Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-hc48f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T05:48:09.726Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Leviathan Writ Small: Thomas Hobbes on the Family*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Richard Allen Chapman
Richard Allen Chapman*
Affiliation:
University of Montana
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Though not above an occasional appeal to the “experience of fathers,” Hobbes was not a patriarchalist in his view of the family. Rather, he quite deliberately represented the family as a small Leviathan, and he used it to illustrate the principles of Hobbesian political science. In the family, as in the state, there is a mutual relationship between protection and obedience; sovereignty is undivided, based on necessity, and justified by performance; authority is absolute and derives from consent. In the state of nature, Hobbes views the family in structure and function as a small state. In commonwealth, the family sovereign relinquishes his absolute power over wife, servant, and child, but he is still entitled to obedience and honor for having raised and educated his children. The content of family education consists of the principles of Hobbesian political science, and the children thereby are properly receptive to sovereign power as they leave the family, whether for the university or for independence.

Hobbes's conception of the family is derived from the patria potestas of republican Rome, and not from common law. His use of the family is fully integrated with his political theory, and it is designed to reinforce both the theory and practice of Leviathan.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 69 , Issue 1 , March 1975 , pp. 76 - 90
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1975

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I wish to thank David C. Rapoport and Howard E. Schwartz for their comments on earlier drafts. Part of the research was funded by the University of Montana Foundation.

References

1 Laslett, Peter, Patriarcha and Other Political Works of Sir Robert Filmer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1949), p. 26Google Scholar.

2 Hinton, R. W. K., “Husbands, Fathers and Conquerors II,” Political Studies 16 (February 1968), 59–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Laslett, p. 27.

4 Hinton, R. W. K., “Husbands, Fathers, and Conquerors I,” Political Studies 15 (October 1967), 292CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schochet, Gordon, “Thomas Hobbes on the Family and the State of Nature,” Political Science Quarterly, 82 (September 1967), 429CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Greenleaf, W. H., “Filmer's Patriarchal History,” The Historical Journal, 9 (1966), 159CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Laslett, Peter, “Introduction” to Locke, John, Two Treatises of Government, ed. Laslett, Peter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960), p. 70Google Scholar.

6 Hinton I, p. 300.

7 Hinton I, p. 293.

8 Hinton II, p. 57.

9 Skinner, Quentin, “Hobbes on Sovereignty: An Unknown Discussion,” Political Studies 13 (June 1965), 217CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Thomas, Keith, “The Social Origins of Hobbes's Political Thought,” in Hobbes Studies, ed. Brown, K. C. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965), pp. 188–189Google Scholar.

11 Hood, F. C., The Divine Politics of Thomas Hobbes: An Interpretation of Leviathan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964), p. 174Google Scholar.

12 Warrender, Howard, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: His Theory of Obligation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957), p. 124Google Scholar.

13 Schochet, , “Thomas Hobbes on the Family,” p. 444Google Scholar; also, Peters, Richard, Hobbes (Baltimore: Penguin, 1956), p. 198Google Scholar.

14 Strauss, Leo, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes: Its Basis and Its Genesis, trans. Sinclair, Elsa M. (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1952), p. 103Google Scholar.

15 Hobbes, Thomas, Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme, Power of a Commonwealth Ecclesiastical and Civill [1651], with an Essay by Smith, W. G. Pogson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1909), Ch. 13, p. 96Google Scholar.

16 Leviathan 30, p. 263Google Scholar.

17 Leviathan 30, p. 273Google Scholar.

18 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, p. 554.

19 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, p. 556.

20 Leviathan 30, p. 269Google Scholar.

21 Leviathan 13, p. 97Google Scholar. See Laslett's introduction to Locke, , Two Treatises, p. 70Google Scholar, and Hood, , Divine Politics, p. 81Google Scholar.

22 Hobbes, Thomas, De Cive or The Citizen [1651], ed. Lamprecht, Sterling (New York: Appleton, 1949), pp. 21n–22n, 28n, 80nGoogle Scholar. Hobbes apparently added these notes in 1642 after friends reacted to a private printing of the work in Latin; see p. 17. I follow Lamprecht in referring to the Latin title, though Hobbes's English title in his 1651 translation is Philosophical Rudiments Concerning Government and Society.

