Tao Te Ching
Thomas Hobbes
1588 – 1679 CE
Secretary, student, friend to Francis Bacon; Hobbes established the foundation for most modern political philosophy. Formulating social contract theory, he promoted individual rights, natural equality, government based on the will of the people, only representative government as legitimate, and the freedom to do anything that laws don’t forbid. He described human nature as “self-interested cooperation” and introduced mathematical reasoning to the philosophy of science. Though called “the father of totalitarianism” and fixated on peace and order, his radical shift from religion and belief to applying science for understanding human nature helped undermine that same “order” creating more personal, political freedom.
Eras
Sources
Unlisted Sources
Philosophical Rudiments (1651)
Quotes by Thomas Hobbes (16 quotes)
“Only the present has a right to exist because the past is only a memory and the future has no existence. ”
Chapters:
40. Returning
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“Happiness comes from prospering, not in having prospered”
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“Reducing democracy to ‘government by the best orator,’ political rallies and popular assemblies are as subject to evil counsel and the seduction by orators as a monarch by flatters.”
from Leviathan
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“He that is to govern a whole nation must read in himself, not this or that particular man; but mankind itself.”
from Leviathan
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“Hell is truth seen too late.”
from Leviathan
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“It can never be that war shall preserve life, and peace destroy it.”
from Leviathan
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“Words are the counters of wise men, and the money of fools.”
from Leviathan
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“Wisdom is acquired, not by reading books, but but by reading people.”
from Leviathan
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“The nature of justice consists in the keeping of valid covenants… Where there is no Commonwealth, there is nothing unjust.”
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“Intemperance is naturally punished with disease, injustice with the violence of enemies, cowardice with oppression”
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“In the nature of man we find three main causes of conflict: competition, diffidence, and the lust for approval.”
from Leviathan
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“In the first place, I put for a general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ends only in death.”
from Leviathan
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“Curiosity—the desire to know why and how—is a lust of the mind that exceeds the short vehemence of any carnal pleasure.”
from Leviathan
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“Justice, equity, modesty, mercy—doing to others as we would be done to—are contrary to our natural passions that carry us to partiality, pride, revenge, and the like.”
from Leviathan
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“By art is created that great Leviathan, called a Commonwealth or State—which is but an artificial man.”
from Leviathan
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“The origination of all great and lasting societies consisted not in the mutual good will men had toward each other, but in the mutual fear they had of each other.”
from Philosophical Rudiments (1651)
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Quotes about Thomas Hobbes (1 quotes)
“Hobbes is a philosopher whom it is difficult to classify... He is completely free from superstition... He is clear and logical... he is the first really modern writer on political theory... To occupy his leisure, he wrote, at 84, an autobiography in Latin verse, and published, at 87, a translation of Homer.”
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