Thomans Hobbes, the Leviathan Synopses Ch. 17-19

Leviathan Synopsis: Chapters 17-19

Although the laws of nature require that human beings seek peace, and maintain that the establishment of contracts is the best means of doing so, the natural human hunger for power always threatens the safety of the contract. Hobbes concludes that there must be some common power, some sovereign authority, to force people to uphold the contract. This sovereign would be established by the people as part of the contract, endowed with the individual powers and wills of all, and authorized to punish anyone who breaks the covenant. The sovereign operates through fear; the threat of punishment reinforces the mandates of the laws of nature, thus ensuring the continued operation of the social contract.

The sovereign is the ruling force behind the contract; in the analogy between the abstracted contract and an artificial person, the concept of sovereignty is the soul of the artificial person and the sovereign itself, the head. This artificial person is a metaphor for the state in total, and Hobbes names this artificial person "Leviathan." Hobbes's description of the construction of the Leviathan draws upon the conclusions made in Book I about the state of nature and repeats its images: "The only way to erect such a Common Power, as may be able to defend them from . . . the injuries of one another . . . is, to conferre all their power and strength upon one Man, or upon an Assembly of men, that may reduce all their wills, by plurality of voices unto one Will . . . This is more than Consent, or Concord; it is a real Unitie of them all, in one and the same Person, made by Covenant of every man with every man, in such a manner, as if every man should say to every man, I Authorize and give up my Right of Governing my selfe, to this Man . . . on this condition, that thou give up thy Right to him . . . This done, the Multitude so united in one Person, is called a COMMON-WEALTH . . . This is the Generation of the great LEVIATHAN."

The purpose...