Thomas Hobbes

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Thomas Hobbes

Born

5 April 1588
Westport near Malmesbury,
Wiltshire, England

Died

4 December 1679 (aged 91)

Derbyshire, England

Alma Magdalen Hall, Oxford

mater

Era

17th-century philosophy
(Modern Philosophy)

Region Western Philosophers

School Social contract, classical

realism,empiricism, determinism
,materialism, ethical egoism
Main Political philosophy, history,
interes ethics, geometry
ts
Notabl Modern founder of the social
e ideas contract tradition; life in
the state of nature is "solitary,
poor, nasty, brutish and short"
Influences[show]
Influenced[show]
Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury (/hbz/; 5 April 1588 4 December 1679), in some older
[a]
texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work
on political philosophy. His 1651 book Leviathan established social contract theory, the foundation of
[1]
most later Western political philosophy.
Though on rational grounds a champion of absolutism for the sovereign, Hobbes also developed
some of the fundamentals of European liberal thought: the right of the individual; the natural equality
of all men; the artificial character of the political order (which led to the later distinction between civil
society and the state); the view that all legitimate political power must be "representative" and based
on the consent of the people; and a liberal interpretation of law which leaves people free to do
[2]
whatever the law does not explicitly forbid.
[3][4]

He was one of the founders of modern political philosophy and political science.
His
understanding of humans as being matter and motion, obeying the same physical laws as other
matter and motion, remains influential; and his account of human nature as self-interested
cooperation, and of political communities as being based upon a "social contract" remains one of the
major topics of political philosophy.
In addition to political philosophy, Hobbes also contributed to a diverse array of other fields,
including history, geometry, the physics of gases, theology, ethics, and general philosophy.

Early life and education[edit]

Thomas Hobbes was born at Westport, now part

of Malmesbury in Wiltshire, England, on 5 April 1588.[5] Born
prematurely when his mother heard of the coming invasion
of the Spanish Armada, Hobbes later reported that "my
mother gave birth to twins: myself and fear."[6] His childhood
is almost completely unknown, and his mother's name is
unknown.[7] His father, Thomas Sr., was
the vicar of Charlton and Westport. Thomas Hobbes, the
younger, had a brother Edmund, about two years older, and
a sister. Thomas Sr. was involved in a fight with the local
clergy outside his church, forcing him to leave London and
abandon the family. The family was left in the care of
Thomas Sr.'s older brother, Francis, a wealthy merchant
with no family. Hobbes Jr. was educated at Westport church
from age four, passed to the Malmesbury school, and then
to a private school kept by a young man named Robert
Latimer, a graduate of the University of Oxford. Hobbes was
a good pupil, and around 1603 he went up to Magdalen
Hall, the predecessor college to Hertford College, Oxford.[8][9]
[10][11]

The principal John Wilkinson was a Puritan, and he had

some influence on Hobbes.

At university, Hobbes appears to have followed his own

curriculum; he was "little attracted by the scholastic
learning". He did not complete his B.A. degree until 1608,
but he was recommended by Sir James Hussey, his master
at Magdalen, as tutor to William, the son of William
Cavendish, Baron of Hardwick (and later Earl of
Devonshire), and began a lifelong connection with that
family.[12]
Hobbes became a companion to the younger William and
they both took part in a grand tour of Europe in 1610.
Hobbes was exposed to European scientific and critical
methods during the tour, in contrast to the scholastic
philosophy which he had learned in Oxford. His scholarly
efforts at the time were aimed at a careful study of classic
Greek and Latin authors, the outcome of which was, in
1628, his great translation of Thucydides' History of the
Peloponnesian War, the first translation of that work into
English from a Greek manuscript. It has been argued that
three of the discourses in the 1620 publication known
as Horea Subsecivae: Observations and Discourses, also
represent the work of Hobbes from this period.[13]

Although he associated with literary figures like Ben

Jonson and briefly worked as Francis Bacon's amanuensis,
[14]

he did not extend his efforts into philosophy until after

1629. His employer Cavendish, then the Earl of Devonshire,

died of theplague in June 1628. The widowed countess
dismissed Hobbes but he soon found work, again as a tutor,
this time toGervase Clifton, the son of Sir Gervase Clifton,
1st Baronet. This task, chiefly spent in Paris, ended in 1631
when he again found work with the Cavendish family,
tutoring William, the eldest son of his previous pupil. Over
the next seven years, as well as tutoring, he expanded his
own knowledge of philosophy, awakening in him curiosity
over key philosophic debates. He visited Florence in 1636
and was later a regular debater in philosophic groups in
Paris, held together by Marin Mersenne. From 1637 he
considered himself a philosopher and scholar.[citation needed]

