Leviathan

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OXFORD WORLD'S CLASSICS

THOMAS HOBBES

Leviathan Edited with an Introduction and Notes by

]. C. A. GASKIN

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

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J.ibrary of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Hobbes, Thomas, 1588-l6j9. Lc\"iathan/Thnmas Hobbes; edited with an introduction by ). C. :\. Gaskin. (Oxford world's classics) Includes bibliographical refCrenccs and index. 1. Political science-Early works to 18nO. 2. State, The. I. Gaskin, J. C. :\. Uohn Charle Addison). II. Title. 111. Series. JC153.H65 1996 320.1-ddO 95-40506

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OXFORD WORLD'S CLASSICS

LEVIATHAN THOMAS HoBBES was born near Malmesbury in Wiltshire in 1588. Well taught in local schools and, from his own reports, ill taught at Oxford, he was employed as tutor and secretary by the Cavendish family for much of his life. His three tours of the Continent before 1640 introduced him to the new learning of Galileo and others, and established the connet:tions necessary for his sojourn in Paris, 164o-51, during the English Civil Wars. His first substantial original work was The Elements of Law (1640). Its arguments concerning nature, man, and society were redeployed and extended in De Give (1642), his masterpiece Leviathan (1651), and De Corpore (1655), as well as in numerous other fiercely controversial publications. Popularly condemned for his political philosophy, his analysis of morality, and his 'atheism', his works were nevertheless widely read in England and Europe. After the Restoration in 166o he survived his own notoriety under the protection of Charles II and the Earl of Devonshire. He died at Hardwick Hall in 1679, his character as a philosopher almost universally denigrated; his character as a man able to attract the kindness and friendship of almost all who knew him. jOHN GASKIN is the Professor of Naturalistic Philosophy and Head of the Department of Philosophy in the University of Dublin. He is also a Fellow of Trinity College Dublin. A graduate of Oxford University, his publications include The Quest for Eternity (1984), Hume 's Philosophy of Religion ( 1988 and 1993), and Varieties of Unbelief (1989). He has previously edited a volume of David Hume's works on religion and Hobbes's The Elements of Law for Oxford World's Classics. His latest publication is The Epicurean Philosophers (1995), which includes translations of the complete works of Epicurus and Lucretius.

PREFACE No one can pretend that editions of Leviathan are now few or hard to locate. But they often represent editorial extremes. One extreme retains antique spelling, every odd use of italics or capital letters, and even the curiosities of seventeenth-century typography. The other extreme changes italics, punctuation, paragraph lengths, and in short anything (except the order of the words themselves) which the editor thinks will make the text easier to read according to the fashion of the moment. The normal reader will surely look for something between these extremes: something which reproduces as faithfully as possible what Hobbes actually sanctioned for publication, but without the accidental impediments which play no part in what Hobbes meant or what he wished to be read. I have attempted to provide such a text. It is free from antique spellings and printing conventions which had no significance even in the seventeenth century. It is authentic and complete in all other respects. The notes-philosophical, textual, historical, and biographical-offer information if it is wanted. They make a special effort to indicate where the thought and arguments of Leviathan may be followed in other of Hobbes's major philosophical works. The Introduction takes up some of the more obvious issues raised by Leviathan without attempting any grand assessment. A great philosophical text should be read with the new eyes of each generation, sharpened by relevant information, not directed by old judgements. The judgements and the overviews can be built into the picture later. The excitement of the ideas must come first. To facilitate references to and within the text I have inserted a new run of paragraph numbers for each chapter, as Hobbes himself did in his other main philosophical works. For the same reason I have put the page numbers of the original 1651 edition in the margins: a mode of reference used by a number of commentators. All the editorial material is new with the exception of two notes and parts of five paragraphs which are adapted from similar material in my World's Classics edition of The Elements of Law (Human Nature and De Corpore Politico). I am grateful to the work done by Richard Tuck in recording in his edition of Leviathan the variants in the large paper copies. As explained in the Note on the Text, these are incorporated into the present edition. I would like to express my indebtedness to my editor, Judith Luna, for v

PREFACE

her patience and encouragement, and to William Lyons for his friendly advice and generous help. I would further like to express my gratitude to Trinity College Dublin, for awarding me a grant from the Arts and Social Sciences Benefactions Fund to enable m.e to undertake some of the work required, to Marsh's Library for allowing me access to their copies of the Head edition, and finally again to Trinity College for granting me sabbatical leave to bring this book to a conclusion. JOHN GASKIN

VI

CONTENTS A Scheme of Reference

IX

Introduction

XI

xliv

A Note on the Text Select Bibliography

!iii

Chronology

LEVIATHAN The Epistle Dedicatory

3

The Contents of the Chapters

5

The Introduction

7

Part

I. OF MAN

Part

2.

9

OF COMMONWEALTH

III

Part 3·

OF A CHRISTIAN COMMONWEALTH

247

Part 4·

OF THE KINGDOM OF DARKNESS

403

467

A Review, and Conclusion Explanatory Notes

477

Index of Subjects

501

Vll

A SCHEME OF REFERENCE Elements of Law

The Elements of Law Natural and Politic (I64o), Part I Human Nature, Part II De Corpore Politico, ed.

]. C. A. Gaskin (World's Classics, I994). Philosophical Rudiments concerning Government and Society (I65I), the English version of the Latin De Cive (I64z), ed. Howard Warrender (Oxford, I983). Spelling has been modernized in quotations cited. Leviathan Leviathan, or The Matter, Form, and Power ofa Commonwealth Ecclesiastical and Civil (I65I). De Corpore Elements of Philosophy, the First Section concerning Body (I656), the English version of the Latin De Corpore (I 655). Quotations are from the first volume of the English Works of Thomas Hobbes, ed. W. Molesworth (London, I839). White's De Mundo Examined Thomas White's De Mundo Examined(written c. I64I) translated from the Latin by H. W. Jones and first published I976 (Bradford University Press). De Cive

In all the above editions Hobbes or his editors have numbered the chapters in a single run of numbers from start to finish ignoring the Parts. Except in the case of Leviathan (where they are supplied in the present text), Hobbes also numbered the paragraphs or 'articles' in each chapter. This provides a convenient and brief method of reference to the works. Thus, for example, De Give, X. 6, means chapter X, paragraph 6. Until the Clarendon Edition ofthe Works ofThomas Hobbes is completed, other works of his must still be referred to in the English Works of Thomas Hobbes, ed. W. Molesworth, I I vols. (London, I839). For short reference, English Works, followed by volume and page.

IX

INTRODUCTION THE memorable vividness of language, the sustained interconnections of argument, the insistent logic, the vast scale of the structure, and the learning and mental power required to sustain it all: these never fail in Leviathan. The result is one of the most powerful, influential, and eagerly refuted books ever written, and the only work in English on political philosophy that ranks with Plato, Aristotle, Hegel, and Marx.

Education, Influences, and Outcomes Thomas Hobbes was born on 5 April 1588 at Westport, adjoining Malmesbury in Wiltshire, where his father was parson-a man who 'disesteemed learning ... as not knowing the sweetness of it' 1-and who vanished early from the scene after assaulting one of his parishioners. His brother, Francis Hobbes, a wealthy glover without children of his own, thus assumed responsibility in loco parentis for the costs of young Thomas's education. At the age of 4 Hobbes went to Westport Church School, and at 8 to a private school at Malmesbury, where, according to his biographer Aubrey, he became proficient in Greek and Latin under the instruction of 'a good Graecian ... the first that came into our parts hereabout since the Reformation'. In early 1603 he matriculated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford (the buildings are now part of Magdalen College) and there acquired the lifelong distaste for universities which surfaces not infrequently in Leviathan and in his polemical disputes with academics. Poised between the outmoded fashion for burning heretics, and the minor vindictiveness of refusing honorary degrees, Oxford belatedly vent its anger upon Hobbes in 1683 by ordering copies of De Give and Leviathan to be burnt along with other 'Pernicious Books and Damnable Doctrines' on account of their being 'Heretical and Blasphemous, infamous to Christian Religion, and destructive of all Government in Church and State'. 2 But, academic animosities apart, Oxford in the first decade of the seventeenth century 1 This, and many other charming details about Hobbes's character and life, can be found in John Aubrey's 'Brief Life'. This life, together with translations of Hobbes's own 'Prose Life' and 'Verse Life' (both originally written in Latin) can be found in the World's Classics edition of The Elements of Law (Human Nature and De Corpore Politico), Oxford, 1994. ' The Judgement and Decree of the University of Oxford Past in their Convocation (Oxford, 1683). Q!Ioted inS. I. Mintz, The Hunting of Leviathan (Cambridge, 1969).

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indeed seems to have had little to commend it. Its intellectual enterprise was, according to Hobbes, jejune scholastic logic and useless Aristotelian physics. As usual, its students were prone to drunken brawling; less usually, its politics sheltered both Papal and Puritan sedition. Anthony Wood records that in 16o8, just after Hobbes went down, 'a young forward bachelor' was disciplined for maintaining 'that it was lawful for a subject, in cause of religion, to forsake his prince, and take up arms against him'; 3 a principle that was to cast a long and destructive shadow over seventeenth-century life and politics. In early 1608 Hobbes graduated BA, having for no ascertainable reason spent one more than the then normal four years at the University. At the same time he was recommended by the Principal of Magdalen Hall to Sir William Cavendish (created Earl of Devonshire in 1618) as tutor and travelling companion to his eldest son. Although his employment was interrupted by force of circumstances on several occasions, Hobbes was eventually to sever his connections with the Cavendish family only under the force of final circumstances when he died at Hardwick Hall on 4 December 1679. In the thirty years after 16o8, Hobbes published nothing but a translation of Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War. It is strange to speak of the formative years of a man's life as being between the ages of 20 and 52, but so it was with Hobbes. Before 1640 he had probably written no original work.+ Between 1640 and his death, his philosophical works in English fill seven massive volumes in the Molesworth edition, and these of course do not include original Latin works like De Homine and the unpublished White's De Mundo Examined (see Scheme of Reference, p. ix). But the grounds for this extraordinary late flowering were being prepared throughout what, for Hobbes, counted as his long youth. The biographical chronology is somewhat difficult to establish, and the personal details are fragmentary, but the preparation clearly included Hobbes's knowledge and experience of the forces and events which led to the outbreak of civil war in 1642, together with a number of intellectual stimuli encountered piecemeal in his reading and travels. Throughout the period 1603 (when the United Kingdom of England 3 Q!loted in George Croom Robertson, Hobbes (Edinburgh and London, 1886), 5· Even in 1995, this is still the only reasonably extensive compilation of information about Hobbes's life. ' A possible exception is the semi-Aristotelian 'Short Tract on First Principles', maybe written by Hobbes about 1630 and first published in 1889 as an Appendix to F. Tiinnies's edition of The Elements of Law.

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and Scotland was established at the accession of James I) to 1642 (when civil war finally broke out between Charles I and the rebellious parliamentarians) civil society was increasingly threatened by claims that private consciences in matters of religion could absolve a man from his legal obligations to a sovereign, by Roman and Presbyterian claims to authority which could override the secular powers in a body politic, and by conflicts between king and parliament concerning the right to raise taxes, the government of the Church (and what sort of Church), the direction of foreign policy, and other constitutional matters. The common consent of historians is that James did not have the political abilities and personal authority of his august predecessor, Elizabeth I, and almost from the beginning tensions developed between the high-handed episcopalian king and his ever more puritanical and commercially minded parliaments. But in the new conditions, as Davies observes, it is very doubtful whether even Q\ieen Elizabeth could have succeeded, for both these sovereigns regarded parliament as an unwelcome and intrusive body that had to be cajoled by occasional concessions into granting much-needed subsidies. Consequently they directed all their efforts to excluding the estates from any share in administration and listened to criticisms only when they either became unusually vehement or when the fiscal situation was especially serious. 5

When this attitude was combined, as it was combined in both James I and Charles I (who succeeded his father in 1625), with a belief that a king had a divine right to govern and, moreover, to govern the established Church as a high Anglican in an increasingly puritanical country, the conditions for conflict with a parliament (whose constitutional lawyers were intent on returning to a supposed time in which Lords and Commons had more authority) were all in place. In 1629 Charles dismissed his parliament and for eleven years ruled by royal prerogative with great care and economy. But in 1640 a need for money to raise an army to contain the rebellion of Presbyterian forces in Scotland obliged him to summon a parliament, the 'Short Parliament'. It sat in May 1640. The king could get nothing from it but unacceptable demands, and it was speedily dissolved. But the king's financial plight was now so serious that another parliament had to be called. In November 1640 the anti-Royalist Long Parliament met for the first time. The increasingly desperate move and counter-move of king and Commons over the next eighteen months precipitated the now virtually inevitable civil war. 5

Godfrey Davies, The Early Stuarts I60]-I66o (Oxford, 1959), 15. XIII

INTRODUCTION

Separated by religious, constitutional, social, and economic differences, Royalists and Parliamentarians fought it out over four years. The issue was defeat for the Royalists. The king surrendered to the Scots in May 1646. In 1649 he was executed in London. After what was in effect a second civil war, 1648-51, in which Cromwell's army suppressed rebellions in Scotland and Ireland and Royalist risings in Wales, Cromwell became Lord Protector. In 166o, after the death of Cromwell, Charles II was restored as king by general agreement. It is virtually certain that Hobbes became aware of the acute political dangers inherent in combining constitutional problems with dogmatic and divisive religious convictions while he was still at Oxford. It is a fact indisputable that sixty years later, in Behemoth or The History ofthe Causes ofthe Civil Wars ofEngland, he maintained that 'the core of rebellion ... are the Universities'. The reasons he gives for this judgement are illuminating: And as the Presbyterians brought with them into their churches their divinity [Calvinism] from the universities, so did many of the gentlemen bring their politics from thence into the Parliament; but neither of them did this very boldly in the time of Queen Elizabeth. And ... certainly the chief leaders were ambitious ministers and ambitious gentlemen; the ministers envying the authority of bishops, whom they thought less learned; and the gentlemen envying the privy-council, whom they thought less wise than themselves. For it is a hard matter for men, who do all think highly of their own wits, when they have also acquired the learning of the university, to be persuaded that they want any ability requisite for the government of a commonwealth, especially having read the glorious histories ... of the ancient popular governments of the Greeks and Romans, amongst whom ... popular government ... passed by the name of liberty. (English Works, vi. 192-3)

What is more, Hobbes's awareness of the dangers in the political situation between 1608 and 1640 was made more acute and immediate by his continuous association with men of considerable power in the state: the Cavendishes, Bacon (who was Lord Chancellor in 1618--Hobbes acted as amanuensis for him in the early 162os), the Earl of Newcastle (another Cavendish), and Sir Gervase Clifton, among others. The political fears and dangers that formed the background against which Hobbes began to write in 1640 are a matter of history. The intellectual background is less accessible, but at least five special influences can be identified. They are: 1. Particularly prior to 1628, when Hobbes's 'young master' died (by then the second Earl of Devonshire), Hobbes had the unusual advantage of free access to the libraries at the great houses of the Cavendishes, Chatsworth and Hardwick Hall. As Hobbes wrote in 1629 in the dedicatXIV

INTRODUCTION

ory letter to his Thucydides, addressed to the third Earl, then only 10 years old, 'For by the experience of many years ... I have this: there was not any, who more really ... favoured those that studied the liberal arts more liberally, than my Lord your father did; nor in whose house, a man should less need the university than in his.' 2. When Hobbes went down from Oxford, he was competent in Latin and Greek. Within a few years, by his own admission, he had become rusty as a consequence of attending to the social affairs of his employers. Some time about 1616 he set about repairing his knowledge. As a result he became able to communicate accurately and with sophistication in the common language of European learning, Latin. His first work published on the Continent, De Give, and much of his correspondence in the 164os were in that language. His recovery of an expert command of Greek-then a rare accomplishment-shows itself in his distinguished translation of Thucydides published in 1629. 3· As his subsequent references show, Thucydides provided an enduring lesson for Hobbes. The lesson was that Athenian democracy was ultimately incapable of imposing the unity of organization and the continuity of purpose required for the successful prosecution of policies needed for the long-term preservation of the commonwealth; democracy was not a bad, but an inefficient species of sovereign power. 4· Hobbes enjoyed a belated but influential encounter (in about 1628 if Aubrey is correct) with the geometry of Euclid; an encounter which not only led him to a sometimes disastrously misguided practice of the skill, but much more importantly drew his attention to the use of definitions in rigorous argument. In Leviathan he was to call geometry 'the only science that it hath pleased God hitherto to bestow on mankind' (IV. 12; see also V. 7). Be that as it may, geometry was, and remained until the middle of the nineteenth century, the paradigm for deductive probity. 5· It is possible that Hobbes left Oxford with some unfocused awareness that traditional academic instruction was worthless in relation to the new ideas that were appearing on the Continent. It is certain that three extensive visits to Europe with his noble charges (I6IO-c.1615, 1629-30, and 1634-6) not only gave him a fluent knowledge of French and some ability in Italian, but also established his unbounded enthusiasm for optics and for the new science of motion. In his travels he met and talked with Galileo and Gassendi, and through friendship with Marin Mersenne established the intellectual connections that were to be so valuable during his long residence in Paris in the 164os. His encounter with questions about the mechanical nature of sensation was particularly influential. According XV

INTRODUCTION

to his own report, written in the third person in 'The Prose Life' (1676), this took place in Paris during his sojourn in 1636/7 when he was there as mentor to the third Earl of Devonshire: When he became aware of the variety of movement contained in the natural world, he first inquired as to the nature of these motions, to determine the ways in which they might effect the senses, the intellect, the imagination, together with the other natural properties. He communicated his findings on a daily basis to the Reverend Father Marin Mersenne, of the Order of the Minim Brothers, a scholar who was venerated as an outstanding exponent of all branches of philosophy.

Out of this crucible of influences and skills-acute awareness of political dangers, access to learned men and great libraries, travel, skill in Latin and Greek, the warnings ofThucydides, addiction to geometry and fascination with optics, mechanics, and contemporary theories of sensationemerged, in 1640, Hobbes's first original work, The Elements ofLaw Natural and Politic. It was initially circulated in a number of manuscript copies and eventually printed in 1650 as two separate volumes, Human Nature and De Corpore Politico. At the end of 1640 Hobbes fled to Paris to avoid the impending civil strife in England, and in fear lest the Elements of Law might put him in danger from the warring parties. For although its immediate implication would have been support for the king, it gave final legitimacy to any de facto government. In Paris, and in the stimulating company of Mersenne, Gassendi, eventually Descartes, and others in Mersenne's salon, Hobbes's philosophical writings grew rapidly. In 1642 De Give appeared in Paris (two further Latin editions were published in Amsterdam in 1647, and the English version in London in 1651). In 1646 he was working on De Corpore, although it was not to be published until 1655. In the same year he became tutor in mathematicspolitics were expressly excluded from his brief-to the future Charles II, then sheltering in Paris. The following summer he suffered a serious illness from which dates the palsy which eventually compelled him to make use of an amanuensis in all his writing. Despite this, Leviathan was written in Paris between about 1648 and 1651. The exact commencement and conclusion of the activity cannot be ascertained. But John Aubrey's account of a typical day's work in his later years could easily describe the way Leviathan was written: He rose about seven, had his breakfast of bread and butter; and took his walk, meditating till ten; then he did put down the minute of his thoughts, which he penned in the afternoon ... He was never idle; his thoughts were always XVI

INTRODUCTION

working ... His dinner was provided for him exactly by eleven ... After dinner he took a pipe of tobacco, and then threw himself immediately on his bed ... and took a nap of about half an hour. In the afternoon he penned his morning thoughts.

Leviathan was published in London in 1651, probably in May, and Hobbes returned to his own country, this time to stay, early in the following year. The return was not entirely what he might have chosen in other circumstances despite being, as he said, minded to go home after so long a sojourn abroad. But Leviathan had offended the Royalists in Paris on account of its 'atheism' and the political ambiguity already noticed in The Elements of Law. It also antagonized the French clerical authorities because of its unsparing attack upon the political claims of the Roman Church. Hobbes felt unsafe. In London, after a wretched journey from France, he made his submission to the Council of State and resumed private life, mainly in the capital, pouring out vigorously controversial works on liberty and necessity, mathematics, Boyle's scientific method, physics (De Corpore), human nature (De Homine), histories, books on law, and latterly translations of Homer. For all his reputed disputatiousness and refusal to admit himself wrong, even when manifestly in error, and despite the violent attacks provoked by the supposed irreligion, moral subversion, and ambiguous political allegiance of Leviathan, Hobbes was a man much befriended by the good and the great. Clarendon liked him despite attacking his ideas. Charles II treated him with a bemused and protective affection once he was king. Aubrey revered him. The Cavendish family befriended him almost throughout his long life. In 1675 Hobbes was still mainly resident in London. But he was 87 years old, and while most of his critics thought it time he departed to a much hotter world, he himself chose merely to retire to a better one in Derbyshire. At Chatsworth he was cherished and sustained by the Cavendish family. In October 1679 he suffered a strangury-a retention ofurine-'1 shall be glad then to find a hole to creep out of the world at.' On about 28 November he suffered a stroke. He died on 4 December at the great age of 91. A broadsheet which circulated in London after his death concluded: Ninety years' eating and immortal Jobs Here MATTER lies, and there's an end of Hobbes!

But it was not. Despite the hostility of politicians, despite angry refutations by countless6 books and pamphlets, and despite the Convocation of Oxford 6 Not exactly countless. S. I. Mintz, in his outstanding monograph The Hunting of Leviathan, identifies I 07 up to the end of the century.

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University, neither ballad-makers, nor divines, nor academics, nor politicians could bury the ideas as nature had ultimately buried the man. The Grand Design in Three Parts

At some time in the early r64os, possibly as early as the writing of The Elements ofLaw (which reads like a first mapping of the ideas), Hobbes had conceived a vast design for a systematic account of science and philosophy: a basic or first philosophy (essentially materialism), a natural science (mainly the mechanics of moving bodies), and a human physiology and psychology (based on the mechanics) leading to a moral and political philosophy. In short it was to be an account of'body natural' leading to an account of what in The Elements he calls 'body politic' or, more famously, to an account of the 'artificial man' which is Leviathan. 7 The idea for such a comprehensive philosophy was first announced in De Give, in the Latin 'Preface to the Reader' which Hobbes added in the Amsterdam edition of 1647. In the words of the English version of 1651: I was studying Philosophy for my mind's sake, and I had gathered together its first Elements in all kinds, and having digested them into three Sections by degrees, I thought to have written them so as in the first I would have treated of a body, and its general properties; in the second of man and his special faculties, and affections; in the third, of civil government and the duties of Subjects: Wherefore the first Section would have contained the first Philosophy, and certain elements of Physics; in it we would have considered the reasons of Time, Place, Cause, Power, Relation, Proportion, Quantity, Figure and motion. In the second we would have been conversant about imagination, Memory, intellect, ratiocination, appetite, will, good and evil, honest and dishonest, and the like.

The third section is De Give itself. Part of Hobbes's summary of it in the Preface is also a description of what had already been his main concerns in the chapters XIV-XXIX of The Elements of Law and what, with many additions, would be his central concern in Leviathan. In the words of the De Give Preface: I demonstrate in the first place, that the state of men without civil society (which state we may properly call the state of nature) is nothing else but a mere war of all against all; and in that war all men have equal right unto all things; Next, that all men as soon as they arrive to understanding of this hateful condition, do desire (even nature itself compelling them) to be freed from this misery. But that this 7 Leviathan is the name of the text. 'Leviathan' is Hobbes's name for the organic structure which is the sovereign power and people together. The name is full of associations. See note to p. 7 of the text.

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cannot be done except by compact, they all quit that right which they have unto all things. Furthermore I declare, and confirm what the nature of compacts is; how and by what means the right of one might be transferred unto another to make their compacts valid; also what rights, and to whom they must necessarily be granted for the establishing of Peace, I mean what those dictates of reason are, which may properly be termed the Laws of Nature.

In De Corpore, I. 9, a part of the work written about the same time as the Preface to De Give, but not published until 1655, Hobbes describes a very similar progression of philosophy and science, but in different terms: The principal parts of philosophy are two. For two chief kinds of bodies, and very different from one another, offer themselves to such as search after their generation and properties; one whereof being the work of nature, is called a natural body, the other is called a commonwealth, and is made by the wills and agreement of men. And from these spring the two parts of philosophy, called natural and civil. But seeing that, for the knowledge of the properties of a commonwealth, it is necessary first to know the dispositions, affections, and the manners of men, civil philosophy is again commonly divided into two parts, whereof one, which treats of men's dispositions and manners, is called ethics; and the other, which takes cognizance of their civil duties, is called politics, or simply civil philosophy. In the first place, therefore (after I have set down such premises as appertain to the nature of philosophy in general), I will discourse of bodies natural; in the second, of the dispositions and manners of men; and in the third, of the civil duties of subjects.

From this outline it will be evident that even if Hobbes had never written Leviathan, much of its content would have been conveyed in one way or another by his other works, particularly if The Elements ofLaw and De Give are read as a whole. What Hobbes did in Leviathan, under the pressure of urgent concern about the civil and religious wars in England, was to produce a brilliant additional statement of his ideas, complete in itself, but sustained by the substructure of his philosophical system. 8 The focus of 8 Hobbes did complete his systematic 'three sections' of philosophy, but not in their logical order. Taking the proposed logical order as a pattern, his publications, including Leviathan, complete it as follows: FIRST PHILOSOPHY, (a) philosophy in general: Elements ofLaw, chs. I-VI; De Corpore, chs. I-VI; White's De Mundo Examined, chs. I and XXX (not published until 1976), Leviathan, IV. (b) BODY or BODY NATURAL: De Corpore, chs. VII-XXX, with numerous sections concerning mathematics and geometry. (The account of body natural is largely taken for granted in Leviathan.) MAN: Elements of Law, chs. VII-XIII; De Romine (which also includes much material on optics), Leviathan, VI-XI. COMMONWEALTH or BODY POLITIC (including the thesis that 'man by nature is in a state of war' and the Laws of Nature): Elements of Law, chs. XIV-XXIX; De Give, chs. I-XIV, Leviathan, XII-XXXI. Matters arising, (a) because woven into the fabric of the body politic,

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INTRODUCTION

attention of the new work was an analysis of the breakdown in civil society, and the construction of a political philosophy that would obviate the causes of such a breakdown.

The Structure of Leviathan The main outline of Hobbes's thesis in Leviathan can be stated briefly. He states it himself at the end of Part 2 (XXXI. I and s). 9 1t is first argued that human nature is commonly concerned with self-preservation, and with the attaining of whatever each individual holds to be his or her personal and individual good. Given that human nature usually functions in this way, then its unrestrained outcome will be a miserable conflict of isolated individuals, each taking what he can get. Hobbes calls this the 'state of war'. However, human beings have the sagacity to discern what articles of peace (or 'laws of nature') have to be enforced in order to avoid the state of war of each against every man. But it is usually unsafe or disadvantageous for individuals to be bound by these articles unless everyone else is at the same time similarly bound. This binding of all to observe the laws of nature is achieved by a compact in which each gives up the right of nature (to do whatever he or she wants at any given moment) to a sovereign power in a civil society. The sovereign enforces the laws of nature, and all that follows from that. The rest of Leviathan is concerned with defining religious, legal, and constitutional structures which will sustain the sovereign power in a peaceful and secure body politic, rather than lead to the breakdowns Hobbes had experienced. A similar thesis had earlier been set out by Hobbes in The Elements of Law. There is in both books a preliminary attempt to relate a basic mechanic of body and motion to sensation, and sensation to the push-pull of desires and aversions. There is in both a consequential analysis of what unconstrained human beings in fact are, and how they function. There is an account of the state of war: what life would be like if human beings acted in accordance with the natures they really have. There is in both books an account of the rational precepts (or 'laws of nature') we have to adopt if we (or BODY SPIRITUAL): Elements of Law, chs. XI, XXV, and XXVI; De Cive, chs. XV-XVIII, Leviathan, XII, XXXII-XLVII; (b) because a major philosophical dispute arising from the nature of man: LIBERTY and NECESSITY: touched upon in Elements of Law and De Cive, extensively examined in the controversy with Bishop Bramhall Of Liberty and Necessity (1654) and Questions concerning Liberty, Necessity and Chance (1656), touched upon in Leviathan. 9 If a chapter and paragraph reference is given without the title of the work attached, the reference will be to the present text of Leviathan. RELIGION

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INTRODUCTION

are to avoid the state of war. There is an account of how the end, peace, can be attained if each man yields some of his natural freedom to a common power, a sovereign. Finally, but much more extensively in Leviathan, there is an account of how the forces that destroy the body politic can be restrained: particularly the forces of religion. Before examining some ofthe details in this structure, it should be noted that in Leviathan Hobbes virtually takes for granted both a fundamental ontological position, a form of materialism which I shall call 'one-world realism', and a philosophical method which might be called 'argument by definition'.