23 For Hobbes's contemporary critics, see Schochet, pp. 428–429.

24 On the interesting idea that the family as “value, a theme of expression, an occasion of emotion” is recent, and a product of liberal individualism, rather than a casualty, see Ariès, Phillipe, Centuries of Childhood: A Social History of Family Life, trans. Baldick, Robert (New York: Vintage, 1962), pp. 9-11, 365–407Google Scholar.

25 Leviathan 30, p. 260Google Scholar.

26 Schochet, pp. 428, 442–445. Cf. Mansfield, Harvey Jr., “Hobbes and the Science of Indirect Government,” American Political Science Review 65 (March, 1971), 103nCrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gauthier, David P., The Logic of Leviathan: The Moral and Political Theory of Thomas Hobbes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), pp. 118–119Google Scholar. Evidence that “Everyman” is the family sovereign and that the family is therefore the basic social unit may be found in Leviathan 13, pp. 96–97Google Scholar; 22, p. 180; 25, pp. 197–198; 30, pp. 263, 273; 42, p. 438; 43, p. 457; De Cive x, p. 115Google Scholar.

27 Leviathan 25, p. 202Google Scholar.

28 Hobbes, Thomas, A Dialogue Between a Philosopher and a Student of the Common Laws of England [1666], in The English Works of Thomas Hobbes, ed. Molesworth, William, VI (London: John Bohn, 1839–1845), 147Google Scholar. The English Works will be cited as E. W.

29 I use the term “family sovereign” to mean the head of the family; “father” is misleading, since the mother may govern as well. Leviathan 20, p. 154Google Scholar.

30 Dialogue, E. W. VI, p. 148Google Scholar.

31 Leviathan 10, p. 72Google Scholar.

32 Leviathan 17, p. 129Google Scholar.

33 De Cive xiii, 14, p. 150Google Scholar.

34 Leviathan 17, p. 129Google Scholar.

35 Hobbes, Thomas, De Corpore Politico: or The Elements of Law [1640], I, 6, 2, E. W. IV, p. 118Google Scholar.

36 Dialogue, E. W. VI, 147Google Scholar. On the historical context of these passages, see Pocock, J. G. A., The Ancient Constitution and The Feudal Law (New York: Norton, 1967), pp. 162–170Google Scholar.

37 Leviathan 17, p. 129Google Scholar.

38 Dialogue, E. W. VI, pp. 150–151Google Scholar.

39 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, p. 551.

40 De Corpore Politico II, 5, 3Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 166.

41 De Cive x, 3, p. 116Google Scholar.

42 Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity and Chance, E. W., V, p. 180Google Scholar.

43 Leviathan 35, p. 319Google Scholar.

44 Leviathan 40, p. 366 (emphasis omitted)Google Scholar; 20, p. 157; 26, p. 221; 35, p. 319; Review and Conclusion, p. 551.

45 Abraham's “right” for Hobbes comes from his position: he was “Father, and Lord, and Civill Soveraign,” and not just the father. Leviathan 40, pp. 364–365Google Scholar.

46 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 14Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 160; Leviathan 20, p. 154Google Scholar.

47 Leviathan 20, p. 157Google Scholar.

48 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 4Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 156.

49 De Corpore Politico II, 3, 2Google Scholar, E. W. IV, pp. 149–150.

50 De Cive ix, 10, p. 110Google Scholar.

51 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 3Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 155.

52 De Cive ix, 3, p. 107Google Scholar.

53 Leviathan 20, p. 154Google Scholar. The father is known if—in the state of nature—she has covenanted with a man for “copulation,” “society of bed” or for “society of all things.” De Corpore Politico II, 4, 4–7, E. W. IV, pp. 156–157.

54 Leviathan 13, p. 94Google Scholar.

55 De Cive ix, 3, p. 106Google Scholar.

56 De Corpore Politico II, 3, 2Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 149.

57 Leviathan 20, p. 153Google Scholar.

58 Leviathan 20, p. 155Google Scholar.

59 De Corpore Politico I, 2, 9Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 90.

60 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 3Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 156; De Cive ix, 3, p. 106Google Scholar.

