Leviathan PDF Play Books

It is a work authored by Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) and published in 1651. The biblical Leviathan inspired its name. The work is one of the first and most influential examples of social contract theory, and it deals with the structure of society and legitimate government. It was written during the English Civil War (1642–1651) and advocates for a social compact and absolute monarchy. Civil conflict and the raw situation of a state of nature ("the fight of all against all"), according to Hobbes, could only be prevented by strong, undivided governance.

Hobbes begins by defining concepts in a straightforward and non-sentimental manner. Good and evil are simply phrases used to describe an individual's appetites and desires, which are nothing more than the inclination to go toward or away from a particular item. Hope is nothing more than a desire for something mixed with the belief that it is possible to obtain it. He claims that Scholasticism, the dominant political theology of the day, feeds on muddled definitions of everyday phrases like incorporeal substance, which Hobbes regards as a contradiction in terms. Hobbes describes human psychology without mLeviathan, also known as The Matter, Forme, and Power of a Commonwealth Ecclesiasticall and Civil,entioning the summum bonum, or greatest good, as earlier thought did.