One-World Realism Hobbes's fundamental ontology is that the constituents of the universe are

'imagined space', that which may be filled, and which appears to be external to us (De Corpore, VII. 2), together with something, body, which is 'that, which having no dependence upon our thought, is coincident or coextended with some part of space', and so fills 'that which some call real space' (De Corpore, VIII. 1). Given this ontology, it is further taken as evident that bodies move, 10 and that they have other related features such as solidity which result in the mechanical communication of motion. Although Hobbes has somewhat greater concern with problems about perception-how the 'external' world relates to each person's 'internal' experience-his fundamental position is essentially the same as the ancient archetype of unified materialism to be found in Democritus and Epicurus. Thus in the 'Letter to Herodotus' Epicurus maintained that: The whole of being consists of bodies and space. For the existence of bodies is everywhere attested by sense itself, and it is upon sensation that reason must rely when it attempts to infer the unknown from the known. And if there were no space (which we call also void, and place, and intangible nature), bodies would have nothing in which to be and through which to move, as they are plainly seen to move. Beyond bodies and space there is nothing which by mental apprehension or on its analogy we can conceive to exist. 11

Hobbes's own emphatic statement of an almost identical position is in

Leviathan, XXXIV. 2, and again in XLVI. 15: 10 The movement Hobbes (and of course Galileo) is concerned with is the reversal of the principle of Aristotle's that bodies are at rest unless something moves them. Hobbes is closer to the Epicurean premiss that everything moves unless something stops the motion. His account of the law of inertia is in De Corpore, VIII. 19. See also Leviathan, II. 2. 11 See John Gaskin (ed.), The Epicurean Philosophers (London and Vermont, 1995), 14. For Lucretius' treatment of the same topic see De Rerum Natura, Book I, lines J2 INTRODUCTION

following had of course other causes, particularly the sudden relaxation of the joyless repression of the Puritans that took place at the Restoration in 166o. But there are examples in Restoration drama of characters who justify their actions in a pseudo-Hobbesian way by reference to their own interests, and regard this as more 'natural', closer to the real nature of human beings, than the pretences of conventional morality could bring them. (Mirabell in Congreve's The Way of the World of 1700 and Horner in Wycherley's The Country Wife are of this type.) Indeed, it could, I think, be argued that the motivation of self-interest, derivable in part from some understandings and many misunderstandings of Hobbes, forms as significant a feature of literature in the period I66o-176o as the motivation of subconscious sexuality does in the literature of the first half of the twentieth century. The philosophical reaction to Hobbes's account of human nature and morality is evident in the greatest writers of the period: Shaftesbury, Butler, Hutcheson, and Hume among others. They all, in different ways, seek to show that human nature is more complex than Hobbes allowed and that self-interest has many facets. It includes the 'original joy' (as Shaftesbury calls it) of doing good to others. It can be short-term and impetuous (and as such is often self-destructive), or cool, considered, and long-term (in which form it is often consistent with the public good). It need not exclude motives of benevolence and sympathy, and so on. 22 Another aspect of Hobbes's morality to which philosophers and theologians took strong exception was his supposed moral relativism. Thus Samuel Clarke and William Wollaston at the beginning of the eighteenth century are much concerned to emphasize the absolute nature of moral rules: morality is not a matter of fashion or subjective decision. But properly understood Hobbes had never said that it was, only that the natural man outside a body politic would act relative to his own decisions about what was good for him. In civil society on the other hand moral laws would be particular formulations of the laws of nature, and the laws of nature are not subjective. They are the articles of peace which are universally applicable because human nature is everywhere the same. As so often with Hobbes, he is criticized (on this occasion as a moral relativist) on account of an incomplete understanding of what he says. In political theory Hobbes once again provoked an adverse reaction, not 22 Useful guides to this area are provided by any of the following selections from the original material: D. H. Monro, A Guide to the British Moralists (London, 1972); D. D. Raphael, British Moralists, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1969); L. A. Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1897 and reprints).

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INTRODUCTION

merely from Royalists who could find no unambiguous endorsement of their views about monarchy in his pages, but from almost all writers in what might loosely be called the democratic tradition. Thus Hegel, who thought well of Hobbes, writing over 150 years later in his Lectures on the History ofPhilosc.phy, observes that 'Society, the state, is to Hobbes absolutely pre-eminent, it is the determining power without appeal as regards law and positive religion and their external relations; and because he placed these in subjection to the state, his doctrines were of course regarded with the utmost horror.' Locke's Two Treatises of Civil Government (169o), although not directly aimed at Hobbes, ably illustrate one anti-Hobbesian thesis in the democratic tradition, namely that bad but constitutionally immovable government may be changed (it had been changed in 1689) and society remain intact: 'There remains still in the People a supreme power to remove or alter the Legislative, when they find the Legislative act contrary to the trust reposed in them.' (The whole of the last chapter of the Second Treatise argues this thesis.) There is no necessary connection, Locke would argue, between the onset of the state of war as Hobbes defined it and a legal change of government (for example by an election or referendum) or even, in very carefully defined circumstances, an illegal change of government. In the middle of the eighteenth century Hume could report that Hobbes was 'much neglected', but his mechanistic psychology, the push-pull of desires and aversions, fitted so well with the ideas of Benthamite utilitarianism that in John Austin's utilitarian account of law as command, The Province of Jurisprudence Determined (1832), Hobbes's account of sovereignty is central to the argument. In the prolix literature of the twentieth century Hobbes has been much fought over by different interpreters. Some idea of the scale of the discussion can be gathered from William Sacksteder's Hobbes Studies (I8JgI979): A Bibliography (Bowling Green, Ohio, 1982) and a short cut to some of its main components can be read in D. D. Raphael's Hobbes: Morals and Politics (London, 1977). But it is since 1945 that Hobbes's account of the state of war has acquired a new and unexpected relevance. As Howard Warrender pointed out in his article on Hobbes in the Encyclopedia Americana, sovereign states now have a relation to each other similar to that which Hobbes attributed to individual men: there is the potential for the war of each against every one, with fear and the balance of power (in precisely Hobbes's sense: 'power simply is no more, but the excess of the power of one above that of another') keeping such peace as there is. As Warrender remarks, 'on Hobbes's assumptions, it would thus be rational xlii

INTRODUCTION

to form a World State' (or, one might add, at the very least a United Nations with sovereign and coercive powers). More recently still, as I have indicated elsewhere in this Introduction, Hobbes's concern with confining and emasculating the political claims of religion, and the public damage that private religious beliefs can inflict, has acquired a new and horribly unwelcome relevance in the world. For us, as for him, it is simply not acceptable that fanatics and self-appointed prophets should enjoy unchallenged claims to philosophical or conscientious grounds for their attempts to subvert by violence the established structures of the body politic. The Memorable Result

No more comprehensive, tightly structured, and closely argued political philosophy exists than Hobbes set out in Leviathan. It shocks our conventional assumptions, and it is disquieting. For the sake of peace and order, religion cannot be allowed the political power and conscientious authority it has often claimed. To cure our political ills and contain the state of war we may have to submit to governments we thoroughly dislike. The most prevalent and powerful traits of human nature are unpleasant and socially destructive. It is this insight which touches a raw nerve of truth with so many readers. Modern man, if not all mankind, is ominously close to Hobbes's account of us-competitive, acquisitive, possessive, restless, individualistic, self-concerned, and insatiable in our demands for whatever we see in isolation as our own good. It is this point of realism which almost all other political philosophies underestimate, and which Hobbes gets memorably right in his great endeavour to deliver us from a life consistent with our own natures, and of our own making; a life which would be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

xliii

A NOTE ON THE TEXT A RECENT editor of Leviathan commented that 'there has never been an accurate edition of the work'. If by 'accurate' is meant a text devoid of errata, with every word and mark of punctuation exactly as Hobbes would have chosen it to be at the last possible moment before first publication, or with every variation recorded and resolved in the text as Hobbes would have wished it resolved, then indeed there never has been and never will be an accurate edition. But some editions have been and will be more accurate than others, and some editions will be more easy to read and use than others. The present text is intended to be as faithful as possible to Hobbes's usually clear intentions without noting explicitly every minute stylistic or typographical variation, and without retaining accidental impediments such as the antique spelling and the italicization of proper names which form no part of what Hobbes intended us to read and think about. The Obstacles to an Accurate Text

According to appearances, Leviathan was published in English only once in Hobbes's lifetime, namely in London in 1651 (probably in early May) with the imprint 'London, Printed for Andrew Crooke, at the Green Dragon in St Pauls Church-yard, 1651'. But in fact three separate editions bear this imprint, two of them considerably later than the first. The three are readily distinguished by the ornaments which appear on their titlepages. As suggested by H. MacDonald and M. Hargreaves in their Thomas Hobbes: A Bibliography (London, 1952), the editions may be designated the 'Head', the 'Bear', and the 'Ornaments' respectively. Only the Head (see reproduced title-page, p. 1 in this volume) was in fact printed and published in London in 1651 under Hobbes's somewhat distant supervision from Paris. The Bear may well have been printed in Holland towards the end of the 166os, presumably to circumvent the current prohibition of its further printing in London, and the Ornaments was printed later still, although possibly in London. The later printing of the Bear and the Ornaments is established, among other things, by a different set of printer's errors supervening on the Head text, by signs of wear on the famous frontispiece engraving, and by their somewhat more modern spelling. There is, however, no substantial reason to suppose that Hobbes was responsible for the minute textual variations which distinguish the xliv

A NOTE ON THE TEXT

Bear and the Ornaments from each other and from the Head, or even that he knew about their printing. It is thus accepted practice that all good editions are reproductions of copies of the Head, or based on such copies. But even when attention is confined to the Head edition, it is virtually impossible to find any two copies that are absolutely identical, or to be able to claim that any particular copy is definitive. The variations between copies probably result from two factors: the technology of seventeenthcentury printing, and the peculiar circumstances under which Hobbes corrected the proof sheets. Very few if any seventeenth-century printers would have had a sufficient store of movable type to set up a whole book--especially one as long as Leviathan. The normal practice was thus to set up a few formes of type (each forme containing two, four, or eight pages depending on the intended size of the finished book). The formes were corrected and printed on to large sheets which were laid aside to be folded and cut in due course to make the pages of the final volume. The type was then distributed to be reused in later pages, and so on until the book was completed. Corrections were made by the in-house proof-reader and sometimes also (as in the case of Leviathan) by the author. The difficulty was that Hobbes was in Paris throughout the printing of Leviathan, and we know from Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, who was visited by him in April 1651, that the book 'was then printing in England, and that he received every week a sheet to correct of which he shewed me one or two sheets' (A Brief View and Survey [of Leviathan], Oxford, 1676, pp. 7-8): a slow, cumbersome, and expensive process. What appears to have happened, at least what would readily account for the small variations between copies of the Head edition, is that a number of sheets were printed with in-house proof-reader's corrections while the printers were waiting for Hobbes's corrections to be returned. (There is evidence that Parts I and II were printed by one firm, and Parts III and IV by another.) When his corrections were received and incorporated into the text, the sheets were then printed again to make up the number of copies required for the completed publication, and then laid aside, as explained, with those already printed. But when the final folding and sewing was being done, the sheets were combined without regard to the way they had been corrected. The outcome is that it is unusual to find two Head copies which are absolutely identical. It must, however, be emphasized that the vast majority of the variations are minute. They usually amount to no more than grammatical corrections, the resolution of ambiguities, variations in punctuation, or making xlv

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the wording consistent with something written elsewhere in the same paragraph. In effect this means that any copy of the Head edition would make a respectable text for ordinary reading, or for the study of Hobbes's philosophy. But it is possible to do better than simply reprinting a copy of the Head with errata and other obvious errors corrected. Two further sources exist against which any given copy of the Head can be checked. The first is a scribal manuscript, with some emendations in Hobbes's own hand, now in the British Library. It is claimed to be, and very probably is the copy Hobbes caused to be made and which he presented to the future Charles II in November or December 1651. It consists of 248 sheets of vellum, written on both sides in a fine but very small hand, in ink which has partly rubbed off or faded except for the few sheets where the vellum has been of poor quality and consequently absorbed the ink. Perversely, these remain sharp and clear, while the rest of the text is miserably difficult to read and sometimes all but impossible. The relation between this manuscript (which I shall refer to as the written copy) and the printed text is complicated. For example, some of Hobbes's emendations serve to bring the written copy into line with the printed copies. Other differences may relate to its particular and rather special reader. I have not used it in the preparation of the present text except to draw attention in my notes to some occasions when a variation seems significant and interesting. The second, and for practical purposes the more helpful check on the Head text, is provided by the large-paper copies. These were the 'de luxe' or presentation copies of the book, and they alone, as Richard Tuck suggests (and I would agree with him), seem to have been made up from gatherings of the fully corrected sheets. Tuck has identified the variations against a normal copy of the Head edition. They are silently incorporated into the present text except in the few cases when they might be construed as substantial. These substantial variations are noted. But a full record of alternative readings and an assessment of their significance must await Noel Malcolm's critical edition in the Clarendon Edition of the Works of Thomas Hobbes. The Principles of this Edition

From what I have said it will be clear that a minutely and definitively correct edition of Leviathan is not possible. Nevertheless, an entirely satisfactory philosophical text (and certainly one as good as or better than most of Hobbes's contemporaries could have read) is achievable by incorporating into a Head copy the errata which it lists, by correcting the obvious minor printer's errors, and by adopting the alternative readings xlvi

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from the large-paper text. In the present edition these things have been done, and the following principles followed: 1. Seventeenth-century punctuation in the Head edition is retained on the grounds that 'modernization' is a non-standard operation which interposes an editor's opinion between what Hobbes intended and what the reader can see. Exceptions (if they so count) are: putting in the apostrophe in the possessive case wherever it is needed by modern convention, and, in a tiny handful of instances towards the end of Leviathan, replacing a colon with a full stop, where this is sanctioned by both the Bear and Ornaments editions. 2. Spelling is modernized throughout. It cannot, for example, alter what Hobbes meant us to understand if we print 'near' rather than 'neer'. To keep mid-seventeenth-century spelling (already being modernized by the time the Ornaments edition was printed) simply hinders the reader without getting one whit closer to understanding Hobbes's work. 3· Hobbes's use of italics is somewhat excessive by modern standards. Nevertheless, I have felt bound to retain them in most cases. He employs them for quotations (or close paraphrases), for emphasis (particularly for contrasting pairs of words in juxtaposition), for foreign words, for titles of books, and sometimes for proper names. Only the last seems to be a mere uninformative typographical convention, and it is the only one I have modified to roman type. 4· When giving particular attention to a concept, often for the purposes of introducing a definition, Hobbes commonly prints the word in running capitals, presumably to help catch the eye. This convention is retained. 5· In accordance with modern practice I have replaced with lower-case letters the initial capital letters Hobbes usually gives to substantives in his text, and to the first word following a colon. Again there seems to be no intrusion into what he means if we now read, for example, 'the ground of courage is always strength or skill' rather than 'the ground of Courage is always Strength or Skill'. Nevertheless, in any doubtful case (e.g. 'Schools'), where Hobbes might wish to give a special dignity or quasi proper-name status to a noun, I have let his capitals stand. 6. In keeping with what will be done in the Clarendon Press edition, and what has already been done in Edwin Curley's American text of Leviathan, each Head paragraph has been numbered with a new run of arabic numerals for each chapter. Hobbes had already done this in The Elements of Law and in De Give, and was to revert to the practice in De Corpore. The device is extremely useful for quick reference. Thus XLII. 54 means Chapter XLII, paragraph 54· To further facilitate cross-referxlvii

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ence with other editions, the page number of the original Head pages is given in square brackets in the margin: a device adopted by a number of modern editors. 7· Hobbes usually gives biblical references in the text enclosed by round brackets, but he sometimes uses commas, and occasionally puts references in the margin. In the present text all such references are given in the text in round brackets except where they form part of the grammatical structure of a clause or sentence. 8. With one category excepted, all the present editor's notes-sources, philosophical notes, biographies, translations, textual comments, etc.-are signalled in the text with an asterisk. The exception is where a curious or obsolete word can be explained by at most two familiar words. In order to save the reader turning to extremely brief endnotes, such explanations are given in square brackets in the text immediately following the word they explain. The Latin Leviathan

The Leviathan which provoked the furious rage of divines and politicians in the first fifty years after its publication, which survived the neglect of the mid-eighteenth century to become the subject of so many reprints and so much comment from the 188os onwards, and which in 1946 elicited Oakeshott's famous judgement that 'The Leviathan is the greatest, perhaps the sole, masterpiece of political philosophy written in the English language. And the history of our civilization can provide only a few works of similar scope and achievement to set beside it', is the English Leviathan. But there is another Leviathan. A Latin version appeared in Amsterdam in 1668 and again in 1670, and the same version appeared in London in 1678, with a pcssible earlier printing there in 1676 (although this may be a false attribution for another issue of the Amsterdam sheets). The Latin version differs significantly from the English. It is thus misleading to think of it as a translation, despite a general (but only a general) paragraph-by-paragraph parallel. Very briefly, the differences are: (a) that much of the Latin reads like a close paraphrase in which particular details filled out by the English text have been ignored; (b) that, despite this, numerous substantial adjustments and additions to the English text have been made, most of them seemingly to rebut charges of atheism and heresy, or to correct what Hobbes came to regard as errors (in a reply to Bishop Bramhall he explicitly says that an error of argument is being corrected in the edition being printed in Holland); and (c) that the Latin text, apart from a near reworking of the material in Chapters XLVI and xlviii

A NOTE ON THE TEXT

XL VII, also has a three-chapter Appendix which never had any English equivalent. The additional chapters are: 'On the Nicene Creed', 'On Heresy', and 'On certain Objections to Leviathan' (the last being again mainly concerned with charges of atheism and heresy). In preparing the present text of the English Leviathan I have made no attempt to indicate where it differs from the Latin version. There are two reasons for this. One is that the task has already been done, for example by Julius Lips in ch. VII of Die Stellung des Thomas Hobbes zu den politischen Parteien der grossen Englischen Revolution (Leipzig, 1927) and in Fran~Yois Tricaud's French translation of Leviathan (Paris, 1971). A translation by George Wright of the Appendix can be found in the journal Interpretation (1991), 323-412. Wright also provides a substantial commentary. The other reason for ignoring the Latin Leviathan in the present edition is that it is the English text which is, and, with the exception of a short period on the continent of Europe in the late seventeenth century, always has been the Leviathan which the world has argued over and discussed. Hobbes specialists, particularly those concerned with later adjustments to Hobbes's views about religion, cannot disregard the Latin version. The student of moral and political philosophy, and the ordinary reader concerned to grasp Hobbes's ideas and their influence, can disregard it; and almost always has. The Latin version is a relatively obscure work for scholars. The English version is the book which has challenged, and continues to challenge, the moral, political, and religious ideas of the world. This is the text which is 'the greatest, perhaps the sole, masterpiece of political philosophy written in the English language'.

xlix

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY THE literature spawned by Hobbes's publications in general and Leviathan in particular, both in his own century and again in the second half of the twentieth century, is so vast that any select bibliography that is to be useful has to be very select indeed. Between 1651 and about 1700 the reason for the attention was the huge opposition provoked by what were taken to be his ideas about politics, religion, and morality. This is fascinatingly documented in S. I. Mintz, The Hunting of Leviathan (Cambridge, 1969). More recently, the literature reflects the extraordinary scale and variety of the subjects to which Hobbes contributed, their capacity to interest philosophers and scholars with diverse views, their continuing ability to provoke controversy and divergent interpretations, and their sheer excitement as ideas. A general, easy account of his life and works can be found in Hobbes by G. Croom Robertson (Edinburgh, 1886) and in Leslie Stephen's Hobbes (London, 1904). Some of the details ofhis private life and activities can be found in the edition of his collected letters, The Correspondence of Thomas Hobbes, ed. Noel Malcolm (2 vols., Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1994). The three main contemporary biographical documents, Aubrey's 'Brief Life' and Hobbes's own 'Prose Life' and 'Verse Life' (in English translations), are included in the World's Classics edition of The Elements of Law (Human Nature and De Corpore Politico). Three general accounts of Hobbes's ideas are notably useful: Hobbes by Richard Peters (Harmondsworth, 1956), Hobbes by Tom Sorell (London and New York, 1986), and Hobbes by Richard Tuck (Oxford and New York, 1989). His general philosophy and philosophy of science is well dealt with in ]. W. N. Watkin's Hobbes's System ofIdeas (London, 1965, revised edition 1989) as well as by Peters and Sorell. The most exhaustive (some might say exhausting) account of Hobbes's philosophy of science is still F. Brandt's Thomas Hobbes's Mechanical Conception ofNature (Copenhagen, 1928, and English translation, London, same year). A useful introduction to Hobbes's moral and political philosophy-for long treated as almost the only concern of Leviathan-is in D. D. Raphael's lucid Hobbes: Morals and Politics (London, 1977); particularly valuable is his survey of major book-length interpretations of Hobbes. Among such interpretations the following stand out: Leo Strauss, The

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

Political Philosophy of Thomas Hobbes (Oxford, 1936); Howard Warrender, The Political Philosophy ofHobbes: His Theory ofObligation (Oxford, 1957); C. B. Macpherson, The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism (Oxford, 1962); and Michael Oakeshott, Hobbes on Civil Association (Ox-

ford, 1975). Their views are summarized and developed, together with other important essays, in the collection Hobbes Studies, ed. K. Brown (Oxford, 1965). Other important books on Leviathan include F. S. McNeilly, The Anatomy of Leviathan (London, 1968); D. Gauthier, The Logic of Leviathan (Oxford, 1969); D. Johnson, The Rhetoric of Leviathan (Princeton, NJ, 1986); S. A. Lloyd, Ideals as Interests in Hobbes's Leviathan: The Power ofMind over Matter (Cambridge, 1992). Hobbes's account of, and views about, religion as a social and political phenomenon (and to a lesser extent his philosophy of religion and personal beliefs) should be studied in F. C. Hood, The Divine Politics of Thomas Hobbes (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1964), and in A. P. Martinich's The Two Gods of Leviathan (Cambridge, 1992) as well as in Lloyd (see above). But much of the best material is in articles. A massive collection of these--on religion and other Hobbes topics-has been edited by P. King and published as Thomas Hobbes: Critical Assessments (4 vols., London, 1993). Other useful collections of articles are: Hobbes and Rousseau, ed. M. Cranston and R. Peters (New York, 1972); Hobbes's Science of Natural Justice, ed. C. Walton and P.]. Johnson (Dordrecht, 1987); and Perspectives on Thomas Hobbes, ed. G. A.]. Rogers and A. Ryan (Oxford, 1988). Hobbes's own works are still only available as a whole in The English Works of Thomas Hobbes, ed. Sir William Molesworth (II vols., London, 1839) together with his edition of the Latin works (5 vols., London, 1845), although a complete edition of the philosophical works is in preparation for Oxford University Press. But the two works most closely relevant to Leviathan are easily available. They are The Elements of Law (Human Nature and De Corpore Politico), ed. ]. C. A. Gaskin, World's Classics (Oxford, 1994), and De Give, ed. H. Warrender (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1983). Also relevant to some of the earlier chapters of Leviathan is Hobbes's Thomas White's De Mundo Examined, translated by H. W. Jones (first published Bradford and London, 1976). Hobbes returns to the history and politics that form the background to Leviathan in two later works now available in modern editions: A Dialogue between a Philosopher and a Student of the Common Laws of England (Chicago, 1971), and Behemoth (London, 1969). A facsimile of a Head copy of Leviathan was published by The Scolar li

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

Press Ltd., Menston, England, in 1969. A more readily available and remarkably accurate printing of the Head text was done at the Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1909, with numerous reprints. The Latin Leviathan was published in Amsterdam in 1668. The differences between it and the English version are discussed by Franociety. So that the religion of the former sort, is a part of human politics; and teacheth part of the duty which earthly kings require of their subjects. And the religion of the latter sort is divine politics; and containeth precepts to those that have yielded themselves subjects in the kingdom of God. Of the former sort, were all the founders of commonwealths, and the law-givers of the Gentiles: of the latter sort, were Abraham, Moses, and our blessed Saviour; by whom have been derived unto us the laws of the kingdom of God. 13. And for that part of religion, which consisteth in opinions concerning the nature of powers invisible, there is almost nothing that has a name, that has not been esteemed amongst the Gentiles, in one place or another, a god, or devil; or by their poets feigned to be inanimated, inhabited, or possessed by some spirit or other. 14. The unformed matter of the world, was a god, by the name of Chaos. 15. The heaven, the ocean, the planets, the fire, the earth, the winds, were so many gods. 16. Men, women, a bird, a crocodile, a calf, a dog, a snake, an onion, a leek, were deified. Besides, that they filled almost all places, with spirits called demons: the plains, with Pan, and Panises, or Satyrs; the woods, with Fawns, and Nymphs; the sea, with Tritons, and other Nymphs; every river, and fountain, with a ghost of his name, and with Nymphs; every house with its Lares, or familiars; every man, with his Genius; hell, with ghosts, and spiritual officers, as Charon, Cerberus, and the Furies; and in the night time, all places with larvae, lemures, ghosts of men deceased, and a whole kingdom of fairies, and bugbears. They have also ascribed divinity, and built temples to mere accidents,* and qualities; such as are time, night, day, peace, concord, love, contention, virtue, honour, health, rust, fever, and the like; which when they prayed for, or against, they prayed to, as if there were ghosts of those names hanging over their heads, and letting fall, or withholding that good, or evil, for, or against which they prayed. They invoked also their own wit, by the name of Muses; their own ignorance, by the name of Fortune; their own lusts by the name of Cupid; their own rage, by the name of Furies; their own privy members, by the name of Priapus; and attributed their pollutions, to Incubi, and Succubae: insomuch as there was nothing, which a poet could introduce as a person in his poem, which they did not make either a god, or a devil. 75

The absurd opinion of Gentilism.

[55]

PART I

OF MAN

17. The same authors of the religion of the Gentiles, observing the second ground for religion, which is men's ignorance of causes; and thereby their aptness to attribute their fortune to causes, on which there was no dependence at all apparent, took occasion to obtrude on their ignorance, instead of second causes, a kind of second and ministerial gods; ascribing the cause of fecundity, to Venus; the cause of arts, to Apollo; of subtlety and craft, to Mercury; of tempests and storms, to Aeolus; and of other effects, to other gods; insomuch as there was amongst the heathen almost as great variety of gods, as of business. 18. And to the worship, which naturally men conceived fit to be used towards their gods, namely, oblations, prayers, thanks, and the rest formerly named; the same legislators of the Gentiles have added their images, both in picture, and sculpture; that the more ignorant sort, (that is to say, the most part or generality of the people,) thinking the gods for whose representation they were made, were really included, and as it were housed within them, might so much the more stand in fear of them: and endowed them with lands, and houses, and officers, and revenues, set apart from all other human uses; that is, consecrated,* and made holy to those their idols; as caverns, groves, woods, mountains, and whole islands; and have [56] attributed to them, not only the shapes, some of men, some of beasts, some of monsters; but also the faculties, and passions of men and beasts; as sense, speech, sex, lust, generation, (and this not only by mixing one with another, to propagate the kind of gods; but also by mixing with men, and women, to beget mongrel gods, and but inmates of heaven, as Bacchus, Hercules, and others;) besides anger, revenge, and other passions of living creatures, and the actions proceeding from them, as fraud, theft, adultery, sodomy, and any vice that may be taken for an effect of power, or a cause of pleasure; and all such vices, as amongst men are taken to be against law, rather than against honour. 19. Lastly, to the prognostics of time to come; which are naturally, but conjectures upon experience of time past; and supernaturally, divine revelation; the same authors of the religion of the Gentiles, partly upon pretended experience, partly upon pretended revelation, have added innumerable other superstitious ways of divination; and made men believe they should find their fortunes, sometimes in the ambiguous or senseless answers of the priests at Delphi, Delos, Ammon, and other famous oracles; which answers,

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were made ambiguous by design, to own the event both ways; or absurd, by the intoxicating vapour of the place, which is very frequent in sulphurous caverns: sometimes in the leaves of the Sybils; of whose prophecies (like those perhaps of Nostradamus* for the fragments now extant seem to be the invention oflater times), there were some books in reputation in the time of the Roman republic: sometimes in the insignificant speeches of madmen, supposed to be possessed with a divine spirit, which possession they called enthusiasm; and these kinds of foretelling events, were accounted theomancy, or prophecy: sometimes in the aspect of the stars at their nativity; which was called horoscopy, and esteemed a part of judiciary astrology: sometimes in their own hopes and fears, called thumomancy, or presage: sometimes in the prediction of witches, that pretended conference with the dead; which is called necromancy, conjuring, and witchcraft; and is but juggling and confederate knavery: sometimes in the casual flight, or feeding of birds; called augury: sometimes in the entrails of a sacrificed beast; which was aruspicina: sometimes in dreams: sometimes in croaking of ravens, or chattering of birds: sometimes in the lineaments of the face; which was called metoposcopy; or by palmistry in the lines of the hand; in casual words, called omina: sometimes in monsters, or unusual accidents; as eclipses, comets, rare meteors, earthquakes, inundations, uncouth births, and the like, which they called portenta, and ostenta, because they thought them to portend, or foreshow some great calamity to come; sometimes, in mere lottery, as cross and pile; counting holes in a sieve; dipping of verses in Homer, and Virgil; and innumerable other such vain conceits. So easy are men to be drawn to believe any thing, from such men as have gotten credit with them; and can with gentleness, and dexterity, take hold of their fear, and ignorance. 20. And therefore the first founders, and legislators of common- [57] wealths among the Gentiles, whose ends were only to keep the The designs people in obedience, and peace, have in all places taken care; first, to of the authors imprint in their minds a belief, that those precepts which they gave of the religion of the concerning religion, might not be thought to proceed from their heathen. own device, but from the dictates of some god, or other spirit; or else that they themselves were of a higher nature than mere mortals, that their laws might the more easily be received: so Numa Pompilius* pretended to receive the ceremonies he instituted amongst the Romans, from the nymph Egeria: and the first king and founder of 77

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The true religion, and the laws of God's kingdom the same.

