pleased God hitherto to bestow on mankind, men begin at settling the significations of their words; which settling of significations they call definitions, and place them in the beginning of their reckoning. By this, it appears how necessary it is for any man that aspires to true knowledge to examine the definitions of former authors; and either to correct them where they are negligently set down, or to make them himselfe. For the errours of definitions multiply themselves according as the reckoning proceeds, an 1 lead men into absurdities, which at last they see, but cannot avoyd without reckoning anew from the beginning, in which lye the foundations of their errours. From whence it happens that they which trust to books do as they that cast up many little summes into a greater, without considering whether those little summes were rightly cast up or not; and at last, finding the errour visible and not mistrusting their first grounds, know not which way to cleere themselves, but spend time in fluttering over their bookes, as birds that, entring by the chimney and finding themselves inclosed in a chamber, flutter at the false light of a glasse window, for want of wit to consider which way they came in. So that in the right definition of names lyes the first use of speech, which is the acquisition of science; and in wrong or no definitions lyes the first abuse; from which proceed all false and senselesse tenets, which make those men that take their instruction from the authority of books, and not from their own meditation, to be as much below the condition of ignorant men as men endued with true science are above it. For between true science and erroneous doctrines, ignorance is in the middle. Naturall sense and imagination are not subject to absurdity. Nature itselfe cannot erre, and as men abound in copiousnesse of language, so they become more wise or more mad than ordinary. Nor is it possible without letters for any man to become either excellently wise, or, unless his memory be hurt by disease or ill constitution of organs, excellently foolish. For words are wise men's counters,-they do but reckon by them; but they are the money of fools, that value them by the authority of an Aristotle, a Cicero, or a Thomas, or any other doctor whatsoever, if but a man. The Leviathan, Part 1, ch. 4, 1651. Man's natural state-War. In the nature of man we find three principall causes of quarrell: first, competition; secondly, diffidence; thirdly, glory. The first maketh man invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the third, for reputation. The first use violence to make themselves masters of other men's persons, wives, children, and cattell; the second, to defend them; the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile, a different opinion, and any other signe of undervalue, either direct in their persons, or by reflexion in their kindred, their friends, their nation, their profession, or their name. Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called warre; and such a warre as is of every man against every man. For warre consisteth not in battel only, or the act of fighting, but in a tract of time, wherein the will to con❤ tend by battel is sufficiently known; and therefore the notion of time is to be considered in the nature of warre as it is in the nature of weather. . . . To this warre of every man against every man, this also is consequent that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice, have there no place. Where there is no common power there is no law; where no law, no injustice. Force and fraud are, in warre, the two cardinall vertues. Justice and injustice are none of the faculties, neither of the body nor mind. If they were, they might be in a man that were alone in the world, as well as his senses and passions. They are qualities that relate to men in society, not in solitude. It is consequent also to the same condition, that there be no propriety, no dominion, no mine and thine distinct; but only that to be every man's that he can get, and for so long as he can keep it. And thus much for the ill condition in which man by meer nature is actually placed: though with a possibility to come out of it, consisting partly in his passions, partly in his reason. The passions which encline men to peace are-feare of death, desire of such things as are necessary to commodious living, and a hope by their industry to obtain them. And reason suggesteth convenient articles of peace, upon which men may be drawn to agreement. These articles are they which otherwise are called the Lawes of Nature. Leviathan, Part 2, ch. 13. The Leviathan-its Nature and Origin. The only way to erect a common power, able to defend men from the invasion of Forreigners and the injuries of one another, and thereby to secure them in such sort, as that by their owne industrie and by the fruits of the earth they may nourish themselves and live contentedly; is to conferre all their power and strength upon one man, or upon one assembly of men, that may reduce all their wills, by plurality of voices, unto one will; and therein to submit their wills every one to his