Being born in 1588, very close to the date of the Spanish Armada, Thomas Hobbes believed that he was born “at the same time as fear.” For this reason, the subject of fear consumed his life, as well as his writing. His lifetime did span over a very violent period of world history, characterized by war, death, political unrest, and the upheaval of many citizenries. In fact, Hobbes wrote “The Leviathan” while on exile in France, since he believed that King Charles I was about to be overthrown and fled England out of fear that his beliefs would lead to his demise.
Hobbes’ psychological portrait of human beings mirrored his own. He felt that people were generally molded by fear. His natural state of mankind or “State of Nature” is violent and driven by fear. He writes of the “war of every man against every man” and he would probably be a proponent of Darwin’s survival of the fittest theory.
He looked at human beings, in fact, all forms of matter simply as moving, breathing beings, clumps of atoms floating around in space. This led his critics to label Hobbes an atheist, although there is no credible evidence to suggest that the author did not believe in God.
In general, Hobbes “State of Nature,” coupled with his psychological portrait of humans, makes the argument that he felt that people were too self-absorbed and willing to destruct each other as well as their surroundings to be capable of governing themselves.
Because of his belief that people sought to consistently destroy each other, he believed that mankind must be governed by a larger body, composed by a composite of humanity with one large sovereign head. By definition, the Leviathan is a huge sea creature, and symbolic of the larger than life figure needed to keep order in society. Ironically, Hobbes was not a fan of the use of metaphors, despite the fact that the topic of his most famous writing is a metaphoric symbol which represented one large sovereign governmental body.
Hobbes’ monstrously large government system was necessary to provide stability to a society, which in Hobbes’ mind was chaotic and incapable of governing itself, because of the greed and uncertainty which existed. He believed that humans sought a peaceful existence because they were also tired of the hatred and destruction which surrounded them. The author believed that a large governmental system was required to provide peace and order.
As it exists, I would not believe in Hobbes’ generalizations about humans and their natural condition. Then again, our American society is little like the one which Hobbes describes. Current critics complain about the current growth of government in America, and there may be a genuine concern about any government which becomes far reaching and gets involved in many different aspects of society.
But Hobbes’ view of the world and the human condition made more sense in the early 17th century. The world, particularly Europe, was in a state of turmoil and governments were regularly overthrown. In parts of the world, this is still happening, just not in America where we thrive in a democracy. Therefore, it is more difficult for us to understand. In Hobbes’ Europe of the 1600’s, I could be more empathetic to his theories such as his “State of Nature.”
Susan Wolf – Moral Saints (extra credit)
According to Susan Wolf, she says that she doesn’t know if there are any moral saints, but is glad that she does not know them. Soon after, she defines the term. A moral saint is a “person whose every action is as morally good as possible, a person, that is, who is as morally worthy as can be.”
But the term doesn’t agree with the author. In her writing, the concept of perfection surfaces and Wolf asks the question. When we consider all of the values that could be attributed to the moral saint – namely that they do the best to be patient, hospitable, honest, and spend all of their time doing good deeds for others – is it not a good thing that we do not know someone so perfect? She notes that we can be happy not to know someone who is “too good for their own good.”
Wolf brings up an interesting point. If someone is spending all their time feeding the hungry, clothing the needy and raising money for one cause or another, then they are not spending time engaging in the activities that most of us enjoy, like reading a book, playing a musical instrument or even taking a walk. By holding out of these simple tasks, the moral saint actually ends up living a barren life – one which is absorbed in acts of charity, and lacking in fun and adventure.
For this reason, she views the moral saint with apprehension, because, after all, how happy could the person be? Without doubt or cynicism in their thinking and logic, the moral saint is incapable of telling a joke or laughing at the person who is making a mistake. And while the moral saint may enjoy good wholesome family entertainment, the person would be unable to laugh at saltier humor, which in Wolf’s case includes a Marx Brothers movie and George Bernard Shaw play.
Basically, Wolf views the moral saint with apprehension because in her thinking, a person who spends so much time conducting good deeds and maintaining a strong moral compass, is electing to miss out on many facets of everyday life. This creates a human being who is not well-rounded. She goes on to explain the importance of well-roundedness and how it is necessary in our lives.
I agree with Wolf in that regard. While we try to be good humans, there is always room for improvement. To be fully-functioning, we must engage in all walks of life, and should think, play and laugh every day. Making the attempt to become a moral saint is too hard. It involves giving up on many of our daily thoughts. The road traveled to reach moral sainthood is very narrow and does not allow for many opportunities to try new things, because of the risk of making a mistake, or offending another person. To paraphrase Wolf, it is one thing to be a Loving saint, but it is more important to behave like a Rational Saint, one who realizes that aiming to become a moral saint is not an objective based in reality. We aim for progress in our spiritual lives, not perfection. There is no shame in having weaknesses and flaws, or of recognizing them in others. The important task is to identify these flaws in ourselves and work at becoming better individuals. Of course, it is a lifelong task, but we should behave like lifelong learners.
