With an Introduction by Dr Richard Serjeantson, Trinity College, Cambridge
Since its first publication in 1651, Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan has been recognised as one of the most compelling, and most controversial, works of political philosophy written in English. Forged in the crucible of the civil and religious warfare of the mid-seventeenth century, it proposes a political theory that combines an unequivocal commitment to natural human liberty with the conviction that the sovereign power of government must be exercised absolutely. Leviathan begins from some...
With an Introduction by Dr Richard Serjeantson, Trinity College, Cambridge
Since its first publication in 1651, Thomas Hobbe...
"During the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre" Written during the turmoil of the English Civil War, Leviathan is an ambitious and highly original work of political philosophy. Claiming that man's essential nature is competitive and selfish, Hobbes formulates the case for a powerful sovereign--or "Leviathan"--to enforce peace and the law, substituting security for the anarchic freedom he believed human beings would otherwise experience. This worldview shocked many of Hobbes's contemporaries, and his...
"During the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre" Written during ...