A Reconciliation Of Self And State In Hobbes' Leviathan
...Hobbes argues for a social contract that involves rule by a sovereign, or monarch, that is instituted by the people. During his discourse Hobbes makes the claim that people are naturally inclined to pursue self interest, while at the same time positing that these very people have a responsibility to the sovereign that rules them. The apparent problem is immediately perceived by the reader in order to fulfill their responsibility to a sovereign, must they not deny the pursuit of self-interest and replace it with the pursuit of the sovereign's interest? Surely Hobbes is not suggesting that man deny his true nature
is he? Upon further examination of the text the reader discovers that indeed Hobbes does allow for a people to fulfill the interests of the sovereign without denying what he has professed to be human nature. However, we jump too far ahead, in order to understand the compatibility of these two seemingly irreconcilable sentiments one must start from the very beginning of the text.
Hobbes opens in an attempt to analyze society with a series of definitions, beginning with Man and the Senses. He speaks of man's perception in a series of events that leads to his definition of imagination as being "nothing but decaying sense," and is the same as memory. He treats dreams and speech in much the same way in order to support his claim about the necessity of definitions to reach an understanding. This is the first point in Leviathan that the reader is explicitly shown by the author that he is attempting to reduce "human nature" into a series of undeniable truths. Hobbes is apparently working with the theory that if one can define humanity in terms that nobody can dispute, then surely one can do the same with a social contract. Even Hobbes' definitions of the Passions are very unemotional, cut and dry performances. He proposes that the words good, evil,...
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