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the kingdom of Peru, pretended himself and his wife to be the children of the Sun; and Mahomet, to set up his new religion, pretended to have conferences with the Holy Ghost, in form of a dove.* Secondly, they have had a care, to make it believed, that the same things were displeasing to the gods, which were forbidden by the laws.* Thirdly, to prescribe ceremonies, supplications, sacrifices, and festivals, by which they were to believe, the anger of the gods might be appeased; and that ill success in war, great contagions of sickness, earthquakes, and each man's private misery, came from the anger of the gods;* and their anger from the neglect of their worship, or the forgetting, or mistaking some point of the ceremonies required. And though amongst the ancient Romans, men were not forbidden to deny, that which in the poets is written of the pains, and pleasures after this life; which divers of great authority, and gravity in that state have in their harangues openly derided; yet that belief was always more cherished, than the contrary. 21. And by these, and such other institutions, they obtained in order to their end, (which was the peace of the commonwealth,) that the common people in their misfortunes, laying the fault on neglect, or error in their ceremonies, or on their own disobedience to the laws, were the less apt to mutiny against their governors. And being entertained with the pomp, and pastime of festivals, and public games, made in honour of the gods, needed nothing else but bread, to keep them from discontent, murmuring, and commotion against the state. And therefore the Romans, that had conquered the greatest part of the then known world, made no scruple of tolerating any religion whatsoever in the city of Rome itself; unless it had something in it, that could not consist with their civil government; nor do we read, that any religion was there forbidden, but that of the Jews;* who (being the peculiar kingdom of God) thought it unlawful to acknowledge subjection to any mortal king or state whatsoever. And thus you see how the religion of the Gentiles was a part of their policy. 22. But where God himself, by supernatural revelation, planted religion; there he also made to himself a peculiar kingdom; and gave laws, not only of behaviour towards himself; but also towards one another; and thereby in the kingdom of God, the policy, and laws civil, are a part of religion; and therefore the distinction of temporal, and spiritual domination, hath there no place. It is true, that God is

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king of all the earth: yet may he be king of a peculiar, and chosen nation. For there is no more incongruity therein, than that he that hath the general command of the whole army, should have withal a peculiar regiment, or company of his own. God is king of all the earth by his power: but of his chosen people, he is king by covenant. But to speak more largely of the kingdom of God, both by nature, and covenant, I have in the following discourse assigned another place (chapter 35). 23. From the propagation of religion, it is not hard to understand the causes of the resolution of the same into its first seeds, or principles; which are only an opinion of a deity, and of powers invisible, and supernatural; that can never be so abolished out of human nature, but that new religions may again be made to spring out of them, by the culture of such men, as for such purpose are in reputation. 24. For seeing all formed religion, is founded at first, upon the faith which a multitude hath in some one person, whom they believe not only to be a wise man, and to labour to procure their happiness, but also to be a holy man, to whom God himself vouchsafeth to declare his will supernaturally; it followeth necessarily, when they that have the government of religion, shall come to have either the wisdom of those men, their sincerity, or their love suspected; or when they shall be unable to show any probable token of divine revelation; that the religion which they desire to uphold, must be suspected likewise; and (without the fear of the civil sword) contradicted and rejected. 25. That which taketh away the reputation of wisdom, in him that formeth a religion, or addeth to it when it is already formed, is the enjoining of a belief of contradictories: for both parts of a contradiction cannot possibly be true: and therefore to enjoin the belief of them, is an argument of ignorance; which detects the author in that; and discredits him in all things else he shall propound as from revelation supernatural: which revelation a man may indeed have of many things above, but of nothing against natural reason. 26. That which taketh away the reputation of sincerity, is the doing or saying of such things, as appear to be signs, that what they require other men to believe, is not believed by themselves; all which doings, or sayings are therefore called scandalous, because they be stumbling blocks, that make men to fall in the way of religion: as injustice, cruelty, profaneness, avarice, and luxury. For 79

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The causes of change in religion.

Enjoining belief of impossibilities.

Doing contrary to the religion they establish.

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who can believe, that he that doth ordinarily such actions, as proceed from any of these roots, believeth there is any such invisible power to be feared, as he affrighteth other men withal, for lesser faults? 27. That which taketh away the reputation of love, is the being detected of private ends: as when the belief they require of others, conduceth or seemeth to conduce to the acquiring of dominion, [59] riches, dignity, or secure pleasure, to themselves only, or specially. For that which men reap benefit by to themselves, they are thought to do for their own sakes, and not for love of others. Want of the 28. Lastly, the testimony that men can render of divine calling, testimony of can be no other, than the operation of miracles; or true prophecy miracles. (which also is a miracle;) or extraordinary felicity. And therefore, to those points of religion, which have been received from them that did such miracles; those that are added by such, as approve not their calling by some miracle, obtain no greater belief, than what the custom, and laws of the places, in which they be educated, have wrought into them. For as in natural things, men of judgment require natural signs, and arguments; so in supernatural things, they require signs supernatural, (which are miracles,) before they consent inwardly, and from their hearts. 29. All which causes of the weakening of men's faith, do manifestly appear in the examples following. First, we have the example of the children of Israel; who when Moses, that had approved his calling to them by miracles, and by the happy conduct of them out of Egypt, was absent but forty days, revolted from the worship of the true God, recommended to them by him; and setting up (Exod. 32. I, 2) a golden calf for their god, relapsed into the idolatry of the Egyptians; from whom they had been so lately delivered. And again, after Moses, Aaron, Joshua, and that generation which had seen the great works of God in Israel, (Judges 2. I I) were dead; another generation arose, and served Baal. So that miracles failing, faith also failed. 30. Again, when the sons of Samuel, (I Sam. 8. 3) being constituted by their father judges in Bersabee, received bribes, and judged unjustly, the people of Israel refused any more to have God to be their king, in other manner than he was king of other people; and therefore cried out to Samuel, to choose them a king after the manner of the nations. So that justice failing, faith also failed; insomuch, as they deposed their God, from reigning over them. So

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31. And whereas in the planting of Christian religion, the oracles ceased in all parts of the Roman empire, and the number of Chrisrians increased wonderfully every day, and in every place, by the preaching of the Apostles, and Evangelists; a great part of that success, may reasonably be attributed, to the contempt, into which the priests of the Gentiles of that time, had brought themselves, by their uncleanness, avarice, and juggling between princes. Also the religion of the church of Rome, was partly, for the same cause abolished in England, and many other parts of Christendom; insomuch, as the failing of virtue in the pastors, maketh faith fail in the people: and partly from bringing of the philosophy, and doctrine of Aristotle into religion, by the Schoolmen; from whence there arose so many contradictions, and absurdities, as brought the clergy into a reputation both of ignorance, and of fraudulent intention; and inclined people to revolt from them, either against the will of their own princes, as in France, and Holland; or with their will, as in England. 32. Lastly, amongst the points by the church of Rome declared [60] necessary for salvation, there be so many, manifestly to the advantage of the Pope, and of his spiritual subjects, residing in the territories of other Christian princes, that were it not for the mutual emulation of those princes, they might without war, or trouble, exclude all foreign authority, as easily as it has been excluded in England. For who is there that does not see, to whose benefit it conduceth, to have it believed, that a king hath not his authority from Christ, unless a bishop crown him? That a king, if he be a priest, cannot marry? That whether a prince be born in lawful marriage, or not, must be judged by authority from Rome? That subjects may be freed from their allegiance, if by the court of Rome, the king be judged an heretic? That a king (as Childeric of France) may be deposed by a pope (as Pope Zachary,) for no cause; and his kingdom given to one of his subjects? That the clergy, and regulars, in what country soever, shall be exempt from the jurisdiction of their king, in cases criminal? Or who does not see, to whose profit redound the fees of private masses, and vales of purgatory; with other signs of private interest, enough to mortify the most lively faith, if (as I said) the civil magistrate, and custom did not more sustain it, than any opinion they have of the sanctity, wisdom, or probity of their teachers? So that I may attribute all the changes of religion in the world, to one and the same cause; 81

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and that is, unpleasing priests; and those not only amongst Catholics, but even in that church that hath presumed most of reformation.*

CHAPTER XIII OF THE NATURAL CONDITION OF MANKIND AS CONCERNING THEIR FELICITY, AND MISERY

1. NATURE hath made men so equal, in the faculties of the body, and mind; as that though there be found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body, or of quicker mind than another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he. For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination, or by confederacy with others, that are in the same danger with himself. 2. And as to the faculties of the mind, (setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and especially that skill of proceeding upon general, and infallible rules, called science; which very few have, and but in few things; as being not a native faculty, born with us; nor attained (as prudence,) while we look after somewhat else,) I find yet a greater equality amongst men, than that of strength. For prudence, is but experience; which equal time, equally bestows on all [61] men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto. That which may perhaps make such equality incredible, is but a vain conceit of one's own wisdom, which almost all men think they have in a greater degree, than the vulgar; that is, than all men but themselves, and a few others, whom by fame, or for concurring with themselves, they approve. For such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves; for they see their own wit at hand, and other men's at a distance. But this proveth rather that men are in that point equal, than unequal. For there is not ordinarily a greater sign of the equal distribution of any thing, than that every man is contented with his share.

Men by nature equal.

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3. From this equality of ability, ariseth equality of hope in the attaining of our ends. And therefore if any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies; and in the way to their end, (which is principally their own conservation, and sometimes their delectation only,) endeavour to destroy, or subdue one another. And from hence it comes to pass, that where an invader hath no more to fear, than another man's single power; if one plant, sow, build, or possess a convenient seat, others may probably be expected to come prepared with forces united, to dispossess, and deprive him, not only of the fruit of his labour, but also of his life, or liberty. And the invader again is in the like danger of another. 4. And from this diffidence of one another, there is no way for any man to secure himself, so reasonable, as anticipation; that is, by force, or wiles, to master the persons of all men he can, so long, till he see no other power great enough to endanger him: and this is no more than his own conservation requireth, and is generally allowed. Also because there be some, that taking pleasure in contemplating their own power in the acts of conquest, which they pursue farther than their security requires; if others, that otherwise would be glad to be at ease within modest bounds, should not by invasion increase their power, they would not be able, long time, by standing only on their defence, to subsist. And by consequence, such augmentation of dominion over men, being necessary to a man's conservation, it ought to be allowed him. 5. Again, men have no pleasure, (but on the contrary a great deal of grief) in keeping company, where there is no power able to over-awe them all. For every man looketh that his companion should value him, at the same rate he sets upon himself: and upon all signs of contempt, or undervaluing, naturally endeavours, as far as he dares (which amongst them that have no common power to keep them in quiet, is far enough to make them destroy each other,) to extort a greater value from his contemners, by damage; and from others, by the example. 6. So that in the nature of man, we find three principal causes of quarrel. First, competition; secondly, diffidence; thirdly, glory. 7. The first, maketh men invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the third, for reputation. The first use violence, to make themselves masters of other men's persons, wives, children, and cattle; the second, to defend them; the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile,

From equality proceeds diffidence.

From diffidence war.

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PART I

Out of civil states, there is always war of every one against every one.

The incommodities of such a war.

OF MAN

a different opinion, and any other sign of undervalue, either direct in their persons, or by reflection in their kindred, their friends, their nation, their profession, or their name. 8. * Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war, as is of every man, against every man. For WAR, consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of time, is to be considered in the nature of war; as it is in the nature of weather. For as the nature of foul weather, lieth not in a shower or two of rain; but in an inclination thereto of many days together: so the nature of war, consisteth not in actual fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE. 9. Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. 10. It may seem strange to some man, that has not well weighed these things; that nature should thus dissociate, and render men apt to invade, and destroy one another: and he may therefore, not trusting to this inference, made from the passions, desire perhaps to have the same confirmed by experience. Let him therefore consider* with himself, when taking a journey, he arms himself, and seeks to go well accompanied; when going to sleep, he locks his doors; when even in his house he locks his chests; and this when he knows there be laws, and public officers, armed, to revenge all injuries shall be done him; what opinion he has of his fellow-subjects, when he rides armed; of his fellow citizens, when he locks his doors; and of his children, and servants, when he locks his chests. Does he not there as much accuse mankind by his actions, as I do by

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my words? But neither of us accuse man's nature in it. The desires, and other passions of man, are in themselves no sin. No more are the actions, that proceed from those passions, till they know a law that forbids them: which till laws be made they cannot know: nor can any law be made, till they have agreed upon the person that shall make it. 11. It may peradventure be thought, there was never such a time, [63] nor condition of war as this;* and I believe it was never generally so, over all the world: but there are many places, where they live so now. For the savage people in many places of America, except the government of small families, the concord whereof dependeth on natural lust, have no government at all; and live at this day in that brutish manner, as I said before. Howsoever, it may be perceived what manner of life there would be, where there were no common power to fear; by the manner of life, which men that have formerly lived under a peaceful government, use to degenerate into, in a civil war. 12. But though there had never been any time, wherein particular men were in a condition of war one against another; yet in all times, kings, and persons of sovereign authority, because of their independency, are in continual jealousies, and in the state and posture of gladiators; having their weapons pointing, and their eyes fixed on one another; that is, their forts, garrisons, and guns upon the frontiers of their kingdoms; and continual spies upon their neighbours; which is a posture of war. But because they uphold thereby, the industry of their subjects; there does not follow from it, that misery, which accompanies the liberty of particular men. 13. To this war of every man against every man, this also is In such a war consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and nothing is wrong, justice and injustice have there no place. Where there is no unjust. common power, there is no law: where no law, no injustice. Force, and fraud, are in war the two cardinal virtues. Justice, and injustice are none of the faculties neither of the body, nor mind. If they were, they might be in a man that were alone in the world, as well as his senses, and passions. They are qualities, that relate to men in society, not in solitude. It is consequent also to the same condition, that there be no propriety, no dominion, no mine and thine distinct; but only that to be every man's, that he can get; and for so long, as he can keep it. And thus much for the ill condition, which man by

ss

PART

I

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mere nature is actually placed in; though with a possibility to come out of it, consisting partly in the passions, partly in his reason. The passions 14. The passions that incline men to peace, are fear of death; that incline desire of such things as are necessary to commodious living; and a men to peace. hope by their industry to obtain them. And reason suggesteth convenient articles of peace, upon which men may be drawn to agreement. These articles, are they, which otherwise are called the Laws of Nature: whereof I shall speak more particularly, in the two following chapters.

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CHAPTER XIV OF THE FIRST AND SECOND NATURAL LAWS, AND OF CONTRACTS

1. THE RIGHT OF NATURE, which writers commonly call jus naturale, is the liberty each man hath, to use his own power, as he will himself, for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say, of his own life; and consequently, of doing any thing, which in his own judgment, and reason, he shall conceive to be the aptest means thereunto. Liberty what. 2. By LIBERTY, is understood, according to the proper signification of the word, the absence of external impediments: which impediments, may oft take away part of a man's power to do what he would; but cannot hinder him from using the power left him, according as his judgment, and reason shall dictate to him. A law of 3. A LAW OF NATURE, (lex natura/is,) is a precept, or general rule, nature what. found out by reason, by which a man is forbidden to do, that, which is destructive of his life, or taketh away the means of preserving the same; and to omit, that, by which he thinketh it may be best preserved. For though they that speak of this subject, use to confound Difference of jus, and lex, right and law; yet they ought to be distinguished; right and because RIGHT, consisteth in liberty to do, or to forbear: whereas law. LAW, determineth, and bindeth to one of them: so that law, and right, differ as much, as obligation, and liberty; which in one and the same matter are inconsistent. Natunlly 4. And because the condition of man, (as hath been declared in every man the precedent chapter) is a condition of war of every one against has right to every thing. every one; in which case every one is governed by his own reason; Right of nature what.

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and there is nothing he can make use of, that may not be a help unto him, in preserving his life against his enemies; it followeth, that in such a condition, every man has a right to every thing; even to one another's body. And therefore, as long as this natural right of every man to every thing endureth, there can be no security to any man, (how strong or wise soever he be,) of living out the time, which nature ordinarily alloweth men to live. And consequently it is a precept, or general rule of reason,* that every man, ought to endeav- The our peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he cannot fundamental obtain it, that he may seek, and use, all helps, and advantages of war. law of The first branch of which rule, containeth the first, and fundamental nature. law of nature; which is, to seek peace, and follow it. The second, the sum of the right of nature; which is, by all means we can, to deftnd ourselves. 5. From this fundamental law of nature, by which men are commanded to endeavour peace, is derived this second law; that a man The second be willing, when others are so too, as far-forth, as for peace, and deftnce law of of himselfhe shall think it necessary, to lay down this right to all things; nature. and be contented with so much liberty against other men, as he would allow other men against himself. For as long as every man holdeth this right, of doing any thing he liketh; so long are all men in the [65] condition of war. But if other men will not lay down their right, as well as he; then there is no reason for any one, to divest himself of his: for that were to expose himselfto prey, (which no man is bound to) rather than to dipose himself to peace. This is that law of the Gospel; whatsoever you require that others should do to you, that do ye to them. And that law of all men, quod tibi fieri non vis, alteri ne ftceris. * 6. To lay down a man's right to any thing, is to divest himself of What it is to the liberty, of hindering another of the benefit of his own right to the lay down a same. For he that renounceth, or passeth away his right, giveth not right. to any other man a right which he had not before; because there is nothing to which every man had not right by nature: but only standeth out of his way, that he may enjoy his own original right, without hindrance from him; not without hindrance from another. So that the effect which redoundeth to one man, by another man's defect of right, is but so much diminution of impediments to the use of his own right original. Renouncing 7. Right is laid aside, either by simply renouncing it; or by trans- a right what ferring it to another. By simply RENOUNCING; when he cares not to it is.

PART I

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whom the benefit thereof redoundeth. By TRANSFERRING; when he intendeth the benefit thereof to some certain person, or persons. And when a man hath in either manner abandoned, or granted away Obligation his right; then he is said to be OBLIGED, or BOUND, not to hinder those, to whom such right is granted, or abandoned, from the Duty. benefit of it: and that he ought, and it is his DUTY, not to make void Injustice. that voluntary act of his own: and that such hindrance is INJUSTICE, and INJURY, as being sine jure; the right being before renounced, or transferred. So that injury, or injustice, in the controversies of the world, is somewhat like to that, which in the disputations of scholars is called absurdity. For as it is there called an absurdity, to contradict what one maintained in the beginning: so in the world, it is called injustice, and injury, voluntarily to undo that, which from the beginning he had voluntarily done. The way by which a man either simply renounceth, or transferreth his right, is a declaration, or signification, by some voluntary and sufficient sign, or signs, that he doth so renounce, or transfer; or hath so renounced, or transferred the same, to him that accepteth it. And these signs are either words only, or actions only; or (as it happeneth most often) both words, and actions. And the same are the BONDS, by which men are bound, and obliged: bonds, that have their strength, not from their own nature, (for nothing is more easily broken than a man's word,) but from fear of some evil consequence upon the rupture. 8. Whensoever a man transferreth his right, or renounceth it; it is either in consideration of some right reciprocally transferred to himself; or for some other good he hopeth for thereby. For it is a [66] voluntary act:* and of the voluntary acts of every man, the object is Not all rights some good to himself And therefore there be some rights, which are alienable. no man can be understood by any words, or other signs, to have abandoned, or transferred. 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 aim thereby, at any good to himself. The same may be said of wounds, and chains, and imprisonment; both because there is no benefit consequent to such patience; as there is to the patience of suffering another to be wounded, or imprisoned: as also because a man cannot tell, when he seeth men proceed against him by violence, whether they intend his death or not. And lastly the motive, and end for which this renouncing, and transferring of right is introduced, is nothing else but the security of a man's person, in his life, and in the means of so

Transferring right what.

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preserving life, as not to be weary of it. And therefore if a man by words, or other signs, seem to despoil himself of the end, for which those signs were intended; he is not to be understood as if he meant it, or that it was his will; but that he was ignorant of how such words and actions were to be interpreted. 9. The mutual transferring of right, is that which men call Contract CONTRACT.

10. There is difference, between transferring of right to the thing; and transferring, or tradition, that is, delivery of the thing itself. For the thing may be delivered together with the translation of the right; as in buying and selling with ready-money; or exchange of goods, or lands: and it may be delivered some time after. 11. Again, one of the contractors, may deliver the thing contracted for on his part, and leave the other to perform his part at some determinate time after, and in the mean time be trusted; and then the contract on his part, is called PACT, or COVENANT: or both parts may contract now, to perform hereafter: in which cases, he that is to perform in time to come, being trusted, his performance is called keeping ofpromise, or faith; and the failing of performance (if it be voluntary) violation offoith. 12. When the transferring of right, is not mutual; but one of the parties transferreth, in hope to gain thereby friendship, or service from another, or from his friends; or in hope to gain the reputation of charity, or magnanimity; or to deliver his mind from the pain of compassion; or in hope of reward in heaven; this is not contract, but GIFT, FREE-GIFT, GRACE: which words signify one and the same thing. 13. Signs of contract, are either express, or by inference. Express, are words spoken with understanding of what they signify: and such words are either of the time present, or past; as, I give, I grant, I have given, I have granted, I wi/{that this be yours: or of the future; as, I will give, I will grant: which words of the future are called PROMISE. 14. Signs by inference, are sometimes the consequence of words; sometimes the consequence of silence; sometimes the consequence of actions; sometimes the consequence of forbearing an action: and generally a sign by inference, of any contract, is whatsoever sufficiently argues the will of the contractor. 15. Words alone, if they be of the time to come, and contain a bare promise, are an insufficient sign of a free-gift, and therefore not obligatory. For if they be of the time to come, as, to-morrow I will

what.

Covenant what.

Free-gift. Signs of contract express. Promise.

[67] Signs of contract by inference. Free gift passeth by words of the present or past.

PART I

Signs of contraa are words both of the past, present, and future.

Merit what.

OF MAN

give, they are a sign I have not given yet, and consequently thai: my right is not transferred, but remaineth till I transfer it by some other act. But if the words be of the time present, or past, as, I have given, or do give to be delivered to-morrow, then is my morrow's right given away to-day; and that by the virtue of the words, though there were no other argument of my will. And there is a great difference in the signification of these words, volo hoc tuum esse eras, and eras dabo; that is, between I will that this be thine to-morrow, and, I will give it thee to-morrow: for the word I will, in the former manner of speech, signifies an act of the will present; but in the latter, it signifies a promise of an act of the will to come: and therefore the former words, being of the present, transfer a future right; the latter, that be of the future, transfer nothing. But if there be other signs of the will to transfer a right, besides words; then, though the gift be free, yet may the right be understood to pass by words of the future: as if a man propound a prize to him that comes first to the end of a race, the gift is free; and though the words be of the future, yet the right passeth: for if he would not have his words so be understood, he should not have let them run. 16. In contracts, the right passeth, not only where the words are of the time present, or past; but also where they are of the future: because all contract is mutual translation, or change of right; and therefore he that promiseth only, because he hath already received the benefit for which he promiseth, is to be understood as if he intended the right should pass: for unless he had been content to have his words so understood, the other would not have performed his part first. And for that cause, in buying, and selling, and other acts of contract, a promise is equivalent to a covenant; and therefore obligatory. 17. He that performeth first in the case of a contract, is said to MERIT that which he is to receive by the performance of the other; and he hath it as due. Also when a prize is propounded to many, which is to be given to him only that winneth; or money is thrown amongst many, to be enjoyed by them that catch it; though this be a free gift; yet so to win, or so to catch, is to merit, and to have it as DUE. For the right is transferred in the propounding of the prize, and in throwing down the money; though it be not determined to whom, but by the event of the contention. But there is between these two sorts of merit, this difference, that in contract, I merit by virtue of my own power, and the contractor's need; but in this case of free 90

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gift, I am enabled to merit only by the benignity of the giver: in contract, I merit at the contractor's hand that he should depart with his right; in this case of gift, I merit not that the giver should part [68] with his right; but that when he has parted with it, it should be mine, rather than another's. And this I think to be the meaning of that distinction of the Schools, between meritum congrui, and meritum condigni.* For God Almighty, having promised Paradise to those men (hoodwinked with carnal desires,) that can walk through this world according to the precepts, and limits prescribed by him; they say, he that shall so walk, shall merit Paradise ex congruo. But because no man can demand a right to it, by his own righteousness, or any other power in himself, but by the free grace of God only; they say, no man can merit Paradise ex condigno. This I say, I think is the meaning of that distinction; but because disputers do not agree upon the signification of their own terms of art, longer than it serves their turn; I will not affirm any thing of their meaning: only this I say; when a gift is given indefinitely, as a prize to be contended for, he that winneth meriteth, and may claim the prize as due. 18. If a covenant be made, wherein neither of the parties perform Covenants of presently, but trust one another; in the condition of mere nature, mutual trust, (which is a condition of war of every man against every man,) upon when invalid. any reasonable suspicion, it is void: but if there be a common power set over them both, with right and force sufficient to compel performance, it is not void. For he that performeth first, has no assurance the other will perform after; because the bonds of words are too weak to bridle men's ambition, avarice, anger, and other passions, without the fear of some coercive power; which in the condition of mere nature, where all men are equal, and judges of the justness of their own fears, cannot possibly be supposed. And therefore he which performeth first, does but betray himself to his enemy; contrary to the right (he can never abandon) of defending his life, and means of living. 19. But in a civil estate, where there is a power set up to constrain those that would otherwise violate their faith, that fear is no more reasonable; and for that cause, he which by the covenant is to perform first, is obliged so to do. 20. The cause of fear, which maketh such a covenant invalid, must be always something arising after the covenant made; as some new fact, or other sign of the will not to perform: else it cannot make the covenant void. For that which could not hinder a man

PART I

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from promising, ought not to be admitted as a hindrance of performing. Right to 21. He that transferreth any right, transferreth the means of the end, enjoying it, as far as lieth in his power. As he that selleth land, is containeth understood to transfer the herbage, and whatsoever grows upon it; right to the nor can he that sells a mill turn away the stream that drives it. And means. they that give to a man the right of government in sovereignty, are understood to give him the right of levying money to maintain soldiers; and of appointing magistrates for the administration of justice. No covenant 22. To make covenants with brute beasts, is impossible; because with beasts. not understanding our speech, they understand not, nor accept of [69] any translation of right; nor can translate any right to another: and without mutual acceptation, there is no covenant. Nor with 23. To make covenant with God,* is impossible, but by meGod without diation of such as God speaketh to, either by revelation supernatuspecial ral, or by his lieutenants that govern under him, and in his name: for revelation. otherwise we know not whether our covenants be accepted, or not. And therefore they that vow anything contrary to any law of nature, vow in vain; as being a thing unjust to pay such vow. And if it be a thing commanded by the law of nature, it is not the vow, but the law that binds them. No counant, 24. The matter, or subject of a covenant, is always something but ofpossible that falleth under deliberation; (for to covenant, is an act of the will; and future. that is to say an act, and the last act, of deliberation;) and is therefore always understood to be something to come; and which is judged possible for him that covenanteth, to perform. 25. And therefore, to promise that which is known to be impossible, is no covenant. But if that prove impossible afterwards, which before was thought possible, the covenant is valid, and bindeth, (though not to the thing itself,) yet to the value; or, if that also be impossible, to the unfeigned endeavour of performing as much as is possible: for to more no man can be obliged. Covenants 26. Men are freed of their covenants two ways; by performing; or how made by being forgiven. For performance, is the natural end of obligation; void. and forgiveness, the restitution of liberty; as being a retransferring of that right, in which the obligation consisted. Covenants 27. Covenants entered into by fear, in the condition of mere extorted by nature, are obligatory. For example, if I covenant to pay a ransom, fear are or service for my life, to an enemy; I am bound by it. For it is a valid.

