Turning from the man to the author, we must content ourselves with very few words on a subject worthy of a volume. For Hobbes is Indeed, as Mr. Mill remarks, "a great name in philosophy, on account both of the value of what he taught and the extraordinary impulse which he communicated to the spirit of free inquiry in Europe." (' Fragment on Mackintosh,' p. 19.) Ho may be considered the father of English psychology, as well as (what every one must allow him to be) the first great English writer on the science of government, Let it be remarked also (for it is from losing eight of this that some of the most important misconceptions of Hobbes's views have arisen) that though be wrote on psychology, sod much of his fame is as is psycho logist, his psychology, like that of Bentham, was only auxiliary and in the way of prelude to his writings on government, and he should always emphatically be viewed as is writer on government. And even were his psychology left entirely out of account, his writings on government, of which the Leviathan,' the ' De ' and the email treatise 'Do Corpore Politico,' are the chief, would be a sufficient pa-sport to immortal fame.
The views of Hobbes on government, as contained in his political treatises, may be thus briefly stated. He views government as a refuge, dictated by reason or the law of nature, from the evils of a state of nature, which he chooses to call (and this one would think was a matter of small import, though, strange to say, it has ever been one of the chief charges brought against Hobbes) a " state of war." The government thus recommended is formed (he imagines) by a covenant or contract entered into between those who are to bo subjects and those who are to be rulers, and ever after tacitly adopted by all future sets of subjects and future sets of rulers. And the subjects having covenanted complete unconditional obedience to their rulers, and the duty of obedience being directly referred to this covenant, Hobbes views obedience as a religious duty, and the supremacy of the rulers, on the other hand, as a divine right. As regards forms of government, he prefers, on account of its greater vigour and aptitude for business, a monarchy; but ho strongly and zealously inculcates at the same time the necessity of a sound educa tion of the people. But whatever be the form of government, he contends that the government must be possessed of supreme powers, else it would not be the government. And being himself in favour of a government of one, or a monarchy, he ever iusists on the supremacy of the monarch and on the duty of unconditional obedience to his laws. Thus it is that the decriers of Hobbes, losing sight of his views on the education of the people, and confounding monarchy with tyranny, and supreme with arbitrary power, have nicknamed him "the apologist of tyranny." And because, carrying out his views as to the supremacy of government, be has required submission to the mode of faith which the monarch establishes, and, writing not on moral but on political science, has chosen to define the words just' and unjust' with a direct reference to the laws which the monarch ordains, and which it is the duty of the subjects to obey, he has been denounced as contemning religion, and as a confounder of moral dia.
tinctions. But Hobbes does not take upon himself to say that the monarch's opinion is the test either of true religion or true morals ; and indeed, in many parts of his works distinctly asserts the pre eminent merits of one form of faith and the independence of morality, which is, as it should be, his criterion of the goodness of law. According to Hobbes, what is established by law must be obeyed ; but there is nothing in his views to prevent attempts which are conform able with the laws to alter what in the laws is wrong.
There is no douot that in Hobbes's views, as we have stated them, there is some error. His hypothesis of a covenant as the origin of government, for instance, is a fiction which has now long been exploded in this country. But this is an error solely speculative, and of little importance; for all the valuable conclusions which Hobbes seeks to derive from his fiction may be got at, without its aid, by means, for instance, of the principle of utility. As to the grave charges which have been so sedulously brought against Hobbes, from the first appear ance of his works to the present time, they have no other foundation than ignorance and prejudice.
The number of works to which Hobbee's writiugs rise is very great. "The Philosopher of Malweabury," says Dr. Warburton, "vas the terror of the last age, as Tindall and Collins are of this. The press sweat with controversy, and every young churchman-mili tant would try his arms in thundering on Hobbes s steel cap." (' Divine Legation,' vol. ii. p. 9, Preface.) His principal antagonists were— Clarendon, in a work named ' A Brief View of the Dangerous and Pernicious Errors to Church and State in Mr. Hobbes's book entitled Leviathan ; ' Cudworth, in his treatise on Eternal and Immutable Morality ; ' and Bishop Cumberland, in his Latin work on the Laws of Nature.' Bishop Bremhall published a book called The Catching of the Leviathan,' to which Hobbes replied. We may also mention Archbishop Tenison's ' Creed of Mr. Hobbes examined,' and Dr. Each ard'e 'Dialogues on Hobbes.' And, in addition to direct and professed attacks on Hobbes, there are numerous references to his views for the purpose of censure in Harrington's ' Oceans,' and in Henry More's writings.
Until recently there was no complete edition of even the English writings of the Philosopher of Malmesbury.' But this want has been well supplied by the handsome edition published at the cost and under the superintendence of the late Sir William Molesworth, under the title of The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, now first collected and edited by Sir William Molesworth, Bart.,' 16 vole. 8vo.