Hobbes & Locke

The philosophy of Thomas Hobbes is riddled with loyalty to the crown and filled with references to Christian scripture. Despite this, in Leviathan Hobbes describes human existence as “nasty, brutish, and short” (133). In the state of nature Hobbes finds man to be in constant conflict with other human beings. In an environment with no manmade laws, each to his own. As Hobbes writes, life in nature is a “warre...of every man against every man” (232). Hobbes argued that in the state of nature there are three primary forces that keep men in a perpetual state of war. As he notes in Leviathan, “In the nature of man, we find three principal causes of quarrel, First, Competition; Secondly, Diffidence; Thirdly, Glory. The first maketh men invade for Gain; the second for Safety; and the third, for Reputation” (345).

The environment during which Hobbes lived had a profoun

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o dispose of his person or possessions,” he writes, “yet he has not liberty to destroy himself, or so much as any creature in his possession, but where some nobler use than its bare preservation calls for it”, and he continues: The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one; and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind who will but consult it that, being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions... (Locke 5) Thus, Locke’s conception of the state of nature differs from that of Hobbes in so far as he sees man in nature as being governed by reason rather than mere self-interest. In Hobbes’ view, there is in nature no guarantee of the rights of the individual, and it is the absence of any protections of this type which leads Hobbes to welcome the prospect of authority. While in this view, the only natural right possessed by an individual is that to his own life, Locke derives from nature a doctrine of natural law affording protections of a type which Hobbes sees it as the function of authority to provide. In other words, while Hobbes and Locke both agree that every individual should be secure in his own person, Locke not only goes b
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Approximate Word count = 1657
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)

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