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contract, wherein one receiveth the benefit of life; the other is to receive money, or service for it; and consequently, where no other law (as in the condition, of mere nature) forbiddeth the performance, the covenant is valid. Therefore prisoners of war, if trusted with the payment of their ransom, are obliged to pay it: and if a weaker prince, make a disadvantageous peace with a stronger, for fear; he is bound to keep it; unless (as hath been said before) there ariseth some new, and just cause of fear, to renew the war. And even in commonwealths, if I be forced to redeem myself from a thief by promising him money, I am bound to pay it, till the civil law discharge me. For whatsoever I may lawfully do without obligation, the same I may lawfully covenant to do through fear: and what I lawfully covenant, I cannot lawfully break. 28. A former covenant, makes void a later. For a man that hath The former passed away his right to one man to-day, hath it not to pass to- covenant to morrow to another: and therefore the later promise passeth no right, one, makes void the later but is null. to another. 29. * A covenant not to defend myself from force, by force, is A man's always void. For (as I have showed before) no man can transfer, or covenant not lay down his right to save himself from death, wounds, and impris- to defend himself, is onment, (the avoiding whereof is the only end of laying down any void. right;) and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no [70] covenant transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may covenant thus, unless I do so, or so, kill me; he cannot covenant thus, unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me. For man by nature chooseth the lesser evil, which is danger of death in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men, in that they lead criminals to execution, and prison, with armed men, notwithstanding that such criminals have consented to the law, by which they are condemned. 30. A covenant to accuse oneself, without assurance of pardon, is No man likewise invalid. For in the condition of nature, where every man obliged to is judge, there is no place for accusation: and in the civil state, the accuse himself accusation is followed with punishment; which being force, a man is not obliged not to resist. The same is also true, of the accusation of those, by whose condemnation a man falls into misery; as of a father, wife, or benefactor. For the testimony of such an accuser, if it be not willingly given, is presumed to be corrupted by nature: and therefore not to be received: and where a man's testimony is not to 93

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be credited, he is not bound to give it. Also accusations upon torture, are not to be reputed as testimonies. For torture is to be used but as means of conjecture, and light, in the further examination, and search of truth: and what is in that case confessed, tendeth to the ease of him that is tortured; not to the informing of the torturers: and therefore ought not to have the credit of a sufficient testimony: for whether he deliver himself by true, or false accusation, he does it by the right of preserving his own life. The end of 31. The force of words, being (as I have formerly noted) too weak an oath. to hold men to the performance of their covenants; there are in man's nature, but two imaginable helps to strengthen it. And those are either a fear of the consequence of breaking their word; or a glory, or pride in appearing not to need to break it. This latter is a generosity too rarely found to be presumed on, especially in the pursuers of wealth, command, or sensual pleasure; which are the greatest part of mankind. The passion to be reckoned upon, is fear; whereof there be two very general objects: one, the power of spirits invisible; the other, the power of those men they shall therein offend. Of these two, though the former be the greater power, yet the fear of the latter is commonly the greater fear. The fear of the former is in every man, his own religion: which hath place in the nature of man before civil society. The latter hath not so; at least not place enough, to keep men to their promises; because in the condition of mere nature, the inequality of power is not discerned, but by the event of battle. So that before the time of civil society, or in the interruption thereof by war, there is nothing can strengthen a covenant of peace agreed on, against the temptations of avarice, ambition, lust, or other strong desire, but the fear of that invisible power, which they every one worship as God; and fear as a revenger of their perfidy. All therefore that can be done between two men not [71] subject to civil power, is to put one another to swear by the God he The form of feareth: which swearing, or OATH, is a form of speech, added to a an oath. promise; by which he that promiseth, signifieth, that unless he perform, he renounceth the mercy of his God, or calleth to him for vengeance on himself Such was the heathen form, Let Jupiter kill me else, as I kill this beast. So is our form, I shall do thus, and thus, so help me God. And this, with the rites and ceremonies, which every one useth in his own religion, that the fear of breaking faith might be the greater. 32. By this it appears, that an oath taken according to any other form, or rite, than his, that sweareth, is in vain; and no oath: and that 94

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there is no swearing by any thing which the swearer thinks not God. For though men have sometimes used to swear by their kings, for fear, or flattery; yet they would have it thereby understood, they attributed to them divine honour. And that swearing unnecessarily by God, is but profaning of his name: and swearing by other things, as men do in common discourse, is not swearing, but an impious custom, gotten by too much vehemence of talking. 33. It appears also, that the oath adds nothing to the obligation. For a covenant, if lawful, binds in the sight of God, without the oath, as much as with it: if unlawful, bindi!th not at all; though it be confirmed with an oath.

No oath but by God.

An oath adds nothing to the obligation.

CHAPTER XV OF OTHER LAWS OF NATURE

I. FRoM that law of nature, by which we are obliged to transfer to another, such rights, as being retained, hinder the peace of mankind, there followeth a third; which is this, that men perform their covenants made: without which, covenants are in vain, and but empty words; and the right of all men to all things remaining, we are still in the condition of war. 2. And in this law of nature, consisteth the fountain and original of JUSTICE. For where no covenant hath preceded, there hath no right been transferred, and every man has right to every thing; and consequently, no action can be unjust. But when a covenant is made, then to break it is unjust: and the definition of INJUSTICE, is no other than the not performance ofcovenant. And whatsoever is not unjust, is just. 3. But because covenants of mutual trust, where there is a fear of not performance on either part, (as hath been said in the former chapter,) are invalid; though the original of justice be the making of . . . ll h b . h covenants; yet InJUStice actua y t ere can e none, t1 11 t e cause of such fear be taken away; which while men are in the natural condition of war, cannot be done. Therefore before the names of just, and unjust can have place, there must be some coercive power, to compel men equally to the performance of their covenants, by the terror of some punishment, greater than the benefit they expect by 95

The third law of nature, justice.

Justice and injustice what.

Justice and propriety begin with the. .r constitutiOn OJ commonwealth.

PART I

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[72] the breach of their covenant; and to make good that propriety, which by mutual contract men acquire, in recompense of the universal right they abandon: and such power there is none before the erection of a commonwealth. And this is also to be gathered out of the ordinary definition of justice in the Schools: for they say, thatjustice is the constant will of giving to every man his own.* And therefore where there is no own, that is, no propriety, there is no injustice; and where there is no coercive power erected, that is, where there is no commonwealth, there is no propriety; all men having right to all things: therefore where there is no commonwealth, there nothing is unjust. So that the nature of justice, consisteth in keeping of valid covenants: but the validity of covenants begins not but with the constitution of a civil power, sufficient to compel men to keep them: and then it is also that propriety begins. Justice not 4. The fool hath said in his heart, there is no such thing as contrary to justice;* and sometimes also with his tongue; seriously alleging, that reason. every man's conservation, and contentment, being committed to his own care, there could be no reason, why every man might not do what he thought conduced thereunto: and therefore also to make, or not make; keep, or not keep covenants, was not against reason, when it conduced to one's benefit. He does not therein deny, that there be covenants; and that they are sometimes broken, sometimes kept; and that such breach of them may be called injustice, and the observance of them justice: but he questioneth, whether injustice, taking away the fear of God, (for the same fool hath said in his heart there is no God,) may not sometimes stand with that reason, which dictateth to every man his own good; and particularly then, when it conduceth to such a benefit, as shall put a man in a condition, to neglect not only the dispraise, and revilings, but also the power of other men. The kingdom of God is gotten by violence:* but what if it could be gotten by unjust violence? were it against reason so to get it, when it is impossible to receive hurt by it? and if it be not against reason, it is not against justice: or else justice is not to be approved for good. From such reasoning as this, successful wickedness hath obtained the name of virtue: and some that in all other things have disallowed the violation of faith; yet have allowed it, when it is for the getting of a kingdom. And the heathen that believed, that Saturn was deposed by his son Jupiter, believed nevertheless the same Jupiter to be the avenger of injustice: somewhat like to a piece of law in Coke's* Commentaries on Littleton; where he says, if the right heir of

OF MAN

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the crown be attainted of treason; yet the crown shall descend to him, and eo instante the attainder be void: from which instances a man will be very prone to infer; that when the heir apparent of a kingdom, shall kill him that is in possession, though his father; you may call it injustice, or by what other name you will; yet it can never be against reason, seeing all the voluntary actions of men tend to the benefit of themselves; and those actions are most reasonable, that conduce most to their ends. This specious reasoning is nevertheless false. [73] 5. For the question is not of promises mutual, where there is no security of performance on either side; as when there is no civil power erected over the parties promising; for such promises are no covenants: but either where one of the parties has performed already; or where there is a power to make him perform; there is the question whether it be against reason, that is, against the benefit of the other to perform, or not. And I say it is not against reason. For the manifestation whereof, we are to consider; first, that when a man doth a thing, which notwithstanding any thing can be foreseen, and reckoned on, tendeth to his own destruction, howsoever some accident which he could not expect, arriving may turn it to his benefit; yet such events do not make it reasonably or wisely done. Secondly, that in a condition of war, wherein every man to every man, for want of a common power to keep them all in awe, is an enemy, there is no man can hope by his own strength, or wit, to defend himself from destruction, without the help of confederates; where every one expects the same defence by the confederation, that any one else does: and therefore he which declares he thinks it reason to deceive those that help him, can in reason expect no other means of safety, than what can be had from his own single power. He therefore that breaketh his covenant, and consequently declareth that he thinks he may with reason do so, cannot be received into any society, that unite themselves for peace and defence, but by the error of them that receive him; nor when he is received, be retained in it, without seeing the danger of their error; which errors a man cannot reasonably reckon upon as the means of his security: and therefore if he be left, or cast out of society, he perisheth; and if he live in society, it is by the errors of other men, which he could not foresee, nor reckon upon; and consequently against the reason of his preservation; and so, as all men that contribute not to his destruction, forbear him only out of ignorance of what is good for themselves. 97

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6. * As for the instance of gaining the secure and perpetual felicity of heaven, by any way; it is frivolous: there being but one way imaginable; and that is not breaking, but keeping of covenant. 7. And for the other instance of attaining sovereignty by rebellion; it is manifest, that though the event follow, yet because it cannot reasonably be expected, but rather the contrary; and because by gaining it so, others are taught to gain the same in like manner, the attempt thereof is against reason. Justice therefore, that is to say, keeping of covenant, is a rule of reason, by which we are forbidden to do any thing destructive to our life; and consequently a law of nature. 8. There be some that proceed further; and will not have the law of nature, to be those rules which conduce to the preservation of man's life on earth; but to the attaining of an eternal felicity after death; to which they think the breach of covenant may conduce; and consequently be just and reasonable; (such are they that think it a [74] work of merit to kill, or depose, or rebel against, the sovereign power constituted over them by their own consent.) But because there is no natural knowledge of man's estate after death; much less of the reward that is then to be given to breach of faith; but only a belief grounded upon other men's saying that they know it supernaturally, or that they know those, that knew them, that knew others, that knew it supernaturally; breach of faith cannot be called a precept of reason, or nature. Covenants 9. Others, that allow for a law of nature, the keeping of faith, do not nevertheless make exception of certain persons; as heretics, and discharged ~y such as use not to perform their covenant to others: and this also is the vice of the person to against reason. For if any fault of a man, be sufficient to discharge our covenant made; the same ought in reason to have been sufficient whom they are made. to have hindered the making of it. 10. The names of just, and unjust, when they are attributed to Justice of men and men, signify one thing; and when they are attributed to actions, justice of another. When they are attributed to men, they signify conformity, actions what. or inconformity of manners, to reason. But when they are attributed to actions, they signify the conformity, or inconformity to reason, not of manners, or manner of life, but of particular actions. A just man therefore, is he that taketh all the care he can, that his actions may be all just: and an unjust man, is he that neglecteth it. And such men are more often in our language styled by the names of righteous, and unrighteous; than just, and unjust; though the

OF MAN

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meaning be the same. Therefore a righteous man, does not lose that title, by one, or a few unjust actions, that proceed from sudden passion, or mistake of things, or persons: nor does an unrighteous man, lose his character, for such actions, as he does, or forbears to do, for fear: because his will is not framed by the justice, but by the apparent benefit of what he is to do. That which gives to human actions the relish of justice, is a certain nobleness or gallantness of courage, (rarely found,) by which a man scorns to be beholding for the contentment of his life, to fraud, or breach of promise. This justice of the manners,* is that which is meant, where justice is called a virtue; and injustice a vice. 11. But the justice of actions denominates men, not just, but guiltless: and the injustice of the same, (which is also called injury,) gives them but the name of guilty. 12. Again, the injustice of manners, is the disposition, or apti- Justice of tude to do injury; and is injustice before it proceed to act; and manners, and without supposing any individual person injured. But the injustice Justtce of actions. of an action, (that is to say injury,) supposeth an individual person injured; namely him, to whom the covenant was made: and therefore many times the injury is received by one man, when the damage redoundeth to another. As when the master commandeth his servant to give money to a stranger; if it be not done, the injury is done to the master, whom he had before covenanted to obey; but the damage redoundeth to the stranger, to whom he had no obligation; and therefore could not injure him. And so also in commonwealths, private men may remit to one another their debts; but not robberies [75] or other violences, whereby they are endamaged; because the detaining of debt, is an injury to themselves; but robbery and violence, are injuries to the person of the commonwealth. 13. Whatsoever is done to a man, conformable to his own will Nothing done signified to the doer, is no injury to him. For if he that doeth it, hath to a man by not passed away his original right to do what he please, by some his own consent can antecedent covenant, there is no breach of covenant; and therefore be injury. no injury done him. And if he have; then his will to have it done being signified, is a release of that covenant: and so again there is no injury done him. 14. Justice of actions, is by writers* divided into commutative, Justice and distributive: and the former they say consisteth in proportion commutative arithmetical; the latter in proportion geometrical. Commutative and distributive. therefore, they place in the equality of value of the things contracted

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for; and distributive, in the distribution of equal benefit, to men of equal merit. As if it were injustice to sell dearer than we buy; or to give more to a man than he merits. The value of all things contracted for, is measured by the appetite of the contractors: and therefore the just value, is that which they be contented to give. And merit (besides that which is by covenant, where the performance on one part, meriteth the performance of the other part, and falls under justice commutative, not distributive,) is not due by justice; but is rewarded of grace only. And therefore this distinction, in the sense wherein it useth to be expounded, is not right. To speak properly, commutative justice, is the justice of a contractor; that is, a performance of covenant, in buying, and selling; hiring, and letting to hire; lending, and borrowing; exchanging, bartering, and other acts of contract. 15. And distributive justice, the justice of an arbitrator; that is to say, the act of defining what is just. Wherein, (being trusted by them that make him arbitrator,) if he perform his trust, he is said to distribute to every man his own: and this is indeed just distribution, and may be called (though improperly) distributive justice; but more properly equity; which also is a law of nature, as shall be shown in due place. The fourth 16. As justice dependeth on antecedent covenant; so does GRATIlaw of TUDE depend on antecedent grace; that is to say, antecedent free gift: nature, and is the fourth law of nature; which may be conceived in this form, gratitude. that a man which receiveth benefit from another of mere grace, endeavour that he which giveth it, have no reasonable cause to repent him ofhis good will. For no man giveth, but with intention of good to himself; because gift is voluntary; and of all voluntary acts, the object is to every man his own good; of which if men see they shall be frustrated, there will be no beginning of benevolence, or trust; nor consequently of mutual help; nor of reconciliation of one man to another; and therefore they are to remain still in the condition of war; which is contrary to the first and fundamental law of nature, which commandeth men to seek peace. The breach of this law, is [76] called ingratitude; and hath the same relation to grace, that injustice hath to obligation by covenant. The fifth, 17. A fifth law of nature, is COMPLAISANCE; that is to say, that mutual every man strive to accommodate himself to the rest. For the underaccommodation, standing whereof, we may consider, that there is in men's aptness to or complaisance. society, a diversity of nature, rising from their diversity of affec100

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tions; not unlike to that we see in stones brought together for building of an edifice. For as that stone which by the asperity, and irregt>larity of figure, takes more room from others, than itself fills; and for the hardness, cannot be easily made plain, and thereby hindereth the building, is by the builders cast away as unprofitable, and troublesome: so also, a man that by asperity of nature, will strive to retain those things which to himself are superfluous, and to others necessary; and for the stubbornness of his passions, cannot be corrected, is to be left, or cast out of society, as cumbersome thereunto. For seeing every man, not only by right, but also by necessity of nature, is supposed to endeavour all he can, to obtain that which is necessary for his conservation; he that shall oppose himself against it, for things superfluous, is guilty of the war that thereupon is to follow; and therefore doth that, which is contrary to the fundamental law of nature, which commandeth to seek peace. The observers of this law, may be called SOCIABLE, (the Latins call them commodi;) the contrary, stubborn, insociable, froward [perverse], intractable. 18. A sixth law of nature, is this, that upon caution of the future time, a man ought to pardon the offences past of them that repenting, desire it. For PARDON, is nothing but granting of peace; which though granted to them that persevere in their hostility, be not peace, but fear; yet not granted to them that give caution of the future time, is sign of an aversion to peace; and therefore contrary to the law of nature. 19. A seventh is, that in revenges, (that is, retribution of evil for evil,) men look not at the greatness ofthe evil past, but the greatness of the good to follow. Whereby we are forbidden to inflict punishment . h any oth er des1gn, . . w1t t han rtor correction of t heo firten der, or d'1rection of others. For this law is consequent to the next before it, that commandeth pardon, upon security of the future time. Besides, revenge without respect to the example, and profit to come, is a triumph, or glorying in the hurt of another, tending to no end; (for the end is always somewhat to come;) and glorying to no end, is vain-glory, and contrary to reason; and to hurt without reason, tendeth to the introduction of war; which is against the law of nature; and is commonly styled by the name of cruelty. 20. And because all signs of hatred, or contempt, provoke to fight; insomuch as most men choose rather to hazard their life, than not to be revenged; we may in the eighth place, for a law of nature, 101

The sixth, facility to pardon.

The seventh, that in revenges, /men respect ony the future good.

The eighth, against contumely.

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set down this precept, that no man by deed, word, countenance, or gesture, declare hatred, or contempt of another. The breach of which law, is commonly called contumely. 21. The question who is the better man, has no place in the condition of mere nature; where, (as has been shewn before,) all men [77] are equal. The inequality that now is, has been introduced by the laws civil. I know that Aristotle in the first book of his Politics, for a foundation of his doctrine, maketh men by nature, some more worthy to command, meaning the wiser sort (such as he thought himself to be for his philosophy;) others to serve, (meaning those that had strong bodies, but were not philosophers as he;) as if master and servant were not introduced by consent of men, but by difference of wit: which is not only against reason; but also against experience. For there are very few so foolish, that had not rather govern themselves, than be governed by others: nor when the wise in their own conceit, contend by force, with them who distrust their own wisdom, do they always, or often, or almost at any time, get the victory. If nature therefore have made men equal, that equality is to be acknowledged: or if nature have made men unequal; yet because men that think themselves equal, will not enter into conditions of peace, but upon equal terms, such equality must be admitted. And therefore for the ninth law of nature, I put this, that every man acknowledge another for his equal by nature. The breach of this precept is pride. The tenth, 22. On this law, dependeth another, that at the entrance into

The ninth, against pride.

against arrogance.

conditions ofpeace, no man require to reserve to himselfany right, which he is not content should be reserved to every one of the rest. As it is

necessary for all men that seek peace, to lay down certain rights of nature; that is to say, not to have liberty to do all they list: so is it necessary for man's life, to retain some; as right to govern their own bodies; enjoy air, water, motion, ways to go from place to place; and all things else, without which a man cannot live, or not live well. If in this case, at the making of peace, men require for themselves, that which they would not have to be granted to others, they do contrary to the precedent law, that commandeth the acknowledgment of natural equality, and therefore also against the law of nature. The observers of this law, are those we call modest, and the breakers arrogant men. The Greeks call the violation of this law nA.eove~ia; that is, a desire of more than their share. I02

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23. Also if a man be trusted to judge between man and man, it is a precept of the law of nature, that he deal equally between them. For without that, the controversies of men cannot be determined but by war. He therefore that is partial in judgment, doth what in him lies, to deter men from the use of judges, and arbitrators; and consequently, (against the fundamental law of nature) is the cause of war. 24. The observance of this law, from the equal distribution to each man, of that which in reason belongeth to him, is called EQUITY, and (as I have said before) distributive justice: the violation, acception [favouritism] ofpersons, npoawnoJ..:rpjJ{a. 25. And from this followeth another law, that such things as can-

The eleunth, equity.

The twelfth,

not be divided, be enjoyed in common, if it can be; and if the quantity of equal use of the thing permit, without stint; otherwise proportionably to the number things of them that have right. For otherwise the distribution is unequal, common.

and contrary to equity. 26. But some things there be, that can neither be divided, nor [78] enjoyed in common. Then, the law of nature, which prescribeth The equity, requireth, that the entire right; or else, (making the use alter- thirteenth, nate,) the first possession, be determined by lot. For equal distribution, of lot. is of the law of nature; and other means of equal distribution cannot be imagined. 27. Of lots there be two sorts, arbitrary, and natural. Arbitrary, is The that which is agreed on by the competitors: natural, is either primo- fourteenth, of geniture, (which the Greek calls x).YJ(!OVOf1La, which signifies, given primogeniture, and first by lot;) or first seizure. seizing. 28. And therefore those things which cannot be enjoyed in common, nor divided, ought to be adjudged to the first possessor; and in some cases to the first born, as acquired by lot.* 29. It is also a law of nature, that all men that mediate peace, be The .fifteenth, allowed safe conduct. For the law that commandeth peace, as the end, of mediators. commandeth intercession, as the means; and to intercession the means is safe conduct. 30. And because, though men be never so willing to observe The these laws, there may nevertheless arise questions concerning a sixteenth, of man's action; fi rst, whether it were done, or not done; secon dly (t'f submission to arbitrement. done) whether against the law, or not against the law; the former whereof, is called a question offact; the latter a question of right, therefore unless the parties to the question, covenant mutually to stand to the sentence of another, they are as far from peace as ever. 103

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The seventeenth, no man is his own judge.

The eighteenth, no man to be judge, that has in him a natural cause ofpartiality. The nineteenth, of witnesses.

[79] A rule, by which the laws of nature may easily be examined.

OF MAN

This other, to whose sentence they submit is called an ARBITRATOR. And therefore it is of the law of nature, that they that are at controversy, submit their right to the judgment of an arbitrator. 31. And seeing every man is presumed to do all things in order to his own benefit, no man is a fit arbitrator in his own cause: and if he were never so fit; yet equity allowing to each party equal benefit, if one be admitted to be judge, the other is to be admitted also; and so the controversy, that is, the cause of war, remains, against the law of nature. 32. For the same reason no man in any cause ought to be received for arbitrator, to whom greater profit, or honour, or pleasure apparently ariseth out of the victory of one party, than of the other: for he hath taken (though an unavoidable bribe, yet) a bribe; and no man can be obliged to trust him. And thus also the controversy, and the condition of war remaineth, contrary to the law of nature. 33. And in a controversy offact, the judge being to give no more credit to one, than to the other, (if there be no other arguments) must give credit to a third; or to a third and fourth; or more: for else the question is undecided, and left to force, contrary to the law of nature. 34. These are the laws of nature, dictating peace, for a means of the conservation of men in multitudes; and which only concern the doctrine of civil society. There be other things tending to the destruction of particular men; as drunkenness, and all other parts of intemperance; which may therefore also be reckoned amongst those things which the law of nature hath forbidden; but are not necessary to be mentioned, nor are pertinent enough to this place. 35. And though this may seem too subtle a deduction of the laws of nature, to be taken notice of by all men; whereof the most part are too busy in getting food, and the rest too negligent to understand; yet to leave all men inexcusable, they have been contracted into one easy sum, intelligible even to the meanest capacity; and that is, Do not that to another, which thou wouldest not have done to thyself; which sheweth him, that he has no more to do in learning the laws of nature, but, when weighing the actions of other men with his own, they seem too heavy, to put them into the other part of the balance, and his own into their place, that his own passions, and self-love, may add nothing to the weight; and then there is none of these laws of nature that will not appear unto him very reasonable. 104

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36. The laws of nature oblige in foro it:terno;* that is to say, they The laws of bind to a desire they should take place: but in foro externo; that is, to nature oblige conscience the putting them in act, not always. For he that should be modest, in always, but and tractable, and perform all he promises, in such time, and in effict then place, where no man else should do so, should but make himself a only when prey to others, and procure his own certain ruin, contrary to the there is ground of all laws of nature, which tend to nature's preservation. security. And again, he that having sufficient security, that others shall observe the same laws towards him, observes them not himself, seeketh not peace, but war; and consequently the destruction of his nature by violence. 37. And whatsoever laws bind in foro interno, may be broken, not only by a fact contrary to the law, but also by a fact according to it, in case a man think it contrary. For though his action in this case, be according to the law; yet his purpose was against the law; which where the obligation is in foro interno, is a breach. 38. The laws of nature are immutable and eternal; for injustice, The laws of ingratitude, arrogance, pride, iniquity, acception of persons, and the nature are rest, can never be made lawful. For it can never be that war shall eternal; preserve life, and peace destroy it. 39. The same laws, because they oblige only to a desire, and And yet easy. endeavour, I mean an unfeigned and constant endeavour, are easy to be observed. For in that they require nothing but endeavour; he that endeavoureth their performance, fulfilleth them; and he that fulfilleth the law, is just. 40. And the science of them, is the true and only moral philos- The science of ophy. For moral philosophy is nothing else but the science of what these laws, is the true is good, and evil, in the conversation, and society of mankind. Good, moral and evil, are names that signify our appetites, and aversions; which philosophy. in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different: and divers men, differ not only in their judgment, on the senses of what is pleasant, and unpleasant to the taste, smell, hearing, touch, and sight; but also of what is conformable, or disagreeable to reason, in the actions of common life. Nay, the same man, in divers times, differs from himself; and one time praiseth, that is, calleth good, what another time he dispraiseth, and calleth evil: from whence arise [80] disputes, controversies, and at last war. And therefore so long as a man is in the condition of mere nature, (which is a condition of war,) as private appetite is the measure of good, and evil: and consequently all men agree on this, that peace is good, and therefore also 105

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the way, or means of peace, which (as I have shewed before) are justice, gratitude, modesty, equity, mercy, and the rest of the laws of nature, are good; that is to say; moral virtues; and their contrary vices,

evil. Now the science of virtue and vice, is moral philosophy; and therefore the true doctrine of the laws of nature, is the true moral philosophy. But the writers of moral philosophy, though they acknowledge the same virtues and vices; yet not seeing wherein consisted their goodness; nor that they come to be praised, as the means of peaceable, sociable, and comfortable living; place them in a mediocrity of passions: as if not the cause, but the degree of daring, made fortitude; or not the cause, but the quantity of a gift, made liberality. 41. These dictates of reason, men used to call by the name of laws; but improperly: for they are but conclusions, or theorems concerning what conduceth to the conservation and defence of themselves; whereas law, properly is the word of him, that by right hath command over others. But yet if we consider the same theorems, as delivered in the word of God, that by right commandeth all things; then are they properly called laws.

CHAPTER XVI OF PERSONS, AUTHORS, AND THINGS PERSONATED*

A person what. Person natural, and artificial. The word person, whence.

