England, 1588–1679
Thomas Hobbes
English political philosopher. Leviathan argues that a strong sovereign is the cost of escaping the war of all against all.
Thomas Hobbes in 37 lines
Every Thomas Hobbes passage in thinkr's library, with the theme each one speaks to.
“The life of man is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short — without civic friendship.”
“Curiosity is the lust of the mind.”
“For he that hath strength enough to protect all, wants not sufficiency to oppresse all.”
“But all this language gotten, and augmented by Adam and his posterity, was again lost at the tower of Babel, when by the hand of God, every man was stricken for his rebellion, with an oblivion of his former language.”
“A naturall foole that could never learn by heart the order of numerall words, as one, two, and three, may observe every stroak of the Clock, and nod to it, or say one, one, one; but can never know what houre it strikes.”
“But this priviledge, is allayed by another; and that is, by the priviledge of Absurdity; to which no living creature is subject, but man only.”
“But Aversion wee have for things, not only which we know have hurt us; but also that we do not know whether they will hurt us, or not.”
“For Appetite with an opinion of attaining, is called HOPE.”
“And Beasts that have Deliberation, must necessarily also have Will.”
“For there is no such thing as perpetual Tranquility of mind, while we live here; because Life it selfe is but Motion, and can never be without Desire, nor without Feare, no more than without Sense.”
“Of all Discourse, governed by desire of Knowledge, there is at last an End, either by attaining, or by giving over.”
“The secret thoughts of a man run over all things, holy, prophane, clean, obscene, grave, and light, without shame, or blame…”
“The Register of Knowledge of Fact is called History.”
“And as in other things, so in men, not the seller, but the buyer determines the Price.”
“And this Feare of things invisible, is the naturall Seed of that, which every one in himself calleth Religion; and in them that worship, or feare that Power otherwise than they do, Superstition.”
“For Prudence, is but Experience; which equal time, equally bestows on all men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto.”
“Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that conditions called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man.”
“As first a man cannot lay down the right of resisting them, that assault him by force, to take away his life; because he cannot be understood to ayme thereby, at any Good to himself.”
“A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is always voyd.”
“Men looke not at the greatnesse of the evill past, but the greatnesse of the good to follow.”
“From whence it follows, that were the publique and private interest are most closely united, there is the publique most advanced.”
“No man is bound by the words themselves, either to kill himselfe, or any other man.”
“For all uniting of strength by private men, is, if for evil intent, unjust; if for intent unknown, dangerous to the Publique, and unjustly concealed.”
“For naturall Bloud is in like manner made of the fruits of the Earth; and circulating, nourisheth by the way, every Member of the Body of Man.”
“No man's error becomes his own Law; nor obliges him to persist in it.”
“So that every Crime is a sinne; but not every sinne a Crime.”
“The source of every Crime, is some defect of the Understanding; or some error in Reasoning, or some sudden force of the Passions. Defect in the Understanding, is Ignorance; in Reasoning, Erroneous Opinion.”
“Fact be vertuous, or vicious, as Fortune pleaseth;”
“As also the great number of Corporations; which are as it were many lesser Common-wealths in the bowels of a greater, like wormes in the entrayles of a natural man.”
“And when all the world is overcharged with Inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is Warre, which provideth for every man, by Victory or Death.”
“Power as is really divided, and as dangerously to all purposes, by sharing with another an Indirect Power, as a Direct one.”
“Christian Kings may erre in deducing a Consequence, but who shall Judge?”
“But if it bee well considered, The praise of Ancient Authors, proceeds not from the reverence of the Dead, but from the competition and mutual envy of the Living.”
“For such Truth as opposeth no man's profit nor pleasure is to all men welcome.”
“To understand this for sense it is not required that a man should be a geometrician or a logician, but that he should be mad.”
“The thoughts are to the desires, as scouts and spies, to range abroad and find the way to the thing desired.”
“Now I am about to take my last voyage, a great leap in the dark.”
Where Thomas Hobbes lands on a hard choice
Quotation is the easy part. The harder test is what a position does when it meets a situation where every option costs something.
You notice a loophole that benefits you and hurts no one visibly.
You are suspicious of moral theater and alert to how systems really work. The risk is becoming clever at the expense of character.
Your workplace rewards a version of you that feels false.
You are acknowledging that institutions run on roles and incentives. The danger is becoming unable to find your own face afterward.
More money would help, but the chase is changing your days.
You are recognizing that resources can widen choice. The danger is letting means quietly become the master end.
A rule you must follow is unjust, and breaking it costs almost nothing.
You are protecting the habit of lawfulness that larger justice depends on. The risk is obedience that never finds its limit.
You are paid more than someone who does more than you.
You are declining responsibility for a mechanism you did not build. The cost is a reasoning that will excuse anything it produces.
Lessons that quote Thomas Hobbes
- The State of Nature — Life before government
Reading Thomas Hobbes today
Thomas Hobbes wrote in 1588–1679, from England — a world with different assumptions about authority, death and what a life is for. That distance is useful rather than a problem: it is what lets the ideas cut against assumptions you did not know you were making.
In thinkr, Thomas Hobbes is one of 44 thinkers you can put a real question to, and the answers come back in that thinker's own voice and commitments rather than as a neutral summary. The 37 passages above are what the app draws on.
Working at roughly the same time
- Baruch Spinoza — Netherlands, 1632–1677
- David Hume — Scotland, 1711–1776
- Immanuel Kant — Prussia, 1724–1804
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau — Switzerland/France, 1712–1778
- John Locke — England, 1632–1704
- René Descartes — France, 1596–1650
Argues the same cases
David Hume, Confucius, John Locke, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Epictetus take positions on the same dilemmas as Thomas Hobbes, which is usually where the disagreements become concrete.