In Paris[edit]

Thomas Hobbes

Hobbes's first area of study was an interest in the physical

doctrine of motion and physical momentum. Despite his
interest in this phenomenon, he disdained experimental
work as in physics. He went on to conceive the system of
thought to the elaboration of which he would devote his life.
His scheme was first to work out, in a separate treatise, a
systematic doctrine of body, showing how physical
phenomena were universally explicable in terms of motion,
at least as motion or mechanical action was then
understood. He then singled out Man from the realm of
Nature and plants. Then, in another treatise, he showed
what specific bodily motions were involved in the production
of the peculiar phenomena of sensation, knowledge,
affections and passions whereby Man came into relation

with Man. Finally he considered, in his crowning treatise,

how Men were moved to enter into society, and argued how
this must be regulated if Men were not to fall back into
"brutishness and misery". Thus he proposed to unite the
separate phenomena of Body, Man, and the State.[citation needed]
Hobbes came home, in 1637, to a country riven with
discontent which disrupted him from the orderly execution of
his philosophic plan. However, by the end of the Short
Parliament in 1640, he had written a short treatise
called The Elements of Law, Natural and Politic. It was not
published and only circulated as a manuscript, among his
acquaintances. A pirated version, however, was published
about ten years later. Although it seems that much ofThe
Elements of Law was composed before the sitting of the
Short Parliament, there are polemical pieces of the work
that clearly mark the influences of the rising political crisis.
Nevertheless, many (though not all) elements of Hobbes's
political thought were unchanged between The Elements of
Law and Leviathan, which demonstrates that the events of
the English Civil War had little effect on
his contractarian methodology. However, the arguments
in Leviathan were modified from The Elements of Law when

it came to the necessity of consent in creating political

obligation. Namely, Hobbes wrote in The Elements of
Law that Patrimonial kingdoms were not necessarily formed
by the consent of the governed, while in Leviathanhe argued
that they were. This was perhaps a reflection either of
Hobbes's thoughts about the engagement controversy or of
his reaction to treatises published by Patriarchalists, such
as Sir Robert Filmer, between 1640 and 1651.[citation needed]
When in November 1640 the Long Parliament succeeded
the Short, Hobbes felt he was a in disfavor due to the
circulation of his treatise, and fled to Paris. He did not return
for 11 years. In Paris, he rejoined the coterie about
Mersenne, and wrote a critique of the Meditations on First
Philosophy of Descartes, which was printed as third among
the sets of "Objections" appended, with "Replies" from
Descartes in 1641. A different set of remarks on other works
by Descartes succeeded only in ending all correspondence
between the two.
Hobbes also extended his own works somewhat, working on
the third section, De Cive, which was finished in November
1641. Although it was initially only circulated privately, it was

well received, and included lines of argumentation that were

repeated a decade later in the Leviathan. He then returned
to hard work on the first two sections of his work and
published little except a short treatise on optics (Tractatus
opticus) included in the collection of scientific tracts
published by Mersenne as Cogitata physico-mathematica in
1644. He built a good reputation in philosophic circles and in
1645 was chosen with Descartes, Gilles de Roberval and
others, to referee the controversy between John
Pell and Longomontanus over the problem of squaring the
circle.
Civil war in England[edit]

The English Civil War broke out in 1642, and when

the royalist cause began to decline in mid-1644, the king's
supporters fled to Europe. Many came to Paris and were
known to Hobbes. This revitalised Hobbes's political
interests and the De Civewas republished and more widely
distributed. The printing began in 1646 by Samuel de
Sorbiere through the Elsevier pressat Amsterdam with a
new preface and some new notes in reply to objections.