I. A PERSON, is he, whose words or actions are considered, either as his own, or as representing the words or actions of another man, or of any other thing to whom they are attributed, whether truly or by fiction. 2. When they are considered as his own, then is he called a natural person: and when they are considered as representing the words and actions of another, then is he aftigned or artificial person.

3. The word person is Latin: instead whereof the Greeks have :rceoaw:rcov, which signifies the face, as persona in Latin signifies the disguise, or outward appearance of a man, counterfeited on the stage;

and sometimes more particularly that part of it, which disguiseth the face, as a mask or vizard [visor]: and from the stage, hath been translated to any representer of speech and action, as well in tribunals, as theatres. So that a person, is the same that an actor is, both on the stage and in common conversation; and to personate, is to act, 106

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or represent himself, or another; and he that acteth another, is said to bear his person, or act in his name; (in which sense Cicero useth it* where he says, Unus sustineo tres personas; mei, adversarii, etjudicis, I bear three persons; my own, my adversary's, and the judge's;) and is called in divers occasions, diversely; as a representer, or representa- [81] tive, a lieutenant, a vicar, an attorney, a deputy, a procurator, an actor, and the like. 4. Of persons artificial, some have their words and actions owned by those whom they represent. And then the person is the actor; and Auor. he that owneth his words and actions, is the AUTHOR: in which case Author. the actor acteth by authority. For that which in speaking of goods and possessions, is called an owner, and in Latin dominus, in Greek xvew;; speaking of actions, is called author. And as the right of possession, is called dominion; so the right of doing any action, is called AUTHORITY and sometimes warrant.* So that by authority, is Authority. always understood a right of doing any act: and done by authority, done by commission, or licence from him whose right it is. 5. From hence it followeth, that when the actor maketh a cov- Covenants by enant by authority, he bindeth thereby the author, no less than if he authority, had made it himself; and no less subjecteth him to all the conse- bind the author. quences of the same. And therefore all that hath been said formerly, (chap. XIV) of the nature of covenants between man and man in their natural capacity, is true also when they are made by their actors, representers, or procurators, that have authority from them, so far forth as is in their commission, but no further. 6. And therefore he that maketh a covenant with the actor, or representer, not knowing the authority he hath, doth it at his own peril. For no man is obliged by a covenant, whereof he is not author; nor consequently by a covenant made against, or beside the authority he gave. 7. When the actor doth any thing against the law of nature by But not the command of the author, if he be obliged by former covenant to obey actor. him, not he, but the author breaketh the law of nature: for though the action be against the law of nature; yet it is not his: but contrarily, to refuse to do it, is against the law of nature, that forbiddeth breach of covenant. 8. And he that maketh a covenant with the author, by mediation The authority of the actor, not knowing what authority he hath, but only takes his is to be word; in case such authority be not made manifest unto him upon shown. demand, is no longer obliged: for the covenant made with the 107

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author, is not valid, without his counter-assurance. But if he that so covenanteth, knew beforehand he was to expect no other assurance, than the actor's word; then is the covenant valid; because the actor in this case maketh himself the author. And therefore, as when the authority is evident, the covenant obligeth the author, not the actor; so when the authority is feigned, it obligeth the actor only; there being no author but himself. Things 9. There are few things, that are incapable of being represented personated, by fiction. Inanimate things, as a church, an hospital, a bridge, may inanimate. be personated by a rector, master, or overseer. But things inanimate, cannot be authors, nor therefore give authority to their actors: yet the actors may have authority to procure their maintenance, given [82] them by those that are owners, or governors of those things. And therefore, such things cannot be personated, before there be some state of civil government. Irrational. 10. Likewise children, fools, and madmen that have no use of reason, may be personated by guardians, or curators; but can be no authors (during that time) of any action done by them, longer than (when they shall recover the use of reason) they shall judge the same reasonable. Yet during the folly, he that hath right of governing them, may give authority to the guardian. But this again has no place but in a state civil, because before such estate, there is no dominion of persons. 11. An idol, or mere figment of the brain, may be personated; as False gods. were the gods of the heathen; which by such officers as the state appointed, were personated, and held possessions, and other goods, and rights, which men from time to time dedicated, and consecrated unto them. But idols cannot be authors: for an idol is nothing. The authority proceeded from the state: and therefore before introduction of civil government, the gods of the heathen could not be personated. 12. The true God may be personated. As he was; first, by Moses; The true God. who governed the Israelites (that were not his, but God's people,) not in his own name, with hoc dicit Moses; but in God's name, with hoc dicit Dominus.* Secondly, by the Son of man, his own Son, our blessed Saviour Jesus Christ, that came to reduce [recall] the Jews, and induce all nations into the kingdom of his father; not as of himself, but as sent from his father. And thirdly, by the Holy Ghost, or Comforter, speaking, and working in the Apostles: which Holy 108

OF MAN

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Ghost, was a Comforter that came not of himself; but was sent, and proceeded from them both on the day of Pentecost.* 13. A multitude of men, are made one person, when they are by A multitude one man, or one person, represented; so that it be done with the ofmen, how consent of every one of that multitude in particular. For it is the one person. unity of the representer, not the unity of the represented, that maketh the person one. And it is the representer that beareth the person, and but one person: and unity, cannot otherwise be understood in multitude. 14. And because the multitude naturally is not one, but many; Every one is they cannot be understood for one; but many authors, of every thing author. their representative saith, or doth in their name; every man giving their common representee, authority from himself in particular; and owning all the actions the representer doth, in case they give him authority without stint: otherwise, when they limit him in what, and how far he shall represent them, none of them owneth more, than they gave him commission to act. 15. And if the representative consist of many men, the voice of An actor may the greater number, must be considered as the voice of them all. be many men For if the lesser number pronounce (for example) in the affirmative, ;::;l~t; and the greater in the negative, there will be negatives more than votces. · enough to destroy the affirmatives; and thereby the excess of [83] negatives, standing uncontradicted, are the only voice the representative hath. 16. And a representative of even number, especially when the Representatives, number is not great, whereby the contradictory voices are when the oftentimes equal, is therefore oftentimes mute, and incapable of number is even, action. Yet in some cases contradictory voices equal in number, may unprofitable. determine a question; as in condemning, or absolving, equality of votes, even in that they condemn not, do absolve; but not on the contrary condemn, in that they absolve not. For when a cause is heard; not to condemn, is to absolve: but on the contrary, to say that not absolving, is condemning, is not true. The like it is in a deliberation of executing presently, or deferring till another time: for when the voices are equal, the not decreeing execution, is a decree of dilation. 17. Or if the number be odd, as three, or more, (men or assem- Negative blies;) whereof every one has by a negative voice, authority to take VOICe. away the effect of all the affirmative voices of the rest, this number

J

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is no representative; because by the diversity of opinions, and interests of men, it becomes oftentimes, and in cases of the greatest consequence, a mute person, and unapt, as for many things else, so for the government of a multitude, especially in time of war. 18. Of authors there be two sorts. The first simply so called; which I have before defined to be him, that owneth the action of another simply. The second is he, that owneth an action, or covenant of another conditionally; that is to say, he undertaketh to do it, if the other doth it not, at, or before a certain time. And these authors conditional, are generally called SURETIES, in Latin, fidejussores, and sponsores; and particularly for debt, praedes; and for appearance before a judge, or magistrate, vades.

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OF COMMONWEALTH CHAPTER XVII OF THE CAUSES, GENERATION, AND DEFINITION OF A COMMONWEALTH*

l. THE final cause, end, or design of men, (who naturally love The end of liberty, and dominion over others,) in the introduction of that re- commonwealth, straint upon themselves, (in which we see them live in common- particular security: wealths,) is the foresight of their own preservation, and of a more contented life thereby; that is to say, of getting themselves out from that miserable condition of war, which is necessarily consequent (as hath been shown, chapter xm) to the natural passions of men, when there is no visible power to keep them in awe, and tie them by fear of punishment to the performance of their covenants, and observation of those laws of nature set down in the fourteenth and fifteenth chapters. 2. For the laws of nature (as justice, equity, modesty, mercy, and (in Which is not sum) doing to others, as we would be done to,) of themselves, without to be had the terror of some power, to cause them to be observed, are contrary ~;m the law . h . . 'd OJ nature: to our naturaI passiOns, t at carry us to part1a11ty, pn e, revenge, and the like. And covenants, without the sword, are but words, and of no strength to secure a man at all. Therefore notwithstanding the laws of nature (which every one hath then kept, when he has the will to keep them, when he can do it safely) if there be no power erected, or not great enough for our security; every man will, and may lawfully rely on his own strength and art, for caution against all other men. And in all places, where men have lived by small families, to rob and spoil one another, has been a trade, and so far from being reputed against the law of nature, that the greater spoils they gained, the greater was their honour;* and men observed no other laws therein, but the laws of honour; that is, to abstain from cruelty, leaving to men their lives, and instruments of husbandry. And as small families did then; so now do cities and kingdoms which are but greater fatr.:iiies {tor i:heir w.n security) enlarge their dominions, III

PART 2

Nor from the conjunction of flfe~men or amz zes: [S 6]

Nor from a great multitude, unless directed by one judgment.

And that continually.

OF COMMONWEALTH

upon all pretences of danger, and fear of invasion, or assistance that may be given to invaders, and endeavour as much as they can, to subdue, or weaken their neighbours, by open force, and secret arts, for want of other caution, justly; and are remembered for it in after ages with honour. 3. Nor is it the joining together of a small number of men, that gives them this security; because in small numbers, small additions on the one side or the other, make the advantage of strength so great, as is sufficient to carry the victory; and therefore gives encouragement to an invasion. The multitude sufficient to confide in for our security, is not determined by any certain number, but by comparison with the enemy we fear; and is then sufficient, when the odds of the enemy is not of so visible and conspicuous moment, to determine the event of war, as to move him to attempt. 4. And be there never so great a multitude; yet if their actions be directed according to their particular judgments, and particular appetites, they can expect thereby no defence, nor protection, neither against a common enemy, nor against the injuries of one another. For being distracted in opinions concerning the best use and application of their strength, they do not help, but hinder one another; and reduce their strength by mutual opposition to nothing: whereby they are easily, not only subdued by a very few that agree together; but also when there is no common enemy, they make war upon each other, for their particular interests. For if we could suppose a great multitude of men to consent in the observation of justice, and other laws of nature, without a common power to keep them all in awe; we might as well suppose all mankind to do the same; and then there neither would be, nor need to be any civil government, or commonwealth at all; because there would be peace without subjection. 5. Nor is it enough for the security, which men desire should last all the time of their life, that they be governed, and directed by one judgment, for a limited time; as in one battle, or one war. For though they obtain a victory by their unanimous endeavour against a foreign enemy; yet afterwards, when either they have no common enemy, or he that by one part is held for an enemy, is by another part held for a friend, they must needs by the difference of their interests dissolve, and fall again into a war amongst themselves.

112

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6. It is true, that certain living creatures, as bees, and ants, live sociably one with another, (which are therefore by Aristotle numbered* amongst political creatures;) and yet have no other direction, than their particular judgments and appetites; nor speech, whereby one of them can signify to another, what he thinks expedient for the common benefit: and therefore some man may perhaps desire to know, why mankind cannot do the same. To which I answer, 7. First, that men are continually in competition for honour and dignity, which these creatures are not; and consequently amongst men there ariseth on that ground, envy and hatred, and finally war; but amongst these not so. 8. Secondly, that amongst these creatures, the common good differeth not from the private; and being by nature inclined to their private, they procure thereby the common benefit. But man, whose joy consisteth in comparing himself with other men, can relish nothing but what is eminent. 9. Thirdly, that these creatures, having not (as man) the use of reason, do not see, nor think they see any fault, in the administration of their common business: whereas amongst men, there are very many, that think themselves wiser, and abler to govern the public, better than the rest; and these strive to reform and innovate, one this way, another that way; and thereby bring it into distraction and civil war. 10. Fourthly, that these creatures, though they have some use of voice, in making known to one another their desires, and other affections; yet they want that art of words, by which some men can represent to others, that which is good, in the likeness of evil; and evil, in the likeness of good; and augment, or diminish the apparent greatness of good and evil; discontenting men, and troubling their peace at their pleasure. 11. Fifthly, irrational creatures cannot distinguish between injury, and damage; and therefore as long as they be at ease, they are not offended with their fellows: whereas man is then most troublesome, when he is most at ease: for then it is that he loves to shew his wisdom, and control the actions of them that govern the commonwealth. 12. Lastly, the agreement of these creatures is natural; that of men, is by covenant only, which is artificial: and therefore it is no wonder if there be somewhat else required (besides covenant) to 113

Why certain creatures without reason, or speech, do nevertheless live in society, without any coercive power.

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make their agreement constant and lasting; which is a common power, to keep them in awe, and to direct their actions to the common benefit. The 13. The only way to erect such a common power, as may be able generation to defend them from the invasion of foreigners, and the injuries of of a one another, and thereby to secure them in such sort, as that by their commonwealth. own industry, and by the fruits of the earth, they may nourish themselves and live contentedly; is, to confer all their power and strength upon one man, or upon one assembly of men, that may reduce all their wills, by plurality of voices, unto one will: which is as much as to say, to appoint one man, or assembly of men, to bear their person; and every one to own, and acknowledge himself to be author of whatsoever he that so beareth their person, shall act, or cause to be acted, in those things which concern the common peace and safety; and therein to submit their wills, every one to his will, and their judgments, to his judgment. This is more than consent, or concord; it is a real unity of them all, in one and the same person, made by covenant of every man with every man, in such manner, as if every man should say to every man, I authorize and give up my right ofgoverning myself, to this man, or to this assembly ofmen, on this condition, that thou give up thy right to him, and authorize all his actions in like manner. This done, the multitude so united in one

person, is called a COMMONWEALTH, in Latin CIVITAS. This is the generation of that great LEVIATHAN, or rather (to speak more reverently) of that Mortal God, to which we owe under the Immortal God, our peace and defence. For by this authority, given him by every [88] particular man in the commonwealth, he hath the use of so much power and strength conferred on him, that by terror thereof, he is enabled to conform* the wills of them all, to peace at home, and mutual aid against their enemies abroad. And in him consisteth the essence of the commonwealth; which (to define it,) is one person, of

The definition of a whose acts a great multitude, by mutual covenants one with another, commonwealth. have made themselves every one the author, to the end he may use the

strength and means of them all, as he shall think expedient, for their peace and common defence. Sovereign, and subject, what.

14. And he that carrieth this person, is called SOVEREIGN, and said to have sovereign power; and every one besides, his SUBJECT. 15. The attaining to this sovereign power, is by two ways. One, by natural force; as when a man maketh his children, to submit themselves, and their children to his government, as being able to

OF COMMONWEALTH

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destroy them if they refuse; or by war subdueth his enemies to his will, giving them their lives on that condition. The other, is when men agree amongst themselves, to submit to some man, or assembly of men, voluntarily, on confidence to be protected by him against all others. This latter, may be called a political commonwealth, or commonwealth by institution; and the former, a commonwealth by acquisition. And first, I shall speak of a commonwealth by institution.

CHAPTER XVIII OF THE RIGHTS OF SOVEREIGNS BY INSTITUTION*

1. A commonwealth is said to be instituted, when a multitude of men do agree, and covenant, every one, with every one, that to whatsoever man, or assembly ofmen, shall be given by the major part, the right to present the person of them all (that is to say, to be their representative;) every one, as well he that voted for it, as he that voted against it, shall authorize all the actions and judgments, of that man, or assembly of men, in the same manner, as if they were his own, to the end, to live peaceably amongst themselves, and be protected against other men. 2. From this institution of a commonwealth are derived all the rights, and faculties of him, or them, on whom the sovereign power is conferred by the consent of the people assembled. 3. First, because they covenant, it is to be understood, they are not obliged by former covenant to any thing repugnant hereunto. And consequently they that have already instituted a commonwealth, being thereby bound by covenant, to own the actions, and judgments of one, cannot lawfully make a new covenant, amongst themselves, to be obedient to any other, in any thing whatsoever, without his permission. And therefore, they that are subjects to a monarch, cannot without his leave cast off monarchy, and return to the confusion of a disunited multitude; nor transfer their person from him that beareth it, to another man, or other assembly of men: for they are bound, every man to every man, to own, and be reputed author of all, that he that already is their sovereign, shall do, and judge fit to be done: so that any one man dissenting, all the rest 115

The act of instituting " commonwealth, what.

The consequences to such institutions, are 1. The subjects c~nnot h

j-/:;,g:J e government.

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should break their covenant made to that man, which is injustice: and they have also every man given the sovereignty to him that beareth their person; and therefore if they depose him, they take from him that which is his own, and so again it is injustice. Besides, if he that attempteth to depose his sovereign, be killed, or punished by him for such attempt, he is author of his own punishment, as being by the institution, author of all his sovereign shall do: and because it is injustice for a man to do any thing, for which he may be punished by his own authority, he is also upon that title, unjust. And whereas some men have pretended for their disobedience to their sovereign, a new covenant, made, not with men, but with God; this also is unjust: for there is no covenant with God,* but by mediation of somebody that representeth God's person; which none doth but God's lieutenant, who hath the sovereignty under God. But this pretence of covenant with God, is so evident a lie, even in the pretenders' own consciences, that it is not only an act of an unjust, but also of a vile, and unmanly disposition. z. Sovereign 4. Secondly, because the right of bearing the person of them all, power cannot is given to him they make sovereign, by covenant only of one to be forfeited. another, and not of him to any of them; there can happen no breach of covenant on the part of the sovereign; and consequently none of his subjects, by any pretence of forfeiture, can be freed from his subjection. That he which is made sovereign maketh no covenant with his subjects beforehand, is manifest; because either he must make it with the whole multitude, as one party to the covenant; or he must make a several covenant with every man. With the whole, as one party, it is impossible; because as yet they are not one person: and if he make so many several covenants as there be men, those covenants after he hath the sovereignty are void; because what act soever can be pretended by any one of them for breach thereof, is the act both of himself, and of all the rest, because done in the person, and by the right of every one of them in particular. Besides, if any one, or more of them, pretend a breach of the covenant made by the sovereign at his institution; and others, or one other of his subjects, or himself alone, pretend there was no such breach, there is in this case, no judge to decide the controversy; it returns therefore to the sword again; and every man recovereth the right of protecting himself by his own strength, contrary to the design they had in the institution. It is therefore in vain to grant sovereignty by way of precedent covenant. The opinion that any monarch receiveth his

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power by covenant, that is to say on condition, proceedeth from want of understanding this easy truth, that covenants being but words, and breath, have no force to oblige, contain, constrain, or protect any man, but what it has from the public sword; that is, from the untied hands of that man, or assembly of men that hath the sovereignty, and whose actions are avouched by them all, and performed by the strength of them all, in him united. But when an assembly of men is made sovereign; then no man imagineth any such covenant to have passed in the institution; for no man is so dull as to say, for example, the people of Rome, made a covenant with the Romans, to hold the sovereignty on such or such conditions; which not performed, the Romans might lawfully depose the Roman people. That men see not the reason to be alike in a monarchy, and in a popular government, proceedeth from the ambition of some, that are kinder to the government of an assembly, whereof they may hope to participate, than of monarchy, which they despair to enjoy. 5. Thirdly, because the major part hath by consenting voices declared a sovereign; he that dissented must now consent with the rest; that is, be contented to avow all the actions he shall do, or else justly be destroyed by the rest. For if he voluntarily entered into the congregation of them that were assembled, he sufficiently declared thereby his will (and therefore tacitly covenanted) to stand to what the major part should ordain: and therefore if he refuse to stand thereto, or make protestation against any of their decrees, he does contrary to his covenant, and therefore unjustly. And whether he be of the congregation, or not; and whether his consent be asked, or not, he must either submit to their decrees, or be left in the condition of war he was in before; wherein he might without injustice be destroyed by any man whatsoever. 6. Fourthly, because every subject is by this institution author of all the actions, and judgments of the sovereign instituted; it follows, that whatsoever he doth, it can be no injury to any of his subjects; nor ought he to be by any of them accused of injustice. For he that doth anything by authority from another, doth therein no injury to him by whose authority he acteth: but by this institution of a commonwealth, every particular man is author of all the sovereign doth: and consequently he that complaineth of injury from his sovereign, complaineth of that whereof he himself is author; and therefore 117

[90]

3· No man can without injustice protest against the institution of the sovereign declared by the major part.

4· The sovereign's acttons b

}:s~~tac~used by the subject.

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5· Whatsoever the sovereign doth is unpunishable by the subject. 6. The sovereign is

judge of what is necessary for the peace and defence of his subjects.

[91]

And judge of what doctrines are fit to be taught them.

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ought not to accuse any man but himself; no nor himself of injury; because to do injury to one's self, is impossible. It is true that they that have sovereign power, may commit iniquity; but not injustice, or injury in the proper signification. 7. Fifthly, and consequently to that which was said last, no man that hath sovereign power can justly be put to death, or otherwise in any manner by his subjects punished. For seeing every subject is author of the actions of his sovereign; he punisheth another, for the actions committed by himself. 8. And because the end of this institution, is the peace and defence of them all; and whosoever has right to the end, has right to the means; it belongeth of right, to whatsoever man, or assembly that hath the sovereignty, to be judge both of the means of peace and defence; and also of the hindrances, and disturbances of the same; and to do whatsoever he shall think necessary to be done, both beforehand, for the preserving of peace and security, by prevention of discord at home, and hostility from abroad; and, when peace and security are lost, for the recovery of the same. And therefore, 9. Sixthly, it is annexed to the sovereignty, to be judge of what opinions and doctrines are averse, and what conducing to peace; and consequently, on what occasions, how far, and what, men are to be trusted withal, in speaking to multitudes of people; and who shall examine the doctrines of all books before they be published.* For the actions of men proceed from their opinions; and in the wellgoverning of opinions, consisteth the well-governing of men's actions, in order to their peace, and concord. And though in matter of doctrine, nothing ought to be regarded but the truth; yet this is not repugnant to regulating the same by peace. For doctrine repugnant to peace, can no more be true, than peace and concord can be against the law of nature. It is true, that in a commonwealth, where by the negligence, or unskilfulness of governors, and teachers, false doctrines are by time generally received; the contrary truths may be generally offensive: Yet the most sudden, and rough bustling in of a new truth, that can be, does never break the peace, but only sometimes awake the war. For those men that are so remissly governed, that they dare take up arms, to defend, or introduce an opinion, are still in war; and their condition not peace, but only a cessation of arms for fear of one another; and they live as it were, in the precincts of battle continually. It belongeth therefore to him that hath the 118

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sovereign power, to be judge, or constitute all judges of opinions and doctrines, as a thing necessary to peace; thereby to prevent discord and civil war. 10. Seventhly, is annexed to the sovereignty, the whole power of prescribing the rules, whereby every man may know, what goods he may enjoy, and what actions he may do, without being molested by any of his fellow-subjects: and this is it men call propriety. For before constitution of sovereign power (as hath already been shown) all men had right to all things; which necessarily causeth war: and therefore this propriety, being necessary to peace, and depend. on sovereign . power, IS . t he act of t hat power, m . ord er to t h e mg public peace. These rules of propriety (or meum and tuum) and of good, evil, lawful, and unlawful in the actions of subjects, are the civil laws;* that is to say, the laws of each commonwealth in particular; though the name of civil law be now restrained to the ancient civil laws of the city of Rome; which being the head of a great part of the world, her laws at that time were in these parts the civil law. 11. Eighthly, is annexed to the sovereignty, the right of judicature; that is to say, of hearing and deciding all controversies, which may arise concerning law, either civil, or natural; or concerning fact. · hout t h e decisiOn · · of controversies, · t here IS . no protectiOn . of F or Wit one subject, against the injuries of another; the laws concerning meum and tuum are in vain; and to every man remaineth, from the natural and necessary appetite of his own conservation, the right of protecting himself by his private strength, which is the condition of war, and contrary to the end for which every commonwealth is instituted. 12. Ninthly, is annexed to the sovereignty, the right of making war, and peace with other nations, and commonwealths; that is to say, of judging when it is for the public good, and how great forces are to be assembled, armed, and paid for that end; and to levy money upon the subjects, to defray the expenses thereof. For the power by which the people are to be defended, consisteth in their armies; and the strength of an army, in the union of their strength under one command; which command the sovereign instituted, therefore hath; because the command of the militia, without other institution, maketh him that hath it sovereign. And therefore whosoever is made general of an army, he that hath the sovereign power is always generalissimo [commander-in-chief]. 119

7· The right of making rules; whereby the subjects may every man know what is so his own, as no other subject can without injustice take it from him.

8. To him also belongeth thde nght of ;u tcature and decision of controversy.

[92] 9· And of making war, and peace, as he shall think best.

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13. Tenthly, is annexed to the sovereignty, the choosing of all counsellors, ministers, magistrates, and officers, both in peace, and war. For seeing the sovereign is charged with the end, which is the common peace and defence; he is understood to have power to use such means, as he shall think most fit for his discharge. 11. And of 14. Eleventhly, to the sovereign is committed the power of rerewarding and warding with riches, or honour; and of punishing with corporal, or punishing, and pecuniary punishment, or with ignominy every subject according to that (where no former law hath the law he hath formerly made; or if there be no law made, according determined the as he shall judge most to conduce to the encouraging of men to serve measure of it) the commonwealth, or deterring of them from doing disservice to arbitrarily. the same. 12. And of 15. Lastly, considering what value men are naturally apt to set honour and upon themselves; what respect they look for from others; and how order. little they value other men; from whence continually arise amongst them, emulation, quarrels, factions, and at last war, to the destroying of one another, and diminution of their strength against a common enemy; it is necessary that there be laws of honour, and a public rate of the worth of such men as have deserved, or are able to deserve well of the commonwealth; and that there be force in the hands of some or other, to put those laws in execution. But it hath already been shown, that not only the whole militia, or forces of the commonwealth; but also the judicature of all controversies, is annexed to the sovereignty. To the sovereign therefore it belongeth also to give titles of honour; and to appoint what order of place, and dignity, each man shall hold; and what signs of respect, in public or private meetings, they shall give to one another. 16. These are the rights, which make the essence of soverThese rights are eignty;* and which are the marks, whereby a man may discern in indivisible. what man, or assembly of men, the sovereign power is placed, and resideth. For these are incommunicable, and inseparable. The power to coin money; to dispose of the estate and persons of infant heirs; to have praeemption in markets; and all other statute prerogatives, may be transferred by the sovereign; any yet the power to protect his subjects be retained. But if he transfer the militia, he [93] retains the judicature in vain, for want of execution of the laws: or if he grant away the power of raising money; the militia is in vain: or if he give away the government of doctrines, men will be frighted into rebellion with the fear of spirits. And so if we consider any one 10. And of choosing all counsellors and ministers, both ofpeace and war.

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of the said rights, we shall presently see, that the holding of all the rest, will produce no effect, in the conservation of peace and justice, the end for which all commonwealths are instituted. And this division is it, whereof it is said, a kingdom divided in itselfcannot stand:* for unless this division precede, division into opposite armies can never happen. If there had not first been an opinion received of the greatest part of England, that these powers were divided between the King, and the Lords, and the House of Commons, the people had never been divided and fallen into this civil war;* first between those that disagreed in politics; and after between the dissenters about the liberty of religion; which have so instructed men in this point of sovereign right, that there be few now (in England,) that do not see, that these rights are inseparable, and will be so generally acknowledged at the next return of peace; and so continue, till their miseries are forgotten; and no longer, except the vulgar be better taught than they have hitherto been. 17. And because they are essential and inseparable rights, it follows necessarily, that in whatsoever words any of them seem to be granted away, yet if the sovereign power itselfbe not in direct terms renounced, and the name of sovereign no more given by the grantees to him that grants them, the grant is void: for when he has granted all he can, if we grant back the sovereignty, all is restored, as inseparably annexed thereunto. 18. This great authority being indivisible, and inseparably annexed to the sovereignty, there is little ground for the opinion of them, that say of sovereign kings, though they be singulis majores, of greater power than every one of their subjects, yet they be universis minores, of less power than them all together. For if by all together, they mean not the collective body as one person, then all together, and every one, signify the same; and the speech is absurd. But if by all together, they understand them as one person (which person the sovereign bears,) then the power of all together, is the same with the sovereign's power; and so again the speech is absurd: which absurdity they see well enough, when the sovereignty is in an assembly of the people; but in a monarch they see it not; and yet the power of sovereignty is the same in whomsoever it be placed. 19. And as the power, so also the honour of the sovereign, ought to be greater, than that of any, or all the subjects. For in the sovereignty is the fountain of honour. The dignities of lord, earl, duke, and prince are his creatures. As in the presence of the master, the 121

And can by no grant pass away without direct renouncing of the sovereign power. The power and honour of subjects vanisheth in the presence of the power sovereign.