61 Leviathan 26, p. 208Google Scholar.

62 Leviathan 30, p. 263Google Scholar. Emphasis added.

63 De Cive i, 1, p. 21n–22nGoogle Scholar.

64 De Cive viii, 1, p. 100Google Scholar.

65 De Cive i, 10, pp. 27n–28nGoogle Scholar. Emphasis added.

66 De Cive ix, 2, p. 106Google Scholar.

67 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 8Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 157.

68 Buckland, W. W., A Textbook of Roman Law from Augustus to Justinian (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1921), p. 102Google Scholar.

69 Jolowicz, H. F., Roman Foundations of Modern Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957), p. 181Google Scholar.

70 Jolowicz, H. F., Historical Introduction to the Study of Roman Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1952), p. 112Google Scholar.

71 Jolowicz, , Roman Foundations, p. 178Google Scholar. As Maine puts it, “Where the Potestas begins, Kinship begins; … Where the Potestas ends, Kinship ends; …” Maine, Henry Sumner, Ancient Law 14th ed. (London: John Murray, 1891), p. 149Google Scholar.

72 Nisbet, Robert A., “Kinship and Political Power in First Century Rome,” Sociology and History: Theory and Research, ed. Cahnman, Werner J. and Boskoff, Alvin (New York: Free Press, 1964), p. 259Google Scholar.

73 Jolowicz, , Historical Introduction, p. 118Google Scholar.

74 Nisbet, , “Kinship and Political Power …” p. 260Google Scholar.

75 Jolowicz, , Historical Introduction, p. 119nGoogle Scholar.

76 De Corpore Politico II, 3, 3Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 150.

77 Maine, Henry Sumner, Ancient Law, p. 163Google Scholar. He adds that the theory was unsound.

78 Bryce, James, “Marriage and Divorce Under Roman and English Law,” in Studies in History and Jurisprudence, II (New York: Oxford University Press, 1901), p. 786Google Scholar.

79 Jolowicz, , Historical Introduction, p. 118Google Scholar.

80 Buckland, p. 113. Although Hobbes is not describing the Roman family in his constructs, his failure to discuss the position of the wife in the family is consistent with his source. Hinton is too sweeping when he says “the pages on husbands, fathers and conquerors” play a vital part in Hobbes's argument. Hinton II, p. 55. Emphasis added.

81 Buckland, p. 106. The quotation refers specifically to Gaius. A modern author observes that in practice the Roman woman acquired relative freedom of behavior and action in marriage, compared with Greek women of the classical age, and that “in every age” the Roman's wife “shared in his authority over the children and slaves.” Paoli, Ugo Enrico, Rome: Its People, Life and Customs, trans., Macnaghten, R. D. (New York: David McKay, 1963), pp. 113–114Google Scholar.

82 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 7Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 157. The language “for the most part’ is not characteristic of Hobbes's later writings.

83 Buckland, pp. 103–104.

84 Jolowicz, , Roman Foundations, p. 184Google Scholar.

85 De Cive ix, 4, p. 107Google Scholar

86 Jolowicz, , Roman Foundations, p. 181Google Scholar.

87 De Corpore Politico II, 3, 7Google Scholar, E. W. IV, pp. 151–152; De Cive viii, 9, p. 103Google Scholar; Leviathan 24, p. 194Google Scholar.

88 Nisbet, pp. 259–260.

89 A contemporary (though satirical) critic pointed out that Hobbes said little on the family that was new. Eachard, John, Mr. Hobbs's State of Nature Considered In a Dialogue between Philautus and Timothy, London, 1672Google Scholar; ed., Peter Ure (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1958), p. 16.

90 In common law, the family was characterized as a matrimonial relationship between husband and wife determined by contract. Paternal power was “much more moderate” than in Rome. The most striking feature of the common law family is the liabilities attached to the man, particularly regarding the acts of his wife and his servants. Blackstone, William, Commentaries on the Laws of England I Chap. 15 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1765)Google Scholar.

91 Strachan-Davidson, James L., Problems of the Roman Criminal Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1912), 2, 38, cited in Nisbet, p. 259Google Scholar.