In 1647, Hobbes took up a position as mathematical

instructor to the young Charles, Prince of Wales,[15] who had
come over from Jersey around July. This engagement
lasted until 1648 when Charles went to Holland.
The company of the exiled royalists led Hobbes to
produce Leviathan, which set forth his theory of civil
government in relation to the political crisis resulting from
the war. Hobbes compared the State to a monster
(leviathan) composed of men, created under pressure of
human needs and dissolved by civil strife due to human
passions. The work closed with a general "Review and
Conclusion", in response to the war, which answered the
question: Does a subject have the right to change allegiance
when a former sovereign's power to protect is irrevocably
lost?

Frontispiece from De Cive (1642)

During the years of composing Leviathan, Hobbes remained

in or near Paris. In 1647, a serious illness disabled him for
six months that nearly killed him. On recovering, he
resumed his literary task and completed it by 1650.
Meanwhile, a translation of De Cive was being produced;
scholars disagree about whether it was Hobbes who
translated it.
In 1650, a pirated edition of The Elements of Law, Natural
and Politic was published. It was divided into two small
volumes (Human Nature, or the Fundamental Elements of
Policie and De corpore politico, or the Elements of Law,
Moral and Politick). In 1651, the translation of De Cive was
published under the title Philosophicall Rudiments

concerning Government and Society. Meanwhile, the

printing of the greater work proceeded, and finally appeared
in mid-1651, titled Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme, and
Power of a Common Wealth, Ecclesiasticall and Civil. It had
a famous title-page engraving depicting a crowned giant
above the waste towering above hills overlooking a
landscape, holding a sword and a crozier and made up of
tiny human figures.
The work had immediate impact. Soon, Hobbes was more
lauded and decried than any other thinker of his time. The
first effect of its publication was to sever his link with the
exiled royalists, who might well have killed him. The
secularist spirit of his book greatly angered both Anglicans
and French Catholics. Hobbes appealed to the revolutionary
English government for protection and fled back to London
in winter 1651. After his submission to theCouncil of State,
he was allowed to subside into private life in Fetter Lane.
Leviathan[edit]

Main article: Leviathan (book)

Frontispiece of Leviathan

In Leviathan, Hobbes set out his doctrine of the foundation

of states and legitimate governments and creating an
objective science of morality. This gave rise to social
contract theory. Leviathan was written during the English
Civil War; much of the book is occupied with demonstrating
the necessity of a strong central authority to avoid the evil of
discord and civil war.
Beginning from a mechanistic understanding of human
beings and the passions, Hobbes postulates what life would
be like without government, a condition which he calls
the state of nature. In that state, each person would have a

right, or license, to everything in the world. This, Hobbes

argues, would lead to a "war of all against all" (bellum
omnium contra omnes). The description contains what has
been called one of the best known passages in English
philosophy, which describes the natural state humankind
would be in, were it not for political community: [16]
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. [17]
In such a state, people fear death, and lack both the things
necessary to commodious living, and the hope of being able
to toil to obtain them. So in order to avoid it, people accede
to a social contract and establish a civil society. According to
Hobbes, society is a population beneath
a sovereign authority, to whom all individuals in that society

cede some rights for the sake of protection. Any power

exercised by this authority cannot be resisted because the
protector's sovereign power derives from individuals'
surrendering their own sovereign power for protection. The
individuals are thereby the authors of all decisions made by
the sovereign.[18] "he that complaineth of injury from his
sovereign complaineth that whereof he himself is the author,
and therefore ought not to accuse any man but himself, no
nor himself of injury because to do injury to one's self is
impossible". There is no doctrine of separation of powers in
Hobbes's discussion.[19] According to Hobbes, the sovereign
must control civil, military, judicial,
and ecclesiastical powers.
Opposition[edit]

John Bramhall[edit]

Hobbes now turned to complete the fundamental treatise of

his philosophical system. He worked so steadily that De
Corpore was first printed in 1654. Also in 1654, a small
treatise, Of Liberty and Necessity, was published by
Bishop John Bramhall, addressed at Hobbes. Bramhall, a
strong Arminian, had met and debated with Hobbes and
afterwards wrote down his views and sent them privately to

be answered in this form by Hobbes. Hobbes duly replied,

but not for publication. But a French acquaintance took a
copy of the reply and published it with "an extravagantly
laudatory epistle." Bramhall countered in 1655, when he
printed everything that had passed between them (under the
title of A Defence of the True Liberty of Human Actions from
Antecedent or Extrinsic Necessity). In 1656, Hobbes was
ready with The Questions concerning Liberty, Necessity and
Chance, in which he replied "with astonishing force" to the
bishop. As perhaps the first clear exposition of the
psychological doctrine of determinism, Hobbes's own two
pieces were important in the history of thefreewill controversy. The bishop returned to the charge in 1658
with Castigations of Mr Hobbes's Animadversions, and also
included a bulky appendix entitled The Catching of
Leviathan the Great Whale.
John Wallis[edit]