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servants are equal, and without any honour at all; so are the subjects, in the presence of the sovereign. And though they shine some more, some less, when they are out of his sight; yet in his presence, they shine no more than the stars in the presence of the sun. [94] 20. But a man may here object, that the condition of subjects is Sovereign very miserable; as being obnoxious to the lusts, and other irregular power not so passions of him, or them that have so unlimited a power in their hurtful as the hands. And commonly they that live under a monarch, think it the want of it, fault of monarchy; and they that live under the government of and the hurt democracy, or other sovereign assembly, attribute all the inconvenproceeds for the greatest ience to that form of commonwealth; whereas the power in all part from not forms, if they be perfect enough to protect them, is the same; not submitting considering that the state of man can never be without some incomreadily to a modity or other; and that the greatest, that in any form of governless. ment can possibly happen to the people in general, is scarce sensible, in respect of the miseries, and horrible calamities, that accompany a civil war; or that dissolute condition of masterless men, without subjection to laws, and a coercive power to tie their hands from rapine and revenge: nor considering that the greatest pressure of sovereign governors, proceedeth not from any delight, or profit they can expect in the damage, or weakening of their subjects, in whose vigour, consisteth their own strength and glory; but in the restiveness of themselves, that unwillingly contributing to their own defence, make it necessary for their governors to draw from them what they can in time of peace, that they may have means on any emergent occasion, or sudden need, to resist, or take advantage on their enemies. For all men are by nature provided of notable multiplying glasses (that is their passions and self-love,) through which, every little payment appeareth a great grievance; but are destitute of those prospective glasses, (namely moral and civil science,) to see afar off the miseries that hang over them, and cannot without such payments be avoided.

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CHAPTER XIX OF THE SEVERAL KINDS OF COMMONWEALTH BY INSTITUTION, AND OF SUCCESSION TO THE SOVEREIGN POWER*

1. THE difference of commonwealths, consisteth in the difference of the sovereign, or the person representative of all and every one of the multitude. And because the sovereignty is either in one man, or in an assembly of more than one; and into that assembly either every man hath right to enter, or not every one, but certain men distinguished from the rest; it is manifest, there can be but three kinds of commonwealth. For the representative must needs be one man, or more: and if more, then it is the assembly of all, or but of a part. When the representative is one man, then is the commonwealth a MONARCHY: when an assembly of all that will come together, then it is a DEMOCRACY, or popular commonwealth: when an assembly of a part only, then it is called an ARISTOCRACY.* Other kind of commonwealth there can be none: for either one, or more, or all, must have the sovereign power (which I have shown to be indivisible) entire. 2. There be other names of government, in the histories, and books of policy; as tyranny, and oligarchy: but they are not the names of other forms of government, but of the same forms misliked. For they that are discontented under monarchy, call it tyranny; and they that are displeased with aristocracy, call it oligarchy: so also, they which find themselves grieved under a democracy, call it anarchy, (which signifies want of government;) and yet I think no man believes, that want of government, is any new kind of government: nor by the same reason ought they to believe, that the government is of one kind, when they like it, and another, when they mislike it, or are oppressed by the governors. 3. It is manifest, that men who are in absolute liberty, may, if they please, give authority to one man, to represent them every one; as well as give such authority to any assembly of men whatsoever; and consequently may subject themselves, if they think good, to a monarch, as absolutely, as to any other representative. Therefore, where there is already erected a sovereign power, there can be no other representative of the same people, but only to certain particu123

The different forms of commonwealths but three.

[95] Tyranny and oligarchy, but different names of monarchy, and aristocracy.

Subordinate representatives dangerous.

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lar ends, by the sovereign limited. For that were to erect two sovereigns; and every man to have his person represented by two actors, that by opposing one another, must needs divide that power, which (if men will live in peace) is indivisible; and thereby reduce the multitude into the condition of war, contrary to the end for which all sovereignty is instituted. And therefore as it is absurd, to think that a sovereign assembly, inviting the people of their dominion, to send up their deputies, with power to make known their advice, or desires, should therefore hold such deputies, rather than themselves, for the absolute representatives of the people: so it is absurd also, to think the same in a monarchy. And I know not how this so manifest a truth, should of late be so little observed; that in a monarchy, he that had the sovereignty from a descent of six hundred years, was alone called sovereign, had the title of Majesty from every one of his subjects, and was unquestionably taken by them for their king, was notwithstanding never considered as their representative; that name without contradiction passing for the title of those men, which at his command were sent up by the people to carry their petitions, and give him (if he permitted it) their advice. Which may serve as an admonition, for those that are the true, and absolute representative of a people, to instruct men in the nature of that office, and to take heed how they admit of any other general representation upon any occasion whatsoever, if they mean to discharge the trust committed to them. Comparison 4. The difference between these three kinds of commonwealth, of monarchy, consisteth not in the difference of power; but in the difference of with convenience, or aptitude to produce the peace, and security of the sovereign people; for which end they were instituted. And to compare monassemblies. archy with the other two, we may observe; first, that whosoever beareth the person of the people, or is one of that assembly that bears it, beareth also his own natural person. And though he be [96] careful in his politic person to procure the common interest; yet he is more, or no less careful to procure the private good of himself, his family, kindred, and friends; and for the most part, if the public interest chance to cross the private, he prefers the private: for the passions of men, are commonly more potent than their reason. From whence it follows, that where the public and private interest are most closely united, there is the public most advanced. Now in monarchy, the private interest is the same with the public. The riches, power, and honour of a monarch arise only from the riches, 124

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strength, and reputation of his subjects. For no king can be rich, nor glorious, nor secure; whose subjects are either poor, or contemptible, or too weak through want, or dissension, to maintain a war against their enemies: whereas in a democracy, or aristocracy, the public prosperity confers not so much to the private fortune of one that is corrupt, or ambitious, as doth many times a perfidious advice, a treacherous action, or a civil war. 5. Secondly, that a monarch receiveth counsel of whom, when, and where he pleaseth; and consequently may hear the opinion of men versed in the matter about which he deliberates, of what rank or quality soever, and as long before the time of action, and with as much secrecy, as he will. But when a sovereign assembly has need of counsel, none are admitted but such as have a right thereto from the beginning; which for the most part are of those who have been versed more in the acquisition of wealth than of knowledge; and are to give their advice in long discourses, which may, and do commonly excite men to action, but not govern them in it. For the understanding is by the flame of the passions, never enlightened, but dazzled. Nor is there any place, or time, wherein an assembly can receive counsel with secrecy, because of their own multitude. 6. Thirdly, that the resolutions of a monarch, are subject to no other inconstancy, than that of human nature; but in assemblies, besides that of nature, there ariseth an inconstancy from the number. For the absence of a few, that would have the resolution once taken, continue firm, (which may happen by security, negligence, or private impediments,) or the diligent appearance of a few of the contrary opinion, undoes to-day, all that was concluded yesterday. 7. Fourthly, that a monarch cannot disagree with himself, out of envy, or interest; but an assembly may; and that to such a height, as may produce a civil war. 8. Fifthly, that in monarchy there is this inconvenience; that any subject, by the power of one man, for the enriching of a favourite or flatterer, may be deprived of all he possesseth; which I confess is a great and inevitable inconvenience. But the same may as well happen, where the sovereign power is in an assembly: for their power is the same; and they are as subject to evil counsel, and to be seduced by orators, as a monarch by flatterers; and becoming one another's flatterers, serve one another's covetousness and ambition by turns. 125

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And whereas the favourites of monarchs, are few, and they have none else to advance but their own kindred; the favourites of an [97] assembly, are many; and the kindred much more numerous, than of any monarch. Besides, there is no favourite of a monarch, which cannot as well succour his friends, as hurt his enemies: but orators, that is to say, favourites of sovereign assemblies, though they have great power to hurt, have little to save. For to accuse, requires less eloquence (such is man's nature) than to excuse; and condemnation, than absolution more resembles justice. 9. Sixthly, that it is an inconvenience in monarchy, that the sovereignty may descend upon an infant, or one that cannot discern between good and evil: and consisteth in this, that the use of his power, must be in the hand of another man, or of some assembly of men, which are to govern by his right, and in his name; as curators, and protectors of his person, and authority. But to say there is inconvenience, in putting the use of the sovereign power, into the hand of a man, or an assembly of men; is to say that all government is more inconvenient, than confusion, and civil war. And therefore all the danger that can be pretended, must arise from the contention of those, that for an office of so great honour, and profit, may become competitors. To make it appear, that this inconvenience, procccdcth not from that form of government we call monarchy, we arc to consider, that the precedent monarch, hath appointed who shall have the tuition of his infant successor, either expressly by testament, or tacitly, by not controlling the custom in that case received: and then such inconvenience (if it happen) is to be attributed, not to the monarchy, but to the ambition, and injustice of the subjects; which in all kinds of government, where the people are not well instructed in their duty, and the rights of sovereignty, is the same. Or else the precedent monarch hath not at all taken order for such tuition; and then the law of nature hath provided this sufficient rule, that the tuition shall be in him, that hath by nature most interest in the preservation of the authority of the infant, and to whom least benefit can accrue by his death, or diminution. For seeing every man by nature seeketh his own benefit, and promotion; to put an infant into the power of those, that can promote themselves by his destruction, or damage, is not tuition, but treachery. So that sufficient provision being taken, against all just quarrel, about the government under a child, if any contention arise to the disturbance of the public peace, it is not to be attributed to the form of 126

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monarchy, but to the ambition of subjects, and ignorance of their duty. On the other side, there is no great commonwealth, the sovereignty whereof is in a great assembly, which is not, as to consultations of peace, and war, and making oflaws, in the same condition, as if the government were in a child. For as a child wants the judgment to dissent from counsel given him, and is thereby necessitated to take the advice of them, or him, to whom he is committed: so an assembly wanteth the liberty, to dissent from the counsel of the major part, be it good, or bad. And as a child has need of a tutor, or protector, to preserve his person, and authority: so also (in great commonwealths,) the sovereign assembly, in all great dangers and troubles, have need of custodes libertatis; that is of dictators, [98] or protectors of their authority; which are as much as temporary monarchs; to whom for a time, they may commit the entire exercise of their power; and have (at the end of that time) been oftener deprived thereof, than infant kings, by their protectors, regents, or any other tutors. 10. Though the kinds of sovereignty be, as I have now shown, but three; that is to say, monarchy, where one man has it; or democracy, where the general assembly of subjects hath it; or aristocracy, where it is in an assembly of certain persons nominated, or otherwise distinguished from the rest: yet he that shall consider the particular commonwealths that have been, and are in the world, will not perhaps easily reduce them to three, and may thereby be inclined to think there be other forms, arising from these mingled together. As for example, elective kingdoms; where kings have the sovereign power put into their hands for a time; or kingdoms, wherein the king hath a power limited: which governments, are nevertheless by most writers called monarchy. Likewise if a popular, or aristocratical commonwealth, subdue an enemy's country, and govern the same, by a president, procurator, or other magistrate; this may seem perhaps at first sight, to be a democratical, or aristocratical government. But it is not so. For elective kings, are not sovereigns, but ministers of the sovereign; nor limited kings sovereigns, but ministers of them that have the sovereign power: nor are those provinces which are in subjection to a democracy, or aristocracy of another commonwealth, democratically or aristocratically governed, but monarchically. 11. And first, concerning an elective king, whose power is limited to his life, as it is in many places of Christendom at this day; or to 127

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certain years or months, as the dictator's power amongst the Romans; if he have right to appoint his successor, he is no more elective but hereditary. But if he have no power to elect his successor, then there is some other man, or assembly known, which after his decease may elect anew, or else the commonwealth dieth, and dissolveth with him, and returneth to the condition of war. If it be known who have the power to give the sovereignty after his death, it is known also that the sovereignty was in them before: for none have right to give that which they have not right to possess, and keep to themselves, if they think good. But if there be none that can give the sovereignty, after the decease of him that was first elected; then has he power, nay he is obliged by the law of nature, to provide, by establishing his successor, to keep those that had trusted him with the government, from relapsing into the miserable condition of civil war. And consequently he was, when elected, a sovereign absolute. 12. Secondly, that king whose power is limited, is not superior to him, or them that have the power to limit it; and he that is not [99] superior, is not supreme; that is to say not sovereign. The sovereignty therefore was always in that assembly which had the right to limit him; and by consequence the government not monarchy, but either democracy, or aristocracy; as of old time in Sparta; where the kings had a privilege to lead their armies; but the sovereignty was in the Ephori. * 13. Thirdly, whereas heretofore the Roman people, governed the land of Judea (for example) by a president; yet was not Judea therefore a democracy; because they were not governed by any assembly, into the which, any of them, had right to enter; nor an aristocracy; because they were not governed by any assembly, into which, any man could enter by their election: but they were governed by one person, which though as to the people of Rome was an assembly of the people, or democracy; yet as to the people of Judea, which had no right at all of participating in the government, was a monarch. For though where the people are governed by an assembly, chosen by themselves out of their own number, the government is called a democracy, or aristocracy; yet when they are governed by an assembly, not of their own choosing, 'tis a monarchy; not of one man, over another man; but of one people, over another people. Of the right 14. Of all these forms of government, the matter being mortal, so of succession. that not only monarchs, but also whole assemblies die, it is necessary 128

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for the conservation of the peace of men, that as there was order taken for an artificial man, so there be order also taken, for an artificial eternity oflife; without which, men that are governed by an assembly, should return into the condition of war in every age; and they that are governed by one man, as soon as their governor dieth. This artificial eternity, is that which men call the right of

succession. 15. There is no perfect form of government, where the disposing of the succession is not in the present sovereign. For if it be in any other particular man, or private assembly, it is in a person subject, and may be assumed by the sovereign at his pleasure; and consequently the right is in himself. And if it be in no particular man, but left to a new choice; then is the commonwealth dissolved; and the right is in him that can get it; contrary to the intention of them that did institute the commonwealth, for their perpetual, and not temporary security. 16. In a democracy, the whole assembly cannot fail, unless the multitude that are to be governed fail. And therefore questions of the right of succession, have in that form of government no place at all. 17. In an aristocracy, when any of the assembly dieth, the election of another into his room belongeth to the assembly, as the sovereign, to whom belongeth the choosing of all counsellors, and officers. For that which the representative doth, as actor, every one of the subjects doth, as author. And though the sovereign assembly, may give power to others, to elect new men, for supply of their court; yet it is still by their authority, that the election is made; and by the same it may (when the public shall require it) be recalled. 18. The greatest difficulty about the right of succession, is in monarchy: and the difficulty ariseth from this, that at first sight, it is not manifest who is to appoint the successor; nor many times, who it is whom he hath appointed. For in both these cases, there is required a more exact ratiocination, than every man is accustomed to use. As to the question, who shall appoint the successor, of a monarch that hath the sovereign authority; that is to say, who shall determine of the right of inheritance, (for elective kings and princes have not the sovereign power in propriety, but in use only,) we are to consider, that either he that is in possession, has right to dispose of the succession, or else that right is again in 129

[100] The present monarch hath right to dispose of the successton.

PART 2

Succession passeth by express words;

Or, by not controlling a custom;

OF COMMONWEALTH

the dissolved multitude. For the death of him that hath the sovereign power in propriety, leaves the multitude without any sovereign at all; that is, without any representative in whom they should be united, and be capable of doing any one action at all: and therefore they are incapable of election of any new monarch; every man having equal right to submit himself to such as he thinks best able to protect him; or if he can, protect himself by his own sword; which is a return to confusion, and to the condition of a war of every man against every man, cont!"ary to the end for which monarchy had its first institution. Therefore it is manifest, that by the institution of monarchy, the disposing of the successor, is always left to the judgment and will of the present possessor. 19. And for the question (which may arise sometimes) who it is that the monarch in possession, hath designed to the succession and inheritance of his power; it is determined by his express words, and testament; or by other tacit signs sufficient. 20. By express words, or testament, when it is declared by him in his lifetime, viva voce, or by writing; as the first emperors of Rome declared who should be their heirs. For the word heir does not of itself imply the children, or nearest kindred of a man; but whomsoever a man shall any way declare, he would have to succeed him in his estate. If therefore a monarch declare expressly, that such a man shall be his heir, either by word or writing, then is that man immediately after the decease of his predecessor, invested in the right of being monarch. 21. But where testament, and express words are wanting, other natural signs of the will are to be followed: whereof the one is custom. And therefore where the custom is, that the next of kindred absolutely succeedeth, there also the next of kindred hath right to the succession; for that, if the will of him that was in possession had been otherwise, he might easily have declared the same in his life-time. And likewise where the custom is, that the next of the male kindred succeedeth, there also the right of succession is in the next of the kindred male, for the same reason. And so it is if the custom were to advance the female. For whatsoever custom a man may by a word control, and does not, it is a natural sign he would have that custom stand. 130

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CHAP. 19

22. But where neither custom, nor testament hath preceded, [101] there it is to be understood, first, that a monarch's will is, that the Or, by government remain monarchical; because he hath approved that presumption government in himself. Secondly, that a child of his own, male, or of natural affection. female, be preferred before any other; because men are presumed to be more inclined by nature, to advance their own children, than the children of other men; and of their own, rather a male than a female; because men, are naturally fitter than women, for actions of labour and danger. Thirdly, where his own issue faileth, rather a brother than a stranger; and so still the nearer in blood, rather than the more remote; because it is always presumed that the nearer of kin, is the nearer in affection; and 'tis evident that a man receives always, by reflection, the most honour from the greatness of his nearest kindred. 23. But if it be lawful for a monarch to dispose of the succession To dispose of by words of contract, or testament, men may perhaps object a great the succession, inconvenience: for he may sell, or give his right of governing to a though to a king of stranger; which, because strangers (that is, men not used to live another under the same government, nor speaking the same language) do nation, not commonly undervalue one another, may turn to the oppression of unlawful. his subjects; which is indeed a great inconvenience: but it proceedeth not necessarily from the subjection to a stranger's government, but from the unskilfulness of the governors, ignorant of the true rules of politics. And therefore the Romans when they had subdued many nations, to make their government digestible, were wont to take away that grievance, as much as they thought necessary, by giving sometimes to whole nations, and sometimes to principal men of every nation they conquered, not only the privileges, but also the name of Romans; and took many of them into the senate, and offices of charge, even in the Roman city. And this was it our most wise king James, aimed at, in endeavouring the union of his two realms of England and Scotland. Which if he could have obtained, had in all likelihood prevented the civil wars, which make both those kingdoms, at this present, miserable. It is not therefore any injury to the people, for a monarch to dispose of the succession by will; though by the fault of many princes, it hath been sometimes found inconvenient. Of the lawfulness of it, this also is an argument, that whatsoever inconvenience can arrive by giving a kingdom to a stranger, may arrive also by so marrying with strangers, as the right IJI

PART Z

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of succession may descend upon them: yet this by all men is accounted lawful.

CHAPTER XX OF DOMINION PATERNAL, AND DESPOTICAL

1. A

A

COMMONWEALTH

by acquisition, is that, where the sovereign

commonwealth power is acquired by force; and it is acquired by force, when men by acquisition.

[102] Wherein different from a commonwealth by institution.

The rights of sovereignty the same in both.

singly, or many together by plurality of voices, for fear of death, or bonds, do authorize all the actions of that man, or assembly, that hath their lives and liberty in his power. 2. And this kind of dominion, or sovereignty, differeth from sovereignty by institution, only in this, that men who choose their sovereign, do it for fear of one another, and not of him whom they institute: but in this case, they subject themselves, to him they are afraid of. In both cases they do it for fear: which is to be noted by them, that hold all such covenants, as proceed from fear of death, or violence, void: which if it were true, no man, in any kind of commonwealth, could be obliged to obedience. It is true, that in a commonwealth once instituted, or acquired, promises proceeding from fear of death, or violence, are no convenants, nor obliging, when the thing promised is contrary to the laws; but the reason is not, because it was made upon fear, but because he that promiseth, hath no right in the thing promised. Also, when he may lawfully perform, and doth not, it is not the invalidity of the covenant, that absolveth him, but the sentence of the sovereign. Otherwise, whensoever a man lawfully promiseth, he unlawfully breaketh: but when the sovereign, who is the actor, acquitteth him, then he is acquitted by him that extorted the promise, as by the author of such absolution. 3. But the rights, and consequences of sovereignty, are the same in both. His power cannot, without his consent, be transferred to another: he cannot forfeit it: he cannot be accused by any of his subjects, of injury: he cannot be punished by them: he is judge of what is necessary for peace; and judge of doctrines: he is sole legislator; and supreme judge of controversies; and of the times, and occasions of war, and peace: to him it belongeth to choose magisIJ2

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CHAP.

20

trates, counsellors, commanders, and all other officers, and ministers; and to determine of rewards, and punishments, honour, and order. The reasons whereof, are the same which are alleged in the precedent chapter, for the same rights, and consequences of sovereignty by institution. 4. Dominion is acquired two ways; by generation, and by con- Dominion quest. The right of dominion by generation, is that, which the paternal how parent hath over his children; and is called PATERNAL.* And is not attained. so derived from the generation, as if therefore the parent had Not by dominion over his child because he begat him; but from the generation, child's consent, either express, or by other sufficient arguments but by declared. For as to the generation, God hath ordained to man a contract; helper; and there be always two that are equally parents: the dominion therefore over the child, should belong equally to both; and he be equally subject to both, which is impossible; for no man can obey two masters. And whereas some have attributed the dominion to the man only, as being of the more excellent sex; they misreckon in it. For there is not always that difference of strength, or prudence between the man and the woman, as that the right can be determined without war. In commonwealths, this controversy is decided by the civil law: and for the most part, (but not always) the sentence is in favour of the father; because for the most part commonwealths have been erected by the fathers, not by the mothers of [103] families. But the question lieth now in the state of mere nature; where there are supposed no laws of matrimony; no laws for the education of children; but the law of nature, and the natural inclination of the sexes, one to another, and to their children. In this condition of mere nature, either the parents between themselves dispose ofthe dominion over the child by contract; or do not dispose thereof at all. If they dispose thereof, the right passeth according to the contract. We find in history* that the Amazons contracted with the men of the neighbouring countries, to whom they had recourse for issue, that the issue male should be sent back, but the female remain with themselves: so that the dominion of the females was in the mother. 5. If there be no contract, the dominion is in the mother. For in Or education; the condition of mere nature, where there are no matrimonial laws, it cannot be known who is the father, unless it be declared by the mother: and therefore the right of dominion over the child dependeth on her will, and is consequently hers. Again, seeing the 133

PART 2

Or precedent subjection of one of the parents to the other.

The right of ·uccesston '0/loweth the ·ules of the right >[possession. Despotica! dominion how attained.

[104]

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infant is first in the power of the mother, so as she may either nourish, or expose it; if she nourish it, it oweth its life to the mother; and is therefore obliged to obey her, rather than any other; and by consequence the dominion over it is hers. But if she expose it, and another find, and nourish it, the dominion is in him that nourisheth it. For it ought to obey him by whom it is preserved; because preservation of life being the end, for which one man becomes subject to another, every man is supposed to promise obedience, to him, in whose power it is to save, or destroy him. 6. If the mother be the father's subject, the child, is in the father's power: and if the father be the mother's subject, (as when a sovereign queen marrieth one of her subjects,*) the child is subject to the mother; because the father also is her subject. 7. If a man and woman, monarchs oftwo several kingdoms, have a child, and contract concerning who shall have the dominion of him, the right of the dominion passeth by the contract. If they contract not, the dominion followeth the dominion of the place of his residence. For the sovereign of each country hath dominion over all that reside therein. 8. He that hath the dominion over the child, hath dominion also over the children of the child; and over their children's children. For he that hath dominion over the person of a man, hath dominion over all that is his; without which, dominion were but a title, without the effect. 9. The right of succession to paternal dominion, proceedeth in the same manner, as doth the right of succession of monarchy; of which I have already sufficiently spoken in the precedent chapter. 10. Dominion acquired by conquest, or victory in war, is that which some writers call DESPOTICAL, from Oca:rcorq~, which signifieth a lord, or master; and is the dominion of the master over his servant. And this dominion is then acquired to the victor, when the vanquished, to avoid the present stroke of death, covenanteth either in express words, or by other sufficient signs of the will, that so long as his life, and the liberty of his body is allowed him, the victor shall have the use thereof, at his pleasure. And after such covenant made, the vanquished is a SERVANT, and not before: for by the word servant (whether it be derived from servire, to serve, or from servare, to save, which I leave to grammarians to dispute) is not meant a captive, which is kept in prison, or bonds, till the owner of him that took 134

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CHAP. 20

him, or bought him of one that did, shall consider what to do with him: (for such men, (commonly called slaves,) have no obligation at all; but may break their bonds, or the prison; and kill, or carry away captive their master, justly:) but one, that being taken, hath corporal liberty allowed him; and upon promise not to run away, nor to do violence to his master, is trusted by him. 11. It is not therefore the victory, that giveth the right of dominion over the vanquished, but his own covenant. Nor is he obliged because he is conquered; that is to say, beaten, and taken, or put to flight; but because he cometh in, and submitteth to the victor; nor is the victor obliged by an enemy's rendering himself, (without promise of life,) to spare him for this his yielding to discretion; which obliges not the victor longer, than in his own discretion he shall think fit. 12. And that which men do, when they demand (as it is now called) quarter, (which the Greeks called ~wyeia, taking alive,) is to evade the present fury of the victor, by submission, and to compound for their life, with ransom, or service: and therefore he that hath quarter, hath not his life given, but deferred till farther deliberation; for it is not a yielding on condition of life, but to discretion. And then only is his life in security, and his service due, when the victor hath trusted him with his corporal liberty. For slaves that work in prisons; or fetters, do it not of duty, but to avoid the cruelty of their task-masters. 13. The master of the servant, is master also of all he hath; and may exact the use thereof; that is to say, of his goods, of his labour, of his servants, and of his children, as often as he shall think fit. For he holdeth his life of his master, by the covenant of obedience; that is, of owning, and authorizing whatsoever the master shall do. And in case the master, if he refuse, kill him, or cast him into bonds, or otherwise punish him for his disobedience, he is himself the author of the same; and cannot accuse him of injury. 14. In sum, the rights and consequences of both paternal and despotical dominion, are the very same with those of a sovereign by institution; and for the same reasons: which reasons are set down in the precedent chapter. So that for a man that is monarch of divers nations, whereof he hath, in one the sovereignty by institution of the people assembled, and in another by conquest, that is by the submission of each particular, to avoid death or bonds; to demand of one nation more than of the other, from the title of 135

Not by the victory, but by the consent of the vanquished.