will, and their judgements to his judgement. This is more than consent or con cord; it is real unitie of them all, in one and the same person made by covenant of every man with every man. . . . This done, the multitude so united in one person, is called a Common-wealth. This is the generation of that great Leviathan, or rather, to speake more reverently, of that mortal God to which we owe, under the immortal God, our peace and defence. . . . And in him consisteth the essence of the common wealth; which (to define it) is one person of whose acts a great multitude, by mutual covenants one with another, have made themselves every one the author, to the end he may use the strength and means of them all as he shall think expedient to their peace and common defence. Leviathan, Part 2, ch. 19. Laughter and Weeping. There is a passion that hath no name; but the sign of it is that distortion of the countenance which we call laughter, which is always joy: but what joy, what we think, and wherein we triumph when we laugh, is not hitherto declared by any. That it consisteth in wit, or, as they call it, in the jest, experience confuteth: for men laugh at mischances and indecencies, wherein there lieth no wit nor jest at all. And forasmuch as the same thing is no more ridiculous when it groweth stale or usual, whatsoever it be that moveth laughter, it must be new and unexpected. Men laugh often, especially such as are greedy of applause from everything they do well, at their own actions performed never so little beyond their own expectations; as also at their own jests: and in this case it is manifest, that the passion of laughter proceedeth from a sudden conception of some ability in himself that laugheth. Also men laugh at the infirmities of others, by comparison wherewith their own abilities are set off and illustrated. Also men laugh at jests, the wit whereof always consisteth in the elegant discovering and conveying to our minds some absurdity of another: and in this case also the passion of laughter proceedeth from the sudden imagination of our own oddes and eminency for what is else the recommending of ourselves to our own good opinion, by comparison with another man's infirmity or absurdity? For when a jest is broken upon ourselves, or friends of whose dishonour we participate, we never laugh thereat. I may therefore conclude, that the passion of laughter is nothing else but sudden glory arising from some sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly: for men laugh at the follies of themselves past, when they come suddenly to remembrance. The passion opposite hereunto, whose sigus are another distortion of the face with tears, called weeping, is the sudden falling out with ourselves, or sudden conception of defect; and therefore children weep oiten; for seeing they think that every thing ought to be given them which they desire, of necessity every repulse must be a check of their expectation, and puts them in mind of their too much weakness to make themselves masters of all they look for. For the same cause women are more apt to weep than men, as being not only more accustomed to have their wills, but also to measure their powers by the power and love of others that protect them. Treatise on Human Nature, or the Fundamental Elements of Policy, ch. 9, sec. 13, 14. A few of Hobbes' characteristic sayings may be quoted; some just, some altogether unjust and false: The summe of virtue is to be sociable with those who will be sociable, and formidable to those that will not. De Corp. Pol., pl. i., ch. iv., sec. 15. Conceptions are nothing really but motion in some internal substance of the head; which motion not stopping there but procceding to the heart must there either help or hinder the motion which is called vital: when it helpeth it is called delight, which is nothing really but motion about the heart as conception is nothing really but motion in the head. . . . This same delight with reference to the object is called love: but when such motion hindereth the vital motion, then it is called pain, and in relation to that which causeth it, hatred ! Humane Nature, ch. vii., sec. I. The value or worth of a man is as of all other things his price; that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power! Leviathan, Part i., ch. x. Griefe for the successe of a competitor, if joyned with endeavours to enforce our own abilities to equal or excel him, is emulation if joyned with endeavours to supplant or hinder, envie. Ib., ch. vi. The distinction is adopted by Bishop Butler and by Griefe for the calamity of another is pitty, and ariseth from the imagination that the like calamity may befall himselfe ; and therefore it is called compassion, or in the phrase of the present time, a fellow-feeling. Ib., ch. vii., sec. I. 87. Thomas Carew, 1589 ?-1639. (Handbook, pars. 67, 148.) A metaphysical' poet, with strong tendencies to the voluptuousness which ripened into such luxuriance in the reign of Charles II. The following specimen illustrates both tendencies. Song. Ask me no more, where Jove bestows, Ask me no more, whither do stray Ask me no more, where those stars light, |