For more details on this topic, see HobbesWallis

controversy.
Hobbes opposed the existing academic arrangements, and
assailed the system of the original universities in Leviathan.
He went on to publish "De Corpore", which contained not

only tendentious views on mathematics, but also an

unacceptable proof of the squaring of the circle. This all led
mathematicians to target him for polemics and sparked John
Wallis to become one of his most persistent opponents.
From 1655, the publishing date of "De Corpore", Hobbes
and Wallis went round after round trying to disprove each
other's positions. After years of debate, the spat over
proving the squaring of the circle gained such notoriety that
this feud has become one of the most infamous in
mathematical history.
Atheism[edit]

Hobbes has been accused of atheism, or (in the case of

Bramhall) of teachings which could lead to atheism. This
was an important accusation, and Hobbes himself wrote, in
his answer to Bramhall's "The Catching of Leviathan" that
"atheism, impiety, and the like are words of the greatest
defamation possible".[20] Hobbes always defended himself
from such accusations.[21] In more recent times also, much
has been made of his religious views by scholars such as
Richard Tuck and J. G. A. Pocock, but there is still
widespread disagreement about the exact significance of
Hobbes's unusual views on religion.

As Martinich (1995, p. 31) has pointed out, in Hobbes's

time, the term "atheist" was often applied to people who
believed in God, but not divine providence, or to people who
believed in God, but also maintained other beliefs which
were inconsistent with such belief. He says that this "sort of
discrepancy has led to many errors in determining who was
an atheist in the early modern period". In this extended early
modern sense of atheism, Hobbes did take positions which
strongly disagreed with church teachings of his time. For
example, Hobbes argued repeatedly that there are no
incorporeal substances, and that all things, including human
thoughts, and even God, heaven, and hell are corporeal,
matter in motion. He argued that "though Scripture
acknowledge spirits, yet doth it nowhere say, that they are
incorporeal, meaning thereby without dimensions and
quantity".[22] (In this view, Hobbes claimed to be
following Tertullian, whose views were not condemned in
the First Council of Nicaea.) He also, like Locke, stated that
true revelation can never disagree with human reason and
experience,[23]although he also argued that people should
accept revelation and its interpretations also for the reason

that they should accept the commands of their sovereign, in

order to avoid war.
Later life[edit]

Tomb of Thomas Hobbes in St John the Baptist's Church, Ault

Hucknall

In 1658, Hobbes published the final section of his

philosophical system, completing the scheme he had
planned more than 20 years before. De Homine consisted
for the most part of an elaborate theory of vision. The
remainder of the treatise dealt cursorily with some of the
topics more fully treated in the Human Nature and
theLeviathan. In addition to publishing some controversial
writings on mathematics and physics, Hobbes also
continued to produce philosophical works. From the time of

the Restoration, he acquired a new prominence; "Hobbism"

became a byword for all that respectable society ought to
denounce. The young king, Hobbes' former pupil, now
Charles II, remembered Hobbes and called him to the court
to grant him a pension of 100.
The king was important in protecting Hobbes when, in 1666,
the House of Commons introduced a bill against atheism
and profaneness. That same year, on 17 October 1666, it
was ordered that the committee to which the bill was
referred "should be empowered to receive information
touching such books as tend to atheism, blasphemy and
profaneness... in particular... the book of Mr. Hobbes called
the Leviathan".[24] Hobbes was terrified at the prospect of
being labelled a heretic, and proceeded to burn some of his
compromising papers. At the same time, he examined the
actual state of the law of heresy. The results of his
investigation were first announced in three short Dialogues
added as an Appendix to his Latin translation of Leviathan,
published in Amsterdam in 1668. In this appendix, Hobbes
aimed to show that, since the High Court of
Commission had been put down, there remained no court of
heresy at all to which he was amenable, and that nothing