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OF COMMONWEALTH

conquest, as being a conquered nation, is an act of ignorance of the [105] rights of sovereignty; for the sovereign is absolute over both alike; or else there is no sovereignty at all; and so every man may lawfully protect himself, if he can, with his own sword, which is the condition of war. Difference 15. By this it appears, that a great family if it be not part of some between a commonwealth, is of itself, as to the rights of sovereignty, a little family and a monarchy; whether that family consist of a man and his children; or kingdom. of a man and his servants; or of a man, and his children, and servants together: wherein the father or master is the sovereign. But yet a family is not properly a commonwealth; unless it be of that power by its own number, or by other opportunities, as not to be subdued without the hazard of war. For where a number of men are manifestly too weak to defend themselves united, every one may use his own reason in time of danger, to save his own life, either by flight, or by submission to the enemy, as he shall think best; in the same manner as a very small company of soldiers, surprised by an army, may cast down their arms, and demand quarter, or run away, rather than be put to the sword. And thus much shall suffice, concerning what I find by speculation, and deduction, of sovereign rights, from the nature, need, and designs of men, in erecting of commonwealths, and putting themselves under monarchs, or assemblies, entrusted with power enough for their protection. The rights of 16. Let us now consider what the Scripture teacheth in the same monarchy point. To Moses, the children of Israel say thus: Speak thou to us, fi'om and we will hear thee; but let not Cod speak to us, lest we die. (Exod. 20. Scripture. 19.) This is absolute obedience to Moses. Concerning the right of kings, God himself by the mouth of Samuel, saith, ( 1 Sam. 8. I I, I 2, &c.) This shall be the right ofthe king you will have to reign over you. He shall take your sons, and set them to drive his chariots, and to be his horsemen, and to run before his chariots; and gather in his harvest; and to make his engines ofwar, and instruments ofhis chariots; and shall take your daughters to make perfumes, to be his cooks, and bakers. He shall take your fields, your vine-yards, and your olive-yards, and give them to his servants. He shall take the tithe ofyour corn and wine, and give it to the men of his chamber, and to his other servants. He shall take your man-servants, and your maid-servants, and the choice of your youth, and employ them in his business. He shall take the tithe ofyour flocks; and you shall be his servants.* This is absolute power, and summed

OF COMMONWEALTH

CHAP. 20

up in the last words, you shall be his servants. Again, when the people heard what power their king was to have, yet they consented thereto, and say thus, (verse I9) we will be as all other nations, and our king shall judge our causes, and go before us, to conduct our wars. Here is confirmed the right that sovereigns have, both to the militia, and to alljudicature; in which is contained as absolute power, as one man can possibly transfer to another. Again, the prayer of king Solomon to God, was this (I Kings 3· 9): Give to thy servant understanding, to judge thy people, and to discern between good and evil. It belongeth therefore to the sovereign to be judge, and to prescribe the [106] rules of discerning good and evil: which rules are laws; and therefore in him is the legislative power. Saul sought the life of David; yet when it was in his power to slay Saul, and his servants would have done it, David forbad them, saying, (I Sam. 24. 9) God forbid I should do such an act against my Lord, the anointed of God. For obedience of servants St. Paul saith: (Col. 3· 22) Servants obey your masters in all things; and, (Col. 3· 20) children obey your parents in all things. There is simple obedience in those that are subject to paternal, or despotical dominion. Again, (Matt. 23. 2, 3) The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses' chair, and therefore all that they shall bid you observe, that observe and do. There again is simple obedience. And St. Paul, (Titus 3· 2) Warn them that they subject themselves to princes, and to those that are in authority, and obey them. This obedience is also

simple. Lastly, our Saviour himself acknowledges, that men ought to pay such taxes as are by kings imposed, where he says, give to Caesar that which is Caesar's; and paid such taxes himself. And that the king's word, is sufficient to take any thing from any subject, when there is need; and that the king is judge of that need: for he himself, as king of the Jews, commanded his disciples to take the ass, and ass's colt to carry him into Jerusalem, saying, (Matt. 21. 2, 3) Go into the village over against you, and you shall find a she ass tied, and her colt with her, untie them, and bring them to me. And if any man ask you, what you mean by it, say the Lord hath need ofthem: and they will let them go. They will not ask whether his necessity be a sufficient

title; nor whether he be judge of that necessity; but acquiesce in the will of the Lord. 17. To these places may be added also that of Genesis, (3. 5) Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. And verse I 1 . Who told thee that thou wast naked? hast thou eaten ofthe tree, ofwhich I commanded I37

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OF COMMONWEALTH

thee thou shouldest not eat? For the cognizance or judicature of good and evil, being forbidden by the name of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, as a trial of Adam's obedience; the devil to inflame the ambition of the woman, to whom that fruit already seemed beautiful, told her that by tasting it, they should be as gods, knowing good and evil. Whereupon having both eaten, they did indeed take upon them God's office, which is judicature of good and evil; but acquired no new ability to distinguish between them aright. And whereas it is said, that having eaten, they saw they were naked; no man hath so interpreted that place, as if they had been formerly blind, and saw not their own skins: the meaning is plain, that it was then they first judged their nakedness (wherein it was God's will to create them) to be uncomely; and by being ashamed, did tacitly censure God himself. And thereupon God saith, Hast thou eaten, C5 c. as if he should say, doest thou that owest me obedience, take upon thee to judge of my commandments? Whereby it is clearly, (though allegorically,) signified, that the commands of them that have the right to command, are not by their subjects to be censured, nor disputed. [107] 18. So that it appeareth plainly, to my understanding, both from Sovereign reason, and Scripture, that the sovereign power, whether placed in power ought one man, as in monarchy, or in one assembly of men, as in popular, in all and aristocratical commonwealths, is as great, as possibly men commonwealths can be imagined to make it. And though of so unlimited a power, to be men may fancy many evil consequences, yet the consequences of absolute. the want of it, which is perpetual war of every man against his neighbour, are much worse. The condition of man in this life shall never be without inconveniences; but there happeneth in no commonwealth any great inconvenience, but what proceeds from the subject's disobedience, and breach of those covenants, from which the commonwealth hath its being. And whosoever thinking sovereign power too great, will seek to make it less, must subject himself, to the power, that can limit it; that is to say, to a greater. 19. The greatest objection is, that of the practice; when men ask, where, and when, such power has by subjects been acknowledged. But one may ask them again, when, or where has there been a kingdom long free from sedition and civil war. In those nations, whose commonwealths have been long-lived, and not been destroyed but by foreign war, the subjects never did dispute of the 138

OF COMMONWEALTH

CHAP. 21

sovereign power. But howsoever, an argument from the practice of men, that have not sifted to the bottom, and with exact reason weighed the causes, and nature of commonwealths, and suffer daily those miseries, that proceed from the ignorance thereof, is invalid. For though in all places of the world, men should lay the foundation of their houses on the sand, it could not thence be inferred, that so it ought to be. The skill of making, and maintaining commonwealths, consisteth in certain rules, as doth arithmetic and geometry; not (as tennis-play) on practice only: which rules, neither poor men have the leisure, nor men that have had the leisure, have hitherto had the curiosity, or the method to find out.

CHAPTER XXI OF THE LIBERTY OF SUBJECTS

1. LIBERTY,* or FREEDOM, signifieth (properly) the absence of opposition; (by opposition, I mean external impediments of motion;) and may be applied no less to irrational, and inanimate creatures, than to rational. For whatsoever is so tied, or environed, as it cannot move, but within a certain space, which space is determined by the opposition of some external body, we say it hath not liberty to go further. And so of all living creatures, whilst they are imprisoned, or restrained, with walls, or chains; and of the water whilst it is kept in by banks, or vessels, that otherwise would spread itself into a larger space, we use to say, they are not at liberty, to move in such manner, as without those external impediments they would. But when the impediment of motion, is in the constitution of the thing itself, we use not to say, it wants the liberty; but the power to move; as when a stone lieth still, or a man is fastened to his bed by sickness. 2. And according to this proper, and generally received meaning of the word, a FREEMAN, is he, that in those things, which by his strength and wit he is able to do, is not hindered to do what he has a will to. But when the words free, and liberty, are applied to any thing but bodies, they are abused; for that which is not subject to motion, is not subject to impediment: and therefore, when 'tis said (for example) the way is free, no liberty of the way is signified, but of those that 139

Liberzy, what.

[108] What it is to be fi'ee.

PART 2

Fear and liberty consistent.

Liberty and necessity consistent.

OF COMMONWEALTH

walk in it without stop. And when we say a gift is free, there is not meant any liberty of the gift, but of the giver, that was not bound by any law, or covenant to give it. So when we speak freely, it is not the liberty of voice, or pronunciation, but of the man, whom no law hath obliged to speak otherwise than he did. Lastly, from the use of the word free-will, no liberty can be inferred of the will, desire, or inclination, but the liberty of the man; which consisteth in this, that he finds no stop, in doing what he has the will, desire, or inclination to do.* 3. Fear and liberty are consistent; as when a man throweth his goods into the sea for fear the ship should sink,* he doth it nevertheless very willingly, and may refuse to do it if he will: it is therefore the action, of one that was free: so a man sometimes pays his debt, only for fear of imprisonment, which because nobody hindered him from detaining, was the action of a man at liberty. And generally all actions which men do in commonwealths, for fear of the law, are actions, which the doers had liberty to omit. 4. Liberty, and necessity are consistent: as in the water, that hath not only liberty, but a necessity of descending by the channel; so likewise in the actions which men voluntarily do: which, because they proceed from their will, proceed from liberty; and yet, because every act of man's will, and every desire, and inclination proceedeth from some cause, and that from another cause, in a continual chain, (whose first link is in the hand of God the first of all causes,) they proceed from necessity. So that to him that could see the connexion of those causes, the necessity of all men's voluntary actions, would appear manifest. And therefore God, that seeth, and disposeth all things, seeth also that the liberty of man in doing what he will, is accompanied with the necessity of doing that which God will, and no more, nor less.* For though men may do many things, which God does not command, nor is therefore author of them; yet they can have no passion, nor appetite to any thing, of which appetite God's will is not the cause. And did not his will assure the necessity of man's will, and consequently of all that on man's will dependeth, the liberty of men would be a contradiction, and impediment to the omnipotence and liberty of God. And this shall suffice, (as to the matter in hand) of that natural liberty, which only is properly called liberty.

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CHAP. 21

5. But as men, for the attaining of peace, and conservation of themselves thereby, have made an artificial man, which we call a commonwealth; so also have they made artificial chains, called civil laws, which they themselves, by mutual covenants, have fastened at one end, to the lips of that man, or assembly, to whom they have given the sovereign power; and at the other end to their own ears. These bonds in their own nature but weak, may nevertheless be made to hold, by the danger, though not by the difficulty ofbreaking them. 6. In relation to these bonds only it is, that I am to speak now, of the liberty of subjects. For seeing there is no commonwealth in the world, wherein there be rules enough set down, for the regulating of . . a t h'mg 1mposs1 . 'ble: ) It . all t he actiOns, an d wor ds of men; (as bemg followeth necessarily, that in all kinds of actions, by the laws praetermitted [passed over], men have the liberty, of doing what their own reasons shall suggest, for the most profitable to themselves. For if we take liberty in the proper sense, for corporal liberty; that is to say, freedom from chains, and prison, it were very absurd for men to clamour as they do, for the liberty they so manifestly enjoy. Again, if we take liberty, for an exemption from laws, it is no less absurd, for men to demand as they do, that liberty, by which all other men may be masters of their lives. And yet as absurd as it is, this is it they demand; not knowing that the laws are of no power to protect them, without a sword in the hands of a man, or men, to cause those laws to be put in execution. The liberty of a subject, lieth therefore only in those things, which in regulating their actions, the sovereign hath praetermitted: such as is the liberty to buy, and sell, and otherwise contract with one another; to choose their own abode, their own diet, their own trade oflife, and institute their children as they themselves think fit; and the like. 7. Nevertheless we are not to understand, that by such liberty, the sovereign power oflife, and death, is either abolished, or limited. For it has been already shown, that nothing the sovereign representative can do to a subject, on what pretence soever, can properly be called injustice, or injury; because every subject is author of every act the sovereign doth; so that he never wanteth right to any thing, otherwise, than as he himself is the subject of God, and bound thereby to observe the laws of nature. And therefore it may, and doth often happen in commonwealths, that a subject may be put to

Artificial bonds, or covenants.

[109]

Liberty of subjects . lcobnszstefith zn t erty rom covenants.

Liberty of the subject consistent with the unlimited power of the sovereign.

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death, by the command of the sovereign power; and yet neither do the other wrong: as when Jeptha* caused his daughter to be sacrificed: in which, and the like cases, he that so dieth, had liberty to do the action, for which he is nevertheless, without injury put to death. And the same holdeth also in a sovereign prince, that putteth to death an innocent subject. For though the action be against the law of nature, as being contrary to equity, (as was the killing of Uriah, by David;*) yet it was not an injury to Uriah, but to God. Not to Uriah, because the right to do what he pleased, was given him by Uriah himself: and yet to God, because David was God's subject; and prohibited all iniquity by the law of nature. Which distinction, David himself, when he repented the fact, evidently confirmed, saying, To thee only have I sinned. In the same manner, the people of [110] Athens, when they banished the most potent of their commonwealth for ten years, thought they committed no injustice; and yet they never questioned what crime he had done; but what hurt he would do: nay they commanded the banishment of they knew not whom; and every citizen bringing his oystershell into the market place, written with the name of him he desired should be banished, without actually accusing him, sometimes banished an Aristides, for his reputation of justice; and sometimes a scurrilous jester, as Hyperbolus, * to make a jest of it. And yet a man cannot say, the sovereign people of Athens wanted right to banish them; or an Athenian the liberty to jest, or to be just. The liberty 8. The liberty, whereof there is so frequent, and honourable which writers mention, in the histories, and philosophy of the ancient Greeks, and praise, is the Romans, and in the writings, and discourse of those that from them liberty of have received all their learning in the politics, is not the liberty of SO'Vereigns; not ofprivate particular men; but the liberty of the commonwealth: which is the men. same with that, which every man then should have, if there were no civil laws, nor commonwealth at all. And the effects of it also be the same. For as amongst masterless men, there is perpetual war, of every man against his neighbour; no inheritance, to transmit to the son, nor to expect from the father; no propriety of goods, or lands; no security; but a full and absolute liberty in every particular man: so in states, and commonwealths not dependent on one another, every commonwealth, (not every man) has an absolute liberty, to do what it shall judge (that is to say, what that man, or assembly that representeth it, shall judge) most conducing to their benefit. But withal, they live in the condition of a perpetual war, and upon the

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confines of battle, with their frontiers armed, and cannons planted against their neighbours round about. The Athenians, and Romans were free; that is, free commonwealths: not that any particular men had the liberty to resist their own representative; but that their representative had the liberty to resist, or invade other people. There is written on the turrets of the city of Lucca in great characters at this day, the word LIBERTAS; yet no man can thence infer, that a particular man has more liberty, or immunity from the service of the commonwealth there, than in Constantinople. Whether a commonwealth be monarchical, or popular, the freedom is still the same. 9. But it is an easy thing, for men to be deceived, by the specious name of liberty; and for want of judgment to distinguish, mistake that for their private inheritance, and birth-right, which is the right of the public only. And when the same error is confirmed by the authority of men in reputation for their writings on this subject, it is no wonder if it produce sedition, and change of government. In these western parts of the world, we are made to receive our opinions concerning the institution, and rights of commonwealths, from Aristotle, Cicero, and other men, Greeks and Romans, that living under popular states, derived those rights, not from the principles of nature, but transcribed them into their books, out of the practice of their own commonwealths, which were popular; as the [111] grammarians describe the rules of language, out of the practice of the time; or the rules of poetry, out of the poems of Homer and Virgil. And because the Athenians were taught, (to keep them from desire of changing their government,) that they were freemen, and all that lived under monarchy were slaves; therefore Aristotle puts it down in his Politics, (lib. 6. cap. 2.) In democracy, LIBERTY is to be supposed: for it is commonly held, that no man is FREE in any other government. And as Aristotle; so Cicero, and other writers have grounded their civil doctrine, on the opinions of the Romans, who were taught to hate monarchy, at first, by them that having deposed their sovereign, shared amongst them the sovereignty of Rome; and afterwards by their successors. And by reading of these Greek, and Latin authors, men from their childhood have gotten a habit (under a false show of liberty,) of favouring tumults, and of licentious controlling the actions of their sovereigns; and again of controlling those controllers; with the effusion of so much blood; as I think I may truly say, there was never any thing so dearly bought, as these 143

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western parts have bought the learning of the Greek and Latin tongues. Liberty of 10. To come now to the particulars of the true liberty of a subsubjects how ject; that is to say, what are the things, which though commanded by to be the sovereign, he may nevertheless, without injustice, refuse to do; measured. we are to consider, what rights we pass away, when we make a commonwealth; or (which is all one) what liberty we deny ourselves, by owning all the actions (without exception) of the man, or assembly we make our sovereign. For in the act of our submission, consisteth both our obligation, and our liberty; which must therefore be inferred by arguments taken from thence; there being no obligation on any man, which ariseth not from some act of his own; for all men equally, are by nature free. And because such arguments, must either be drawn from the express words, I authorize all his actions, or from the intention of him that submitteth himself to his power, (which intention is to be understood by the end for which he so submitteth;) the obligation, and liberty of the subject, is to be derived, either from those words, (or others equivalent;) or else from the end of the institution of sovereignty; namely, the peace of the subjects within themselves, and their defence against a common enemy. Subjects have 11. First therefore, seeing sovereignty by institution, is by covliberty to enant of every one to every one; and sovereignty by acquisition, by defend their covenants of the vanquished to the victor, or child to the parent; it own bodies, is manifest, that every subject has liberty in all those things, the even against right whereof cannot by covenant be transferred. I have shewn them that lawfully before in the 14th chapter, that covenants, not to defend a man's invade them. own body, are void. Therefore, Are not 12. If the sovereign command a man (though justly condemned,) bound to hurt to kill, wound, or maim himself; or not to resist those that assault themselves. him; or to abstain from the use of food, air, medicine, or any other [112] thing, without which he cannot live; yet hath that man the liberty to disobey. 13. If a man be interrogated by the sovereign, or his authority, concerning a crime done by himself, he is not bound (without assurance of pardon) to confess it; because no man (as I have shown in the same chapter) can be obliged by covenant to accuse himself. 14. Again, the consent of a subject to sovereign power, is contained in these words, I authorize, or take upon me, all his actions; in 144

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which there is no restriction at all, of his wxapev, what we delivered to you, 377

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as in the place next before alleged, which does not prove the traditions of the apostles, to be any more than counsels; though as is said in the 8th verse, he that despiseth them, despiseth not man, but God: for our Saviour himself came not to judge, that is, to be king in this world; but to sacrifice himself for sinners, and leave doctors in his Church, to lead, not to drive men to Christ, who never accepteth forced actions, (which is all the law produceth,) but the inward conversion of the heart; which is not the work of laws, but of counsel, and doctrine. 108. And that of 2 Thess. 3· I4. If any man obey not our word by this Epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed: where from the word obey, he would infer, that this

epistle was a law to the Thessalonians. The epistles of the emperors were indeed laws. If therefore the epistle of St. Paul were also a law, they were to obey two masters. But the word obey, as it is in the Greek vnaxovfl, signifieth hearkening to, or putting in practice, not only that which is commanded by him that has right to punish, but also that which is delivered in a way of counsel for our good; and therefore St. Paul does not bid kill him that disobeys; nor beat, nor imprison, nor amerce [fine] him, which legislators may all do; but avoid his company, that he may be ashamed: whereby it is evident, it was not the empire of an apostle, but his reputation amongst the faithful, which the Christians stood in awe of. 109. The last place is that of Heb. I3. I7. Obey your leaders, and submit yourselves to them, for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account: and here also is intended by obedience, a following

of their counsel: for the reason of our obedience, is not drawn from the will and command of our pastors, but from our own benefit, as being the salvation of our souls they watch for, and not for the exaltation of their own power, and authority. If it were meant here, that all they teach were laws, then not only the Pope, but every pastor in his parish should have legislative power. Again, they that are bound to obey, their pastors, have no power to examine their commands. What then shall we say to St. John, who bids us (I John 4· I) Not to believe every spirit, but to try the spirits whether they are of God, because many folse prophets are gone out into the world? It is therefore manifest, that we may dispute the doctrine of our pastors; but no man can dispute a law. The commands of civil sovereigns are on all sides granted to be laws: if any else can make a law besides himself, all commonwealth, and consequently all peace and justice

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must cease; which is contrary to all laws, both divine and human. Nothing therefore can be drawn from these, or any other places of Scripture, to prove the decrees of the Pope, where he has not also the civil sovereignty, to be laws. 110. The last point he would prove, is this, That our Saviour [311] Christ has committed ecclesiastical jurisdiction immediately to none but The question the Pope. Wherein he handleth not the question of supremacy be- ofsuperiority between the

tween the Pope and Christian kings, but between the Pope and other Pope and bishops. And first, he says it is agreed, that the jurisdiction of other bishops. bishops, is at least in the general de jure divino, that is, in the right of God; for which he alleges St. Paul, Eph. 4· r 1, where he says, that Christ after his ascension into heaven, gave gifts to men, some apostles, some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors, and some teachers. And thence infers, they have indeed their jurisdiction in

God's right; but will not grant they have it immediately from God, but derived through the Pope. But if a man may be said to have his jurisdiction de jure divino, and yet not immediately; what lawful jurisdiction, though but civil, is there in a Christian commonwealth, that is not also de juro divino? For Christian kings have their civil power from God immediately; and the magistrates under him exercise their several charges in virtue of his commission; wherein that which they do, is no less de jure divino mediato, than that which the bishops do, in virtue of the Pope's ordination. All lawful power is of God, immediately in the Supreme Governor, and mediately in those that have authority under him: so that either he must grant every constable in the state, to hold his office in the right of God; or he must not hold that any bishop holds his so, besides the Pope himself. 111. But this whole dispute, whether Christ left the jurisdiction to the Pope only, or to other bishops also, if considered out of those places where the Pope has the civil sovereignty, is a contention de lana caprina:* for none of them (where they are not sovereigns) has any jurisdiction at all. For jurisdiction is the power of hearing and determining causes between man and man; and can belong to none, but him that hath the power to prescribe the rules of right and wrong; that is, to make laws; and with the sword of justice to compel men to obey his decisions, pronounced either by himself, or by the judges he ordaineth thereunto; which none can lawfully do but the civil sovereign. 112. Therefore when he allegeth out of chapter 6 of Luke, that 379

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our Saviour called his disciples together, and chose twelve of them which he named apostles, he proveth that he elected them (all, except Matthias, Paul and Barnabas,) and gave them power and command to preach, but not to judge of causes between man and man: for that is a power which he refused to take upon himself, saying, Who made me a judge, or a divider, amongst you? and in another place, My kingdom is not of this world. But he that hath not the power to hear, and determine causes between man and man, cannot be said to have any jurisdiction at all. And yet this hinders not, but that our Saviour gave them power to preach and baptize in all parts of the world, supposing they were not by their own lawful sovereign forbidden: for to our own sovereigns Christ himself, and [312] his apostles, have in sundry places expressly commanded us in all things to be obedient. 113. The arguments by which he would prove, that bishops receive their jurisdiction from the Pope (seeing the Pope in the dominions of other princes hath no jurisdiction himself,) are all in vain. Yet because they prove, on the contrary, that all bishops receive jurisdiction when they have it from their civil sovereigns, I will not omit the recital of them. 114. The first is from chapter I I of Numbers, where Moses not being able alone to undergo the whole burthen of administering the affairs of the people of Israel, God commanded him to choose seventy elders, and took part of the spirit of Moses, to put it upon those seventy elders: by which is understood, not that God weakened the spirit of Moses, for that had not eased him at all; but that they had all of them their authority from him; wherein he doth truly, and ingenuously interpret that place. But seeing Moses had the entire sovereignty in the commonwealth of the Jews, it is manifest, that it is thereby signified, that they had their authority from the civil sovereign: and therefore that place proveth, that bishops in every Christian commonwealth have their authority from the civil sovereign; and from the Pope in his own territories only, and not in the territories of any other state. 115. The second argument, is from the nature of monarchy; wherein all authority is in one man, and in others by derivation from him: but the government of the Church, he says, is monarchical. This also makes for Christian monarchs. For they are really monarchs of their own people; that is, of their own Church (for the Church is the same thing with a Christian people;) whereas the 380

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power of the Pope, though he were St. Peter, is neither monarchy, nor hath any thing of archical, nor cratical, but only of didactical;* for God accepteth not a forced, but a willing obedience. 116. The third, is, from that the see of St. Peter is called by St. Cyprian, the head, the source, the root, the sun, from whence the authority of bishops is derived. But by the law of nature (which is a better principle of right and wrong, than the word of any doctor that is but a man) the civil sovereign in every commonwealth, is the head, the source, the root, and the sun, from which all jurisdiction is derived. And therefore the jurisdiction of bishops, is derived from the civil sovereign. 117. The fourth, is taken from the inequality of their jurisdictions: for if God (saith he) had given it them immediately, he had given as well equality of jurisdiction, as of order: but we see, some are bishops but of one town, some of a hundred towns, and some of many whole provinces; which differences were not determined by the command of God; their jurisdiction therefore is not of God, but of man; and one has a greater, another a less, as it pleaseth the Prince of the Church. Which argument, if he had proved before, that the Pope had an universal jurisdiction over all Christians, had been for his purpose. But seeing that hath not been proved, and that it is [313] notoriously known, the large jurisdiction of the Pope was given him by those that had it, that is, by the Emperors of Rome, (for the Patriarch of Constantinople, upon the same title, namely, of being bishop of the capital city of the empire, and seat of the emperor, claimed to be equal to him,) it followeth, that all other bishops have their jurisdiction from the sovereigns of the place wherein they exercise the same: and as for that cause they have not their authority de jure divino; so neither hath the Pope his de jure divino, except only where he is also the civil sovereign. 118. His fifth argument is this, if bishops have their jurisdiction immediately from God, the Pope could not take it from them, for he can do nothing contrary to God's ordination; and this consequence is good, and well proved. But (saith he) the Pope can do this, and has done it. This also is granted, so he do it in his own dominions, or in the dominions of any other prince that hath given him that power; but not universally, in right of the Popedom: for that power belongeth to every Christian sovereign, within the bounds of his own empire, and is inseparable from the sovereignty. Before the people of Israel had (by the commandment of God to Samuel) set over themselves a 381

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king, after the manner of other nations, the high-priest had the civil government; and none but he could make, nor depose an inferior priest: but that power was afterwards in the king, as may be proved by this same argument of Bellarmine; for if the priest (be he the high-priest or any other) had his jurisdiction immediately from God, then the king could not take it from him;for he could do nothing contrary to God's ordinance. But it is certain that king Solomon (1 Kings 2. 26, 27) deprived Abiathar the high-priest of his office, and placed Zadok (verse 35) in his room. Kings therefore may in like manner ordain, and deprive bishops, as they shall think fit, for the well-governing of their subjects. 119. His sixth argument is this, if bishops have their jurisdiction de jure divino (that is, immediately from God,) they that maintain it, should bring some word of God to prove it: but they can bring none. The argument is good; I have therefore nothing to say against it. But it is an argument no less good, to prove the Pope himself to have no jurisdiction in the dominion of any other prince. 120. Lastly, he bringeth for argument, the testimony of two popes, Innocent and Leo; and I doubt not he might have alleged, with as good reason, the testimonies of all the popes almost since St. Peter: for considering the love of power naturally implanted in mankind, whosoever were made Pope, he would be tempted to uphold the same opinion. Nevertheless, they should therein but do, as Innocent, and Leo did, bear witness of themselves, and therefore their witness should not be good. [314] 121. In the fifth book he hath four conclusions. The first is, that Of the Pope's the Pope is not lord ofall the world: the second, that the Pope is not the temporal lord ofall the Christian world: the third, that the Pope (without his own power. territory) has not any temporal jurisdiction DIRECTLY. These three conclusions are easily granted. The fourth is, that the Pope has (in the dominions of other princes) the supreme temporal power INDIRECTLY: which is denied; unless he mean by indirectly, that he has gotten it by indirect means, then is that also granted. But I understand, that when he saith: he hath it indirectly, he means, that such temporal jurisdiction belongeth to him of right, but that this right is but a consequence of his pastoral authority, the which he could not exercise, unless he have the other with it: and therefore to the pastoral power (which he calls spiritual) the supreme power civil is necessarily annexed; and that thereby he hath a right to change kingdoms,

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giving them to one, and taking them from another, when he shall think it conduces to the salvation of souls. 122. Before I come to consider the arguments by which he would prove this doctrine, it will not be amiss to lay open the consequences of it; that princes, and states, that have the civil sovereignty in their several commonwealths, may bethink themselves, whether it be convenient for them, and conducing to the good of their subjects, of whom they are to give an account at the day of judgment, to admit the same. 123. When it is said, the Pope hath not (in the territories of other states) the supreme civil power directly; we are to understand, he doth not challenge it, as other civil sovereigns do, from the original submission thereto of those that are to be governed. For it is evident, and has already been sufficiently in this treatise demonstrated, that the right of all sovereigns, is derived originally from the consent of every one ofthose that are to be governed; whether they that choose him, do it for their common defence against an enemy, as when they agree amongst themselves to appoint a man, or an assembly of men to protect them; or whether they do it, to save their lives, by submission to a conquering enemy. The Pope therefore, when he disclaimeth the supreme civil power over other states directly, denieth no more, but that his right cometh to him by that way; he ceaseth not for all that, to claim it another way; and that is, (without the consent of them that are to be governed) by a right given him by God, (which he calleth indirectly,) in his assumption to the papacy. But by what way soever he pretend, the power is the same; and he may (if it be granted to be his right) depose princes and states, as often as it is for the salvation of souls, that is, as often as he will; for he claimeth also the sole power to judge, whether it be to the salvation of men's souls, or not. And this is the doctrine, not only that Bellarmine here, and many other doctors, teach in their sermons and books, but also that some councils have decreed, and the Popes have accordingly, when the occasion hath served them, put in [315] practice. For the fourth council ofLateran,* held under Pope Innocent the Third, (in the third chapter De Haereticis,) hath this canon. Ifa king, at the Pope's admonition, do not purge his kingdom ofheretics, and being excommunicate for the same, make not satisfaction within a year, his subjects are absolved of their obedience. And the practice hereof hath been seen on divers occasions; as in the deposing of

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Childeric, king of France; in the translation of the Roman empire to Charlemagne; in the oppression of John king of England; in transferring the kingdom of Navarre; and of late years, in the League against Henry the Third of France, and in many more occurrences. I think there be few princes that consider not this as unjust, and inconvenient; but I wish they would all resolve to be kings, or subjects. Men cannot serve two masters: they ought therefore to ease them, either by holding the reins of government wholly in their own hands; or by wholly delivering them into the hands of the Pope; that such men as are willing to be obedient, may be protected in their obedience. For this distinction of temporal and spiritual power is but words. Power is as really divided, and as dangerously to all purposes, by sharing with another indirect power, as with a direct one. But to come now to his arguments. 124. The first is this, The civil power is subject to the spiritual: therefore he that hath the supreme power spiritual, hath right to command temporal princes, and dispose of their temporals in order to the spiritual. As for the distinction of temporal, and spiritual, let us consider in what sense it may be said intelligibly, that the temporal, or civil power is subject to the spiritual. There be but two ways that those words can be made sense. For when we say, one power is subject to another power, the meaning either is, that he which hath the one, is subject to him that hath the other; or that the one power is to the other, as the means to the end. For we cannot understand, that one power hath power over another power; or that one power can have right or command over another. For subjection, command, right, and power, are accidents, not of powers, but of persons: one power may be subordinate to another, as the art of a saddler, to the art of a rider. If then it be granted, that the civil government be ordained as a means to bring us to a spiritual felicity; yet it does not follow, that if a king have the civil power, and the Pope the spiritual, that therefore the king is bound to obey the Pope, more than every saddler is bound to obey every rider. Therefore as from subordination of an art, cannot be inferred the subjection of the professor; so from the subordination of a government, cannot be inferred the subjection of the governor. When therefore he saith, the civil power is subject to the spiritual, his meaning is, that the civil sovereign, is subject to the spiritual sovereign. And the argument stands thus, The civil sovereign is subject to the spiritual; therefore the spiritual prince may command temporal princes. Where the conclusion is the

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same with the antecedent he should have t>roved. But to prove it, he [316] allegeth first, this reason, kings and popes, clergy and laity, make but one commonwealth; that is to say, but one Church: and in all bodies the members depend one upon another: but things spiritual depend not of things temporal: therefore temporal depend on spiritual. And therefore are subject to them. In which argumentation there be two gross

errors: one is, that all Christian kings, popes, clergy, and all other Christian men, make but one commonwealth: for it is evident that France is one commonwealth, Spain another, and Venice a third, &c. And these consist of Christians; and therefore also are several bodies of Christians; that is to say, several Churches: and their several sovereigns represent them, whereby they are capable of commanding and obeying, of doing and suffering, as a natural man; which no general or universal Church is, till it have a representant; which it hath not on earth: for if it had, there is no doubt but that all Christendom were one commonwealth, whose sovereign were that representant, both in things spiritual and temporal: and the Pope, to make himself this representant, wanteth three things that our Saviour hath not given him, to command, and to judge, and to punish, otherwise than (by excommunication) to run from those that will not learn of him: for though the Pope were Christ's only vicar, yet he cannot exercise his government, till our Saviour's second coming: and then also it is not the Pope, but St. Peter himself, with the other apostles, that are to be judges of the world. 125. The other error in this his first argument is, that he says, the members of every commonwealth, as of a natural body, depend one of another: it is true, they cohere together; but they depend only on the sovereign, which is the soul of the commonwealth; which failing, the commonwealth is dissolved into a civil war, no one man so much as cohering to another, for want of a common dependence on a known sovereign; just as the members of the natural body dissolve into earth, for want of a soul to hold them together. Therefore there is nothing in this similitude, from whence to infer a dependence of the laity on the clergy, or of the temporal officers on the spiritual; but of both on the civil sovereign; which ought indeed to direct his civil commands to the salvation of souls; but is not therefore subject to any but to God himself. And thus you see the laboured fallacy of the first argument, to deceive such men as distinguish not between the subordination of actions in the way to the end; and the subjection of persons one to another in the administration of the means.