92 De Corpore Politico II, 4, 9Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 158.

93 Leviathan 22, p. 182Google Scholar.

94 Leviathan 21, p. 163Google Scholar.

95 Leviathan 22, p. 180Google Scholar.

96 Leviathan 22, p. 170Google Scholar.

97 De Corpore Politico II, 3, 8Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 152.

98 Leviathan 30, p. 263Google Scholar.

99 Leviathan 30, p. 263Google Scholar.

100 Leviathan 31, p. 278Google Scholar.

101 De Cive ix, 15, p. 112Google Scholar.

102 Leviathan 45, p. 505Google Scholar.

103 De Cive ix, 8, p. 109Google Scholar.

104 Leviathan 5, p. 37Google Scholar.

105 Hobbes, Thomas, Of Liberty and Necessity, E. W. IV, p. 244Google Scholar. Emphasis omitted.

106 Leviathan 11, p. 79Google Scholar.

107 De Cive, i, 2, pp. 21n–22nGoogle Scholar.

108 Leviathan 31, pp. 284–285Google Scholar.

109 Leviathan 30, p. 262Google Scholar.

110 De Corpore Politico II, 4Google Scholar, 3, E. W. IV, p. 156. See also Leviathan 20, pp. 154–155Google Scholar.

111 The Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity and Chance, E. W. V, p. 180Google Scholar. Hobbes uses the word “assent.” Cf. Gauthier, p. 117.

112 Leviathan 20, p. 153Google Scholar.

113 De Cive ix, 8, p. 109Google Scholar.

114 Leviathan, 31, pp. 284–285Google Scholar.

115 Behemoth I, E. W. VI, p. 233.

116 Leviathan 18, pp. 136–137.

117 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, p. 556.

118 ns Leviathan 18, pp. 136–137Google Scholar.

119 Leviathan 30, p. 260Google Scholar.

120 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, p. 556.

121 Leviathan 30, p. 262Google Scholar.

122 Behemoth I, E. W. VI, p. 213.

123 De Cive xiii, 9, pp. 146–147Google Scholar.

124 De Corpore Politico II, 9, 8Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 219.

125 Cf. Watkins: “Hobbes's Leviathan … prescribes a universal cure for all revolution and civil war.” Watkins, J. W. N., Hobbes's System of Ideas: A Study in the Political Significance of Philosophical Themes (London: Hutchinson, 1965), p. 14Google Scholar.

126 De Corpore Politico II, p. 9Google Scholar, E. W. IV, p. 219.

127 Leviathan 30, p. 260Google Scholar.

128 Christian moralists assumed Hobbes “intended to teach that when a citizen is not adequately protected, then his obligations cease”—and were horrified by such a teaching. Skinner, Quentin, “Hobbes's Theory of Political Obligation,” in Hobbes and Rousseau: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Cranston, Maurice and Peters, Richard S. (Garden City: Anchor, 1972), p. 140Google Scholar.

129 Leviathan 13, p. 97Google Scholar.

130 Leviathan 30, p. 263Google Scholar.

131 Leviathan 30, p. 265Google Scholar.

132 Aristotle, , Politics, trans. Barker, E. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1946), VIII, 1337a, pp. 332–333Google Scholar.

133 Aristotle, , Nichomachean Ethics, trans. Ostwald, Martin (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1962), X, 1180a, 30-33, pp. 297–298Google Scholar.

134 Burnet, John, trans, and ed., Aristotle on Education (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1936), pp. 97, 106Google Scholar.

135 Politics II, 1236b. Emphasis by translator.

136 Politics V, 1310aGoogle Scholar.

137 Politics VII, 1335bGoogle Scholar.

138 Politics VII, 1334b–1335bGoogle Scholar.

139 Wolin, Sheldon S., Hobbes and the Epic Tradition of Political Theory (Los Angeles: William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, 1970), p. 8Google Scholar.

140 Leviathan, Review and Conclusion, pp. 547–548.

141 Minogue, K. R., “Hobbes and the Just Man,” in Hobbes and Rousseau, ed. Peters, Cranston and, p. 82Google Scholar.

142 Minogue, p. 73.

143 Minogue, p. 74.

144 Wolin, p. 50.

145 For a discussion of contemporaries who agreed with Hobbes's statement of choices, see Skinner, Quentin, “Hobbes's Theory of Political Obligation,” in Hobbes and Rousseau, pp. 126–135Google Scholar.

146 Aristotle, , Ethics, VIIIGoogle Scholar.

147 No doubt the quality of our own public life would improve proportionally, though only eventually.

Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.