could be heresy except opposing the Nicene Creed, which,

he maintained,Leviathan did not do.
The only consequence that came of the bill was that Hobbes
could never thereafter publish anything in England on
subjects relating to human conduct. The 1668 edition of his
works was printed in Amsterdam because he could not
obtain the censor's licence for its publication in England.
Other writings were not made public until after his death,
including Behemoth: the History of the Causes of the Civil
Wars of England and of the Counsels and Artifices by which
they were carried on from the year 1640 to the year 1662.
For some time, Hobbes was not even allowed to respond,
whatever his enemies tried. Despite this, his reputation
abroad was formidable, and noble or learned foreigners who
came to England never forgot to pay their respects to the
old philosopher.
His final works were a curious mixture: an autobiography in
Latin verse in 1672, and a translation of four books of
theOdyssey into "rugged" English rhymes that in 1673 led to
a complete translation of both Iliad and Odyssey in 1675.

In October 1679, Hobbes suffered a bladder disorder, and

then a paralytic stroke from which he died on 4 December
1679. His last words are said to have been "A great leap in
the dark" in his final moments.[25] He was interred in St John
the Baptist's Church, Ault Hucknall in Derbyshire, England.
Works[edit]

1602. Latin translation of Euripides' Medea (lost).

1620. Three of the discourses in the Horae

Subsecivae: Observation and Discourses (A Discourse of
Tacitus, A Discourse of Rome, and A Discourse of Laws).
[13]

1626. De Mirabilis Pecci, Being the Wonders of the

Peak in Darby-shire, (a poem first published in 1636)

1629. Eight Books of the Peloponnesian Warre,

translation with an Introduction of Thucydides's History of
the Peloponnesian War

1630. A Short Tract on First Principles, British Museum,

Harleian MS 6796, ff. 297308: critical edition with
commentary and French translation by Jean
Bernhardt: Court trait des premiers principes, Paris,

PUF, 1988 (authorship doubtful: this work is attributed by

some critics to Robert Payne).[26]

1637 A Briefe of the Art of Rhetorique (in Molesworth's

edition the title is The Whole Art of Rhetoric)[27]

1639. Tractatus opticus II, (British Library, Harley MS

6796, ff. 193266; first complete edition 1963)[28]

1640. Elements of Law, Natural and Politic (circulated

only in handwritten copies, first printed edition, without
Hobbes's permission in 1650)

1641. Objectiones ad Cartesii Meditationes de Prima

Philosophia (Third series of Objections)

1642. De Cive (Latin, first limited edition)

1643. De Motu, Loco et Tempore (first edition 1973 with

the title: Thomas White's De Mundo Examined)[29]

1644. Part of the Praefatio to Mersenni Ballistica (in F.

Marini Mersenni minimi Cogitata physico-mathematica. In
quibus tam naturae qum artis effectus admirandi
certissimis demonstrationibus explicantur)

1644. Opticae, liber septimus, (written in 1640)

in Universae geometriae mixtaeque mathematicae
synopsis, edited by Marin Mersenne (reprinted by
Molesworth in OL V pp. 215248 with the title Tractatus
Opticus)

1646. A Minute or First Draught of the Optiques (Harley

MS 3360; Molesworth published only the dedication to
Cavendish and the conclusion in EW VII, pp. 467471)

1646. Of Liberty and Necessity (published without the

permission of Hobbes in 1654)

1647. Elementorum Philosophiae Sectio Tertia De

Cive (second expanded edition with a new Preface to the
Reader)

1650. Answer to Sir William Davenant's Preface

before Gondibert

1650. Human Nature: or The fundamental Elements of

Policie (first thirteen chapters of The Elements of Law,
Natural and Politic, published without Hobbes's
authorization)

1650. Pirated Edition of The Elements of Law, Natural

and Politic, repackaged to include two parts:

Human Nature, or the Fundamental Elements of

Policie (chapters 1419 of Part One of the Elements of
1640)

De Corpore Politico (Part Two of the Elements of

1640)

1651. Philosophical Rudiments concerning

Government and Society (English translation of De Cive)
[30]

1651. Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme, and Power of a

Commonwealth, Ecclesiasticall and Civil

1654. Of Libertie and Necessitie, a Treatise

1655. De Corpore (Latin)

1656. Elements of Philosophy, The First Section,

Concerning Body (anonymous English translation of De
Corpore)