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For to every end, the means are determined by nature, or by God himself supernaturally: but the power to make men use the means, is in every nation resigned (by the law of nature, which forbiddeth men to violate their faith given) to the civil sovereign. [317] 126. His second argument is this, every commonwealth, (because it is supposed to be perftct and sufficient in itself,) may command any other commonwealth, not subject to it, andforce it to change the administration ofthe government; nay depose the prince, and set another in his room, if it cannot otherwise defond itself against the injuries he goes about to do them: much more may a spiritual commonwealth command a temporal one to change the administration of their government, and may depose princes, and institute others, when they cannot otherwise deftnd the spiritual good. 127. That a commonwealth, to defend itself against injuries, may lawfully do all that he hath here said, is very true; and hath already in that which hath gone before been sufficiently demonstrated. And if it were also true, that there is now in this world a spiritual commonwealth, distinct from a civil commonwealth, then might the prince thereof, upon injury done him, or upon want of caution that injury be not done him in time to come, repair, and secure himself by war; which is in :;urn, deposing, killing, or subduing, or doing any act of hostility. But by the same reason, it would be no less lawful for a civil sovereign, upon the like injuries done, or feared, to make war upon the spiritual sovereign; which I believe is more than Cardinal Bellarmine would have inferred from his own proposition. 128. But spiritual commonwealth there is none in this world: for it is the same thing with the kingdom of Christ; which he himself saith, is not of this world; but shall be in the next world, at the resurrection, when they that have lived justly, and believed that he was the Christ, shall (though they died natural bodies) rise spiritual bodies; and then it is, that our Saviour shall judge the world, and conquer his adversaries, and make a spiritual commonwealth. In the meantime, seeing there are no men on earth, whose bodies are spiritual; there can be no spiritual commonwealth amongst men that are yet in the flesh; unless we call preachers, that have commission to teach, and prepare men for their reception into the kingdom of Christ at the resurrection, a commonwealth; which I have proved already to be none. 129. The third argument is this; it is not lawful for Christians to tolerate an infidel, or heretical king, in case he endeavour to draw them

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to his heresy, or infidelity. But to judge whether a king draw his subjects to heresy, or not, belongeth to the Pope. Therefore hath the Pope right, to determine whether the prince be to be deposed, or not deposed. 130. To this I answer, that both these assertions are false. For Christians, (or men of what religion soever,) if they tolerate not their king, whatsoever law he maketh, though it be concerning religion, do violate their faith, contrary to the divine law, both natural and positive: nor is there any judge of heresy amongst subjects, but their own civil sovereign: for heresy is nothing else, but a private opinion, [318] obstinately maintained, contrary to the opinion which the public person (that is to say, the representant of the commonwealth) hath commanded to be taught. By which it is manifest, that an opinion publicly appointed to be taught, cannot be heresy; nor the sovereign princes that authorize them, heretics. For heretics are none but private men, that stubbornly defend some doctrine, prohibited by their lawful sovereigns. 131. But to prove that Christians are not to tolerate infidel, or heretical kings, he allegeth a place in Deut. 17 where God forbiddeth the Jews, when they shall set a king over themselves, to choose a stranger: and from thence inferreth, that it is unlawful for a Christian, to choose a king that is not a Christian. And 'tis true, that he that is a Christian, that is, he that hath already obliged himself to receive our Saviour when he shall come, for his king, shall tempt God too much in choosing for king in this world, one that he knoweth will endeavour, both by terror, and persuasion to make him violate his faith. But it is (saith he) the same danger, to choose one that is not a Christian, for king, and not to depose him, when he is chosen. To this I say, the question is not of the danger of not deposing; but of the justice of deposing him. To choose him, may in some cases be unjust; but to depose him, when he is chosen, is in no case just. For it is always a violation of faith, and consequently against the law of nature, which is the eternal law of God. Nor do we read, that any such doctrine was accounted Christian in the time of the apostles; nor in the time of the Roman emperors, till the Popes had the civil sovereignty of Rome. But to this he hath replied, that the Christians of old, deposed not Nero, nor Diocletian, nor Julian, nor Valens an Arian, *for this cause only, that they wanted temporal forces. Perhaps so. But did our Saviour, who for calling for, might have had twelve legions of immortal, invulnerable angels to assist him, want forces to depose Caesar, or at least Pilate, that unjustly,

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without finding fault in him, delivered him to the Jews to be crucified? Or if the apostles wanted temporal forces to depose Nero, was it therefore necessary for them in their epistles to the new made Christians, to teach them (as they did) to obey the powers constituted over them, (whereof Nero in that time was one,) and that they ought to obey them, not for fear of their wrath, but for conscience sake? Shall we say they did not only obey, but also teach what they meant not, for want of strength? It is not therefore for want of strength, but for conscience sake, that Christians are to tolerate their heathen princes, or princes (for I cannot call any one whose doctrine is the public doctrine, an heretic) that authorize the teaching of an error. And whereas for the temporal power of the Pope, he allegeth further, that St. Paul (1 Cor. 6) appointed judges under the heathen princes of those times, such as were not ordained by those princes; it is not true. For St. Paul does but advise them, to take some of their [319] brethren to compound their differences, as arbitrators, rather than to go to law one with another before the heathen judges; which is a wholesome precept, and full of charity, fit to be practised also in the best Christian commonwealths. And for the danger that may arise to religion, by the subjects tolerating of a heathen, or an erring prince, it is a point, of which a subject is no competent judge; or if he be, the Pope's temporal subjects may judge also of the Pope's doctrine. For every Christian prince, as I have formerly proved, is no less supreme pastor of his own subjects, than the Pope of his. 132. The fourth argument, is taken from the baptism of kings; wherein, that they may be made Christians they submit their sceptres to Christ; and promise to keep, and defend the Christian faith. This is true; for Christian kings are no more but Christ's subjects: but they may, for all that, be the Pope's fellows; for they are supreme pastors of their own subjects; and the Pope is no more but king, and pastor, even in Rome itself. 133. The fifth argument, is drawn from the words spoken by our Saviour, Feed my sheep; by which was given all power necessary for a pastor; as the power to chase away wolves, such as are heretics; the power to shut up rams, if they be mad, or push at the other sheep with their horns, such as are evil (though Christian) kings; and power to give the flock convenient food: from whence he inferreth, that St. Peter had these three powers given him by Christ. To which I answer, that the last of these powers, is no more than the power, or rather command to teach. For the first, which is to chase away

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wolves, that is, heretics, the place he quoteth is (Matt. 7· 15) Beware offolse prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves. But neither are heretics false prophets, or at all prophets: nor (admitting heretics for the wolves there meant,) were the apostles commanded to kill them, or if they were kings, to depose them; but to beware of, fly, and avoid them: nor was it to St. Peter, nor to any of the apostles, but to the multitude of the Jews that followed him into the mountain, men for the most part not yet converted, that he gave this counsel, to beware of false prophets: which therefore, if it confer a power of chasing away kings, was given, not only to private men; but to men that were not at all Christians. And as to the power of separating, and shutting up of furious rams, (by which he meaneth Christian kings that refuse to submit themselves to the Roman pastor,) our Saviour refused to take upon him that power in this world himself, but advised to let the corn and tares grow up together till the day of judgment: much less did he give it to St. Peter, or can St. Peter give it to the Popes. St. Peter, and all other pastors, are bidden to esteem those Christians that disobey the Church, that is, (that disobey the Christian sovereign) as heathen men, and as publicans. Seeing then men [320] challenge to the Pope no authority over heathen princes, they ought to challenge none over those that are to be esteemed as heathen. 134. But from the power to teach only, he inferreth also a coercive power in the Pope, over kings. The pastor (saith he) must give his flock convenient food: therefore the Pope may, and ought to compel kings to do their duty. Out of which it followeth, that the Pope, as pastor of Christian men, is king of kings: which all Christian kings ought indeed either to confess, or else they ought to take upon themselves the supreme pastoral charge, every one in his own dominion. 135. His sixth, and last argument, is from examples. To which I answer, first, that examples prove nothing: secondly, that the examples he allegeth make not so much as a probability of right. The fact of Jehoiada, in killing Athaliah, (2 Kings 11) was either by the authority ofkingJoash, or it was a horrible crime in the high-priest, which (ever after the election of king Saul) was a mere subject. The fact of St. Ambrose, in excommunicating Theodosius the emperor, (if it were true he did so,) was a capital crime. And for the Popes, Gregory I, Gregory II, Zachary, and Leo III, their judgments are void, as given in their own cause; and the acts done by them con-

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formably to this doctrine, are the greatest crimes (especially that of Zachary) that are incident to human nature. And thus much of Power Ecclesiastical; wherein I had been more brief, forbearing to examine these arguments of Bellarmine, if they had been his, as a private man, and not as the champion of the Papacy against all other Christian Princes, and States.

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CHAPTER XLIII OF WHAT IS NECESSARY FOR A MAN'S RECEPTION INTO THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN

The difficulty of obqinf( God and man both at once;

1.< none to them that distinf(uish between what is, and what is not necessary to salvation.

1. THE most frequent pretext of sedition, and civil war, in Christian commonwealths hath a long time proceeded from a difficulty, not yet sufficiently resolved, of obeying at once, both God and man, then when their commandments are one contrary to the other. It is manifest enough, that when a man receiveth two contrary commands, and knows that one of them is God's, he ought to obey that, and not the other, though it be the command even of his lawful sovereign (whether a monarch, or a sovereign assembly,) or the command of his father. The difficulty therefore consisteth in this, that men when they are commanded in the name of God, know not in divers cases, whether the command be from God, or whether he that commandeth, do but abuse God's name for some private ends of his own. For as there were in the Church of the Jews, many false prophets, that sought reputation with the people, by feigned dreams and visions; so there have been in all times in the Church of Christ, false teachers, that seek reputation with the people, by fantastical and false doctrines; and by such reputation (as is the nature of ambition,) to govern them for their private benefit. 2. But this difficulty of obeying both God, and the civil sovereign on earth, to those that can distinguish between what is necessary, and what is not necessary for their reception into the kingdom of God, is of no moment. For if the command of the civil sovereign be such, as that it may be obeyed, without the forfeiture of life eternal; not to obey it is unjust; and the precept of the apostle takes place; Servants obey your masters in all things; and, Children obey your parents in all things; and the precept of our Saviour, The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses' chair, all therefore they shall say, that observe, and do. But if the

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command be such, as cannot be obeyed, without being damned to eternal death, then it were madness to obey it, and the council of our Savioar takes place, (Matt. 10. 28) Fear not those that kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. Ail men therefore that would avoid, both the punishments that are to be in this world inflicted, for disobedience to their earthly sovereign, and those that shall be inflicted in the world to come for disobedience to God, have need be taught to distinguish well between what is, and what is not necessary to eternal salvation. 3. All that is NECESSARY to salvation, is contained in two virtues, [322] faith in Christ, and obedience to laws. The latter of these, if it were All that is perfect, were enough to us. But because we are all guilty of disobe- necessary to salvation is dience to God's law, not only originally in Adam, but also actually wntained in by our own transgressions, there is required at our hands now, not faith and only obedience for the rest of our time, but also a remission ofsins for obedience. the time past; which remission is the reward of our faith in Christ. That nothing else is necessarily required to salvation, is manifest from this, that the kingdom of heaven is shut to none but to sinners; that is to say, to the disobedient, or transgressors of the law; nor to them, in case they repent, and believe all the articles of Christian faith, necessary to salvation. 4. The obedience required at our hands by God, that accepteth What in all our actions the will for the deed, is a serious endeavour to obey obedience is him; and is called also by all such names as signify that endeavour. necessary; And therefore obedience, is sometimes called by the names of charity, and love, because they imply a will to obey; and our Saviour himself maketh our love to God, and to one another, a fulfilling of the whole law: and sometimes by the name of righteousness; for righteousness is but the will to give to every one his own; that is to say, the will to obey the laws: and sometimes by the name of repentance; because to repent, implieth a turning away from sin, which is the same with the return of the will to obedience. Whosoever therefore unfeignedly desireth to fulfil the commandments of God, or repenteth him truly of his transgressions, or that loveth God with all his heart, and his neighbour as himself, hath all the obedience necessary to his reception into the kingdom of God: for if God should require perfect innocence, there could no flesh be saved. 5. But what commandments are those that God hath given us? And to what Are all those laws which were given to the Jews by the hand of laws. Moses, the commandments of God? If they be, why are not Chris391

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tians taught to obey them? If they be not, what others are so, besides the law of nature? For our Saviour Christ hath not given us new laws, but counsel to observe those we are subject to; that is to say, the laws of nature, and the laws of our several sovereigns: nor did he make any new law to the Jews in his sermon on the Mount, but only expounded the law of Moses, to which they were subject before. The laws of God therefore are none but the laws of nature, whereof the principal is, that we should not violate our faith, that is, a commandment to obey our civil sovereigns, which we constituted over us, by mutual pact one with another. And this law of God, that commandeth obedience to the law civil, commandeth by consequence obedience to all the precepts of the Bible; which (as I have proved in the precedent chapter) is there only law, where the civil sovereign hath made it so; and in other places, but counsel; which a man at his own peril may without injustice refuse to obey. [323] 6. Knowing now what is the obedience necessary to salvation, In the faith and to whom it is due; we are to consider next concerning faith, of a whom, and why we believe; and what are the articles, or points Christian, necessary to be believed by them that shall be saved. And first, for who is the the person whom we believe, because it is impossible to believe any person believed. person, before we know what he saith, it is necessary he be one that we have heard speak. The person therefore, whom Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and the prophets, believed, was God himself, that spake unto them supernaturally: and the person, whom the apostles and disciples that conversed with Christ believed, was our Saviour himself. But of them, to whom neither God the Father, nor our Saviour ever spake, it cannot be said, that the person whom they believed, was God. They believed the apostles, and after them the pastors and doctors of the Church, that recommended to their faith the history of the Old and New Testament: so that the faith of Christians ever since our Saviour's time, hath had for foundation, first, the reputation of their pastors, and afterward, the authority of those that made the Old and New Testament to be received for the rule offaith; which none could do but Christian sovereigns; who are therefore the supreme pastors, and the only persons, whom Christians now hear speak from God; except such as God speaketh to, in these days supernaturally. But because there be many false prophets gone out into the world, men are to examine such spirits (as St. John adviseth us, I John 4· I) whether they be ofGod, or not. And therefore, seeing the examination of doctrines belongeth to the supreme pas392

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tor, the person which all they that have no special revelation are to believe, is (in every commonwealth) the supreme pastor, that is to say, the civil sovereign. 7. The causes why men believe any Christian doctrine, are vari- The causes of ous: for faith is the gift of God; and he worketh it in each several Christian man, by such ways, as it seemeth good unto himself. The most fazth. ordinary immediate cause of our belief, concerning any point of Christian faith, is, that we believe the Bible to be the word of God. But why we believe the Bible to be the word of God, is much disputed, as all questions must needs be, that are not well stated. For they make not the question to be, why we believe it, but, how we know it; as if believing and knowing were all one. And thence while one side ground their knowledge upon the infallibility of the Church, and the other side, on the testimony of the private spirit, neither side concludeth what it pretends. For how shall a man know the infallibility of the Church, but by knowing first the infallibility of the Scripture? Or how shall a man know his own private spirit to be other than a belief, grounded upon the authority, and arguments of his teachers; or upon a presumption of his own gifts? Besides, there is nothing in the Scripture, from which can be inferred the infallibility of the Church; much less, of any particular Church; and least of all, the infallibility of any particular man. 8. It is manifest therefore, that Christian men do not know, but [324] only believe the Scripture to be the word of God; and that the means Faith comes of making them believe which God is pleased to afford men ordi- by hearing. narily, is according to the way of nature, that is to say, from their teachers. It is the doctrine of St. Paul concerning Christian faith in general (Rom. 10. 17),jaith cometh by hearing, that is, by hearing our lawful pastors. He saith also, (verses 14, 15, of the same chapter) how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they be sent? Whereby it is evident, that the ordinary cause of believing that

the Scriptures are the word of God, is the same with the cause of the believing of all other articles of our faith, namely, the hearing of those that are by the law allowed and appointed to teach us, as our parents in their houses, and our pastors in the churches: which also is made more manifest by experience. For what other cause can there be assigned, why in Christian commonwealths all men either believe, or at least profess the Scripture to be the word of God, and in other commonwealths scarce any; but that in Christian common393

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wealths they are taught it from their infancy; and in other places they are taught otherwise? 9. But if teaching be the cause of faith, why do not all believe? It is certain therefore that faith is the gift of God, and he giveth it to whom he will. Nevertheless, because to them to whom he giveth it, he giveth it by the means of teachers, the immediate cause of faith is hearing. In a school, where many are taught, and some profit, others profit not, the cause oflearning in them that profit, is the master; yet it cannot be thence inferred, that learning is not the gift of God. All good things proceed from God; yet cannot all that have them, say they are inspired; for that implies a gift supernatural, and the immediate hand of God; which he that pretends to, pretends to be a prophet, and is subject to the examination of the Church. 10. But whether men know, or believe, or grant the Scriptures to be the word of God; if out of such places of them, as are without obscurity, I shall show what articles of faith are necessary, and only necessary for salvation, those men must needs know, believe, or grant the same. The only 11. The (unum necessarium) only article offaith, which the Scripnecessary ture maketh simply necessary to salvation, is this, that JESus IS THE article of CHRIST. By the name of Christ, is understood the king, which God Christian had before promised by the prophets of the Old Testament, to send faith; into the world, to reign (over the Jews, and over such of other nations as should believe in him) under himself eternally; and to give them that eternal life, which was lost by the sin of Adam. Which when I have proved out of Scripture, I will further show when, and in what sense some other articles may be also called necessary. [325] 12. For proof that the belief of this article, Jesus is the Christ, is all Proved from the faith required to salvation, my first argument shall be from the the scope of scope of the Evangelists; which was by the description of the life of the our Saviour, to establish that one article, Jesus is the Christ. The sum Evangelists: of St. Matthew's Gospel is this, that Jesus was of the stock of David; born of a Virgin; which are the marks of the true Christ: that the Magi came to worship him as King of the Jews: that Herod for the same cause sought to kill him: that John the Baptist proclaimed him: that he preached by himself, and his apostles that he was that king: that he taught the law, not as a scribe, but as a man of authority: that he cured diseases by his word only, and did many other miracles, which were foretold the Christ should do: that he was saluted king 394

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when he entered into Jerusalem: that he f0rewarned them to beware of all others that should pretend to be Christ: that he was taken, accused, and put to death, for saying he was king: that the cause of his condemnation written on the cross was, JESus OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEws. All which tend to no other end than this, that men should believe, that Jesus is the Christ. Such therefore was the scope of St. Matthew's Gospel. But the scope of all the evangelists (as may appear by reading them) was the same. Therefore the scope of the whole Gospel, was the establishing of that only article. And St. John expressly makes it his conclusion (John zo. 31), These things are written, that you may know that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. 13. My second argument is taken from the subjects of the sermons of the apostles, both whilst our Saviour lived on earth, and after his ascension. The apostles in our Saviour's time, were sent, (Luke 9· 2) to preach the kingdom of God: for neither there, nor Matt. 10. 7 giveth he any commission to them, other than this, As ye go, preach, saying, the kingdom of heaven is at hand; that is, that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, the King which was to come. That their preaching also after his ascension was the same, is manifest out of Acts 17. 6, 7, They drew (saith St. Luke) Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers ofthe city, crying, these that have turned the world upside down are come hither also, whom Jason hath received. And these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying, that there is another king, one Jesus. And out of the 2nd and 3rd verses of the same chapter, where it is said, that St. Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them; and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures; opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffired, and risen again from the dead, and that this Jesus (whom he preached) is Christ. 14. The third argument is from those places of Scripture, by which all the faith required to salvation is declared to be easy. For if an inward assent of the mind to all the doctrines concerning Christian faith now taught, (whereof the greatest part are disputed,) were necessary to salvation, there would be nothing in the world so hard, as to be a Christian. The thief upon the cross though repenting, could not have been saved for saying, Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom; by which he testified no belief of any other article, but this, that Jesus was the king. Nor could it be said (as it is, Matt. 1 1. 30) that Christ's yoke is easy, and his burthen light: nor that little children believe in him, as it is Matt. 18. 6. Nor could St. Paul 395

From the sermons of the apostles:

From the easiness of the doctrine:

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have said (I Cor. 1. 2I) It pleased God by the foolishness ofpreaching, to save them that believe. Nor could St. Paul himself have been saved, much less have been so great a doctor of the Church so suddenly, that never perhaps thought of transubstantiation, nor purgatory, nor many other articles now obtruded. From formal 15. The fourth argument is taken from places express, and such and clear as receive no controversy of interpretation; as first, John 5· 39· texts. Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they that testifY of me. Our Saviour here speaketh of the Scriptures only of the Old Testament; for the Jews at that time could not search the Scriptures of the New Testament, which were not written. But the Old Testament hath nothing of Christ, but the marks by which men might know him when he came; as that he should descend from David; be born at Bethlehem, and of a Virgin; do great miracles, and the like. Therefore to believe that this Jesus was He, was sufficient to eternal life: but more than sufficient is not necessary; and consequently no other article is required. Again, (John I 1. 26) Whosoever liveth and believeth in me, shall not die eternally. Therefore to believe in Christ, is faith sufficient to eternal life; and consequently no more faith than that is necessary, but to believe in Jesus, and to believe that Jesus is the Christ, is all one, as appeareth in the verses immediately following. For when our Saviour (verse 26) had said to Martha, Believest thou this? she answereth (verse 27) Yea, Lord, I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world: therefore this article alone is faith sufficient to life eternal; and more than sufficient is not necessary. Thirdly, John 20. 31. These things are written that ye might believe, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son ofGod, and that believing ye might have life through his name. There, to believe that Jesus is the Christ, is faith sufficient to the obtaining of life; and therefore no other article is necessary. Fourthly, I John 4· 2: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God. And I John 5· 1. Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born ofGod. And verse 5. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? Fifthly, Acts 8. 36, 37· See, saith the Eunuch, here is water, what doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, if thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayst. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Therefore this article believed, Jesus is the Christ, is sufficient to baptism, that is to say, to our reception into the kingdom of God, and by consequence, only necessary. And

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generally in all places where our Saviour saith to any man, Thy faith [327] hath saved thee, the cause he saith it, is some confession, which directly, or by consequence, implieth a belief, that Jesus is the Christ.

16. The last argument is from the places, where this article is From that it made the foundation of faith: for he that holdeth the foundation, is the . shall be saved. Which places are first, Matt. 24. 23, 24. If any ~~~ndztwn of man shall say unto you, Lo here is Christ, or there, believe it not, for there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders, CSc. Here we see, this article Jesus is the Christ,

must be held, though he that shall teach the contrary should do great miracles. The second place is, Gal. I. 8. Though we, or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you, than that we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. But the gospel which Paul, and the other apostles, preached, was only this article, that Jesus is the Christ:

therefore for the belief of this article, we are to reject the authority of an angel from heaven; much more of any mortal man, if he teach the contrary. This is therefore the fundamental article of Christian faith. A third place is, I John 4· 1, 2. Beloved, believe not every spirit. Hereby ye shall know the Spirit ofGod; every spirit that conftsseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God. By which it is evident, that

this article, is the measure, and rule, by which to estimate, and examine all other articles; and is therefore only fundamental. A fourth is, Matt. I6. 16, 18, where after St. Peter had professed this article, saying to our Saviour, Thou art Christ the Son of the living God, our Saviour answered, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church: from whence I infer, that this article is that, on which all other doctrines of the Church are built, as on their foundation. A fifth is (1 Cor. 3· II, 12, &c.) Other foundation can no man lay, than that which is laid, Jesus is the Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man's work shall be made maniftst; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burnt, he shall suffir loss; but he himselfshall be saved, yet so as by fire. Which

words, being partly plain and easy to understand, and partly allegorical and difficult; out of that which is plain, may be inferred, that pastors that teach this foundation, that Jesus is the Christ, though they draw from it false consequences, (which all men are sometimes 397

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subject to,) they may nevertheless be saved; much more that they may be saved, who being no pastors, but hearers, believe that which is by their lawful pastors taught them. Therefore the belief of this article is sufficient; and by consequence, there is no other article of faith necessarily required to salvation. 17. Now for the part which is allegorical, as that the fire shall try [328] every man's work, and that they shall be saved, but so as by fire, or though fire, (for the original is