced by his country's civil war and wrote his preeminent work, Leviathan, about the relationship between the individual and the government during that period. Hobbes was a scholar, phauthoilosopher, and the author of several works on political and religious philosophy.

Introduction
Author's Introduction
The First Part/Of Man
Of Sense
Of Imagination
Of the Consequence or Train of Imaginations
Of Speech
Of Reason and Science
Of the Interior Beginnings of Voluntary Motions, commonly called the Passions; and the Speeches by which they are expressed
Of the Ends or Resolutions of Discourse
Of the Virtues, commonly called Intellectual; and their contrary Defects
Of the Several Subjects of Knowledge
Of Power, Worth, Dignity, Honour, and Worthiness
Of the Difference of Manners
Of Religion
Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as concerning their Felicity and Misery
Of the First and Second Natural Laws, and of Contracts
Of other Laws of Nature
Of Persons, Authors, and Things PersonatedThe Second Part /Of Commonwealth
Of the Causes, Generation, and Definition of a Commonwealth
Of the Rights of Sovereigns by Institution
Of the several kinds of Commonwealth by Institution; and of Succession to the Sovereign Power
Of Dominion Paternal, and Despotical
Of the Liberty of Subjects
Of Systems Subject, Political, and Private
Of the Public Ministers of Sovereign Power
Of the Nutrition, and Procreation of a Commonwealth
Of Counsel
Of Civil Laws
Of Crimes, Excuses, and Extenuations
Of Punishments, and Rewards
Of those things that weaken, or tend to the Dissolution of a Commonwealth
Of the Office of the Sovereign Representative
Of the Kingdom of God by NatureThe Third Part /Of a Christian Commonwealth
Of the Principles of Christian Politics
Of the Number, Antiquity, Scope, Authority, and Interpreters of the Books of Holy Scripture
Of the Signification of Spirit, Angel, and Inspiration, in the Books of Holy Scripture
Of the Signification in Scripture of the Kingdom of God, of Holy, Sacred, and Sacrament
Of the Word of God, and of Prophets
Of Miracles, and their Use
Of the Signification in Scripture of Eternal Life, Hell, Salvation, the World to Come, and Redemption
Of the Signification in Scripture of the word Church
Of the Rights of the Kingdom of God, in Abraham, Moses, the High-Priests, and the Kings of Judah
Of the Office of Our Blessed Saviour
Of Power Ecclesiastical
Of what is Necessary for a Man's Reception into the Kingdom of HeavenThe Fourth Part /Of the Kingdom of Darkness
Of Spiritual Darkness, from Misinterpretation of Scripture
Of Demonology, and other Relics of the Religion of the Gentiles
Of Darkness from Vain Philosophy, and Fabulous Traditions
Of the Benefit that proceedeth from such Darkness; and to whom it accrueth
A Review, and
Conclusion
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Excerpts

Chapter 1 Of SenseSense. Concerning the thoughts of man, I will consider them first singly, and afterwards in train, or dependence upon one another. Singly, they are every one arepresentationorappearance, of some quality, or other accident of a body without us, which is commonly called anobject. Which object worketh on the eyes, ears, and other parts of a man's body; and by diversity of working, produceth diversity of appearances.The original of them all, is that which we call SENSE , for there is no conception in a man's mind, which hath not at first, totally, or by parts, been begotten upon the organs of sense. The rest are derived from that original.To know the natural cause of sense, is not very necessary to the business now in hand; and I have elsewhere written of the same at large. Nevertheless, to fill each part of my present method, I will briefly deliver the same in this place.The cause of sense, is the external body, or object, which presseth the organ proper to each sense, either immediately, as in the taste and touch; or mediately, as in seeing, hearing, and smelling; which pressure, by the mediation of the nerves, and other strings and membranes of the body, continued inwards to the brain and heart, causeth there a resistance, or counter-pressure, or endeavour of the heart to deliver itself, which endeavour, becauseoutward, seemeth to be some matter without. And thisseeming, orfancy, is that which men callsense; and consisteth, as to the eye, in alight, orcolour figured; to the ear, in asound; to the nostril, in anodour; to the tongue and palate, in asavour; and to the rest of the body, inheat, cold, hardness, softness, and such other qualities as we discern by feeling. All which qualities, calledsensible, are in the object, that causeth them, but so many several motions of the matter, by which it presseth our organs diversely. Neither in us that are pressed, are they any thing else, but divers motions; for motion produceth nothing but motion. But their appearance to us is fancy, the same waking, that dreaming. And as pressing, rubbing, or striking the eye, makes us fancy a light; and pressing the ear, produceth a din; so do the bodies also we see, or hear, produce the same by their strong, though unobserved action. For if these colours and sounds were in the bodies, or objects that cause them, they could not be severed from them, as by glasses, and in echoes by reflection, we see they are; where we know the thing we see is in one place, the appearance in another. And though at some certain distance, the real and very object seem invested with the fancy it begets in us; yet the object is one thing, the image or fancy is another. So that sense, in all cases, is nothing else but original fancy, caused, as I have said, by the pressure, that is, by the motion, of external things upon our eyes, ears, and other organs thereunto ordained.But the philosophy-schools, through all the universities of Christendom, grounded upon certain texts of Aristotle, teach another doctrine, and say, for the cause ofvision, that the thing seen, sendeth forth on every side avisible species, in English, avisible show, apparition,oraspect, or abeing seen; the receiving whereof into the eye, isseeing. And for the cause ofhearing, that the thing heard, sendeth forth anaudible species, that is anaudible aspect, oraudible being seen; which entering at the ear, makethhearing. Nay, for the cause of understanding also, they say the thing understood, sendeth forth anintelligible species, that is, anintelligible being seen; which, coming into the understanding, makes us understand. I say not this, as disproving the use of universities; but because I am to speak hereafter of their office in a common