1656. Six Lessons to the Professor of Mathematics

1656. The Questions concerning Liberty, Necessity and

Chance (reprint of Of Libertie and Necessitie, a Treatise,
with the addition of Bramhall's reply and Hobbes's reply to
Bramahall's reply)

1657. Stigmai, or Marks of the Absurd Geometry, Rural

Language, Scottish Church Politics, and Barbarisms of
John Wallis

1658. Elementorum Philosophiae Sectio Secunda De

Homine

1660. Examinatio et emendatio mathematicae

hodiernae qualis explicatur in libris Johannis Wallisii

1661. Dialogus physicus, sive De natura aeris

1662. Problematica Physica (translated in English in

1682 as Seven Philosophical Problems)

1662. Seven Philosophical Problems, and Two

Propositions of Geometru (published posthumously)

1662. Mr. Hobbes Considered in his Loyalty, Religion,

Reputation, and Manners. By way of Letter to Dr.
Wallis (English autobiography)

1666. De Principis & Ratiocinatione Geometrarum

1666. A Dialogue between a Philosopher and a

Student of the Common Laws of England (published in
1681)

1668. Leviathan (Latin translation)

1668. An Answer to a Book published by Dr.

Bramhall (published in 1682)

1671. Three Papers Presented to the Royal Society

Against Dr. Wallis. Together with Considerations on Dr.
Wallis his Answer to them

1671. Rosetum Geometricum, sive Propositiones

Aliquot Frustra antehac tentatae. Cum Censura brevi
Doctrinae Wallisianae de Motu

1672. Lux Mathematica. Excussa Collisionibus

Johannis Wallisii

1673. English translation of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey

1674. Principia et Problemata Aliquot Geometrica Ant

Desperata, Nunc breviter Explicata & Demonstrata

1678. Decameron Physiologicum: Or, Ten Dialogues of

Natural Philosophy

1679. Thomae Hobbessii Malmesburiensis Vita.

Authore seipso (Latin autobiography, translated in English
in 1680)

Posthumous works

1680. An Historical Narration concerning Heresie, And

the Punishment thereof

1681. Behemoth, or The Long Parliament (written in

1668, unpublished at the request of the King, first pirated
edition 1679)

1682. Seven Philosophical Problems (English

translation of Problematica Physica, 1662)

1682. A Garden of Geometrical Roses (English

translation of Rosetum Geometricum, 1671)

1682. Some Principles and Problems in

Geometry (English translation of Principia et Problemata,
1674)

1688. Historia Ecclesiastica Carmine Elegiaco

Concinnata

Bibliography[edit]

Bibliographic resources[edit]

MacDonald, Hugh & Hargreaves, Mary. Thomas

Hobbes, a Bibliography, London: The Bibliographical
Society, 1952.

Hinnant, Charles H. (1980). Thomas Hobbes: A

Reference Guide, Boston: G. K. Hall & Co.

Sacksteder, William (1982). Hobbes Studies. (1879

1979): A Bibliography, Bowling Green: Philosophy
Documentation Center.

Garcia, Alfred (1986). Thomas Hobbes: bibliographie

internationale de 1620 1986, Caen: Centre de
Philosophie politique et juridique Universit de Caen.

Works by Hobbes[edit]

Complete editions

Thomae Hobbes Malmesburiensis Opera Philosophica

quae Latina Scripsit, Studio et labore Gulielmi

Molesworth, (Londini, 18391845). 5 volumes. Reprint:

Aalen, 1966 (= OL).
Volume I. Elementorum Philosophiae I: De Corpore
Volume II. Elementorum Philosophiae II and III: De
Homine and De Cive
Volume III. Latin version of Leviathan.
Volume IV. Various concerning mathematics,
geometry and physics.
Volume V. Various short works.
The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury;
Now First Collected and Edited by Sir William
Molesworth, Bart., (London: Bohn, 183945). 11
volumes. Reprint London, 1939-; reprint: Aalen, 1966
(= EW).
Volume 1. De Corpore translated from Latin to
English.
Volume 2. De Cive.
Volume 3. The Leviathan

 Volume 4.
TRIPOS ; in Three Discourses:
I. Human Nature, or the Fundamental Elements of
Policy
II. De Corpore Politico, or the Elements of Law
III. Of Liberty and Necessity
An Answer to Bishop Bramhall's Book, called "The
Catching of the Leviathan"
An Historical Narration concerning Heresy, and the
Punishment thereof
Considerations upon the Reputation, Loyalty,
Manners, and Religion of Thomas Hobbes
Answer to Sir William Davenant's Preface before
"Gondibert"
Letter to the Right Honourable Edward Howard
Volume 5. The Questions concerning Liberty,
Necessity and Chance, clearly stated and debated

between Dr Bramhall Bishop of Derry and Thomas

Hobbes of Malmesbury.
Volume 6.
A Dialogue Between a Philosopher & a Student of
the Common Laws of England
A Dialogue of the Common Law
Behemoth: the History of the Causes of the Civil
Wars of England, and of the Counsels and Artifices
By Which They Were Carried On From the Year
1640 to the Year 1660
The Whole Art of Rhetoric (Hobbes's translation of
his own Latin summary of Aristotle's Rhetoric
published in 1637 with the title A Briefe of the Art of
Rhetorique)
The Art of Rhetoric Plainly Set Forth. With Pertinent
Examples For the More Easy Understanding and
Practice of the Same (this work is not of Hobbes but
by Dudley Fenner, The Artes of Logike and
Rethorike, 1584)

 The Art of Sophistry

Volume 7.
Seven Philosophical Problems
Decameron Physiologicum
Proportion of a straight line to half the arc of a
quadrant
Six lessons to the Savilian Professors of the
Mathematics
, or Marks of the absurd Geometry etc. of Dr
Wallis
Extract of a letter from Henry Stubbe
Three letters presented to the Royal Society against
Dr Wallis
Considerations on the answer of Dr Wallis
Letters and other pieces

 Volume 8 and 9. The Peloponnesian

War by Thucydides, translated into English by
Hobbes.
Volume 10. The Iliad, and The Odyssey,
translated by Hobbes into English
Volume 11. Index.
Posthumous works not included in the Molesworth
editions
The Elements of Law, Natural and Politics, edited
with a preface and critical notes by Ferdinand
Tnnies, London, 1889 (first complete edition).
Short Tract on First Principles, in "The Elements of
Law Natural and Politics", Appendix I, pp. 193210. [31] (this work is now attributed to Robert
Payne). [32]
Tractatus opticus II, (1639, British Library, Harley MS
6796, ff. 193266) first partial edition in "The
Elements of Law Natural and Politics", Appendix II,
pp. 211226; first complete edition (but with the

omission of the diagrams) by Franco Alessio, Rivista

critica di storia dela filosofia, 18, 1963, pp. 147228.
Critique du 'De mundo' de Thomas White, edited by
Jean Jacquot and Harold Whitmore Jones, Paris,
1973, with three appendixes:
De Motibus Solis, Aetheris & Telluris (pp. 439447:
a Latin poem on the movement of the Earth).
Notes in English on an ancient redaction of some
chapters of De Corpore (July 1643; pp. 448460:
MS 5297, National Library of Wales).
Notes for the Logica and Philosophia prima of
the De Corpore (pp. 461513: Chatsworth MS
A10 and the notes of Charles Cavendish on a
draft of the De Corpore: British Library, Harley MS
6083).
Of the Life and History of Thucydides, in Hobbes's
Thucydides, edited by Richard Schlatter, New
Brunswick, pp. 1027, 1975.

 Three Discourses: a Critical Modern Edition of

Newly Identified Work of the Young Hobbes (TD),
edited by Noel B. Reynolds and Arlene Saxonhouse,
Chicago, 1975.
A Discourse upon the Beginning of Tacitus, in TD,
pp. 3167.
A Discourse of Rome, in TD, pp. 71102.
A Discourse of Law, in TD, pp. 105119.
Thomas Hobbes' A minute or First Draught of the
Optiques, (British Library, Harley MS 3360) Critical
Edition by Elaine C. Stroud, Ph.D. dissertation, The
University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1983.
Of Passions, Edition of the unpublished manuscript
Harley 6093 by Anna Minerbi Belgrado, in: Rivista di
storia della filosofia, 43, 1988, pp. 729738.
The Correspondence of Thomas Hobbes, edited by
Noel Malcolm, Oxford: the Clarendon Edition, vol. 6
7, 1994 (I: 16221659; II: 16601679).
Translations in modern English

 De Corpore, Part I. Computatio Sive Logica. Edited

with an Introductory Essay by L C. Hungerland and
G. R. Vick. Translation and Commentary by A.
Martinich. New York Abaris Books, 1981.
Thomas White's De mundo Examined, translation by
H. W. Jones, Bradford: Bradford University Press,
1976 (the appendixes of the Latin edition (1973) are
not enclosed).
New critical editions of Hobbes' works (in
progress)
Clarendon Edition of the Works of Thomas Hobbes,
Oxford: Clarendon Press (10 volumes published of
27 planned).
Traduction des uvres Latines de Hobbes, under
the direction of Yves Charles Zarka, Paris: Vrin (5
volumes published of 17 planned).
Critical studies[edit]

Brandt, Frithiof (1928). Thomas Hobbes' Mechanical

Conception of Nature, Copenhagen: Levin &
Munksgaard.

 Jesseph, Douglas M.(1999), Squaring the Circle.

The War Between Hobbes and Wallis, Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Leijenhorst, Cees (2002). The Mechanisation of
Aristotelianism. The Late Aristotelian Setting of
Thomas Hobbes' Natural Philosophy, Leiden: Brill.
Lemetti, Juhana (2011). Historical Dictionary of
Hobbes's Philosophy, Lanham: Scarecrow Press.
Macpherson, C. B. (1962). The Political Theory of
Possessive Individualism: Hobbes to Locke,
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Malcolm, Noel. (2002). Aspects of Hobbes, New
York: Oxford University Press.
Malcolm, Noel. (2007). Reason of State,
Propaganda, and the Thirty Years' War: An
Unknown Translation by Thomas Hobbes, New York:
Oxford University Press.
Manent, Pierre. (1996) An Intellectual History of
Liberalism, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

 Martinich, A. P. (2003) "Thomas Hobbes," The

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 281: British
Rhetoricians and Logicians, 15001660, Second
Series, Detroit: Gale, pp. 130-144.
Martinich, A. P. (1995) A Hobbes Dictionary,
Cambridge: Blackwell.
Martinich, A. P. (1997) Thomas Hobbes, New
York: St. Martin's Press.
Martinich, A. P. (1992) The Two Gods of Leviathan:
Thomas Hobbes on Religion and Politics,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Martinich, A. P. (1999) Hobbes: A Biography,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Narveson, Jan; Trenchard, David (2008). "Hobbes,
Thomas (1588 1679)". In Hamowy, Ronald. The
Encyclopedia of Libertarianism. Thousand Oaks,
CA: SAGE; Cato Institute. pp. 2267. ISBN 978-14129-6580-4. LCCN 2008009151.OCLC 75083102
4.

 Oakeshott, Michael (1975), "Hobbes on Civil

Association", Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Pettit, Philip (2008). Made with Words. Hobbes on
Language, Mind, and Politics, Princeton: Princeton
University Press.
Robinson, Dave & Groves, Judy (2003). Introducing
Political Philosophy, Icon Books. ISBN 1-84046-450X.
Ross, George MacDonald (2009). Starting with
Hobbes, London: Continuum.
Shapin, Steven and Shaffer,
Simon (1995), Leviathan and the AirPump. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Skinner, Quentin. (1996). Reason and Rhetoric in
the Philosophy of Hobbes, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Skinner, Quentin (2002). Visions of Politics. Vol. III:
Hobbes and Civil Science, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press

 Stomp, Gabriella (ed.) (2008). Thomas Hobbes,

Aldershot: Ashgate.
Strauss, Leo (1936). The Political Philosophy of
Hobbes; Its Basis and Its Genesis,
Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Strauss, Leo (1959). "On the Basis of Hobbes's
Political Philosophy," in What Is Political
Philosophy?, Glencoe, IL: Free Press, chap. 7.
Tnnies, Ferdinand (1925). Hobbes. Leben und
Lehre, Stuttgart: Frommann, 3rd ed.
Tuck, Richard (1993) Philosophy and Government,
15721651, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Vieira, Monica Brito. (2009) The Elements of
Representation in Hobbes, Leiden: Brill Publishers.
Zagorin, Perez. (2009) Hobbes and the Law of
Nature, Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.
See also[edit]

Natural and legal rights#Thomas Hobbes

 Natural law#Hobbes
Hobbesian trap
Conatus#In Hobbes
Joseph Butler