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For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination or by confederacy with others that are in the same danger with himself

Thomas Hobbes

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Thomas Hobbes
Age: 91 †
Born: 1588
Born: April 5
Died: 1679
Died: December 4
Economist
Historian
Mathematician
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Politician
Translator
Westport
Wiltshire
Hobbes
Thomas Hobbsted
Thomas Hobbes of Malflutry
Danger
Strength
Either
Secret
Others
Confederacy
Body
Weakest
Enough
Strongest
Kill

More quotes by Thomas Hobbes

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A Law of Nature, (Lex Naturalis) is a Precept, or general Rule, found out by Reason, by which a man is forbidden to do, that, which is destructive of his life, or taketh away the means of preserving the same and to omit, that, by which he thinketh it may be best preserved.
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To speak impartially, both sayings are very true: that man to man is a kind of God and that man to man is an arrant wolf. The first is true, if we compare citizens amongst themselves and the second, if we compare cities.
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How could a state be governed, or protected in its foreign relations if every individual remained free to obey or not to obey the law according to his private opinion.
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For if all things were equally in all men, nothing would be prized.
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To conclude, The Light of humane minds is Perspicuous Words, but by exact definitions first snuffed, and purged from ambiguity Reason is the pace Encrease of Science, the way and the Benefit of man-kind, the end.
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To this war of every man against every man, this also in 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 war the cardinal virtues.
Thomas Hobbes
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If this superstitious fear of Spirits were taken away, and with it, Prognostiques from Dreams, false Prophecies, and many other things depending thereon, by which, crafty ambitious persons abuse the simple people, men would be much more fitted then they are for civill Obedience.
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A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is always voyd.
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Whatsoever is the object of any man's Appetite or Desire that is it which he for his part calleth Good: and the object of his Hate and Aversion, evil.
Thomas Hobbes
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Covenants without swords are but words.
Thomas Hobbes
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This I know God cannot sin, because his doing a thing makes it just, and consequently, no sin.... And therefore it is blasphemy to say, God can sin but to say, that God can so order the world, as a sin may be necessarily caused thereby in a man, I do not see how it is any dishonor to him.
Thomas Hobbes
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They that are discontented under monarchy, call it tyranny and they that are displeased with aristocracy, call it oligarchy: so also, they which find themselves grieved under a democracy, call it anarchy, which signifies the want of government and yet I think no man believes, that want of government, is any new kind of government.
Thomas Hobbes
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In sum, all actions and habits are to be esteemed good or evil by their causes and usefulness in reference to the commonwealth, and not by their mediocrity, nor by their being commended. For several men praise several customs, and, contrarily, what one calls vice, another calls virtue, as their present affections lead them.
Thomas Hobbes
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To be seduced by Orators, as a Monarch by Flatterers.
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It is many times with a fraudulent Design that men stick their corrupt Doctrine with the Cloves of other mens Wit.
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That wee have of Geometry, which is the mother of all Naturall Science, wee are not indebted for it to the Schools.
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True and false are attributes of speech not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither truth nor falsehood. Error theremay be, as when we expect that which shall not be or suspect what has not been: but in neither case can a man be charged with untruth.
Thomas Hobbes
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Moral philosophy is nothing else but the science of what is good, and evil, in the conversation, and society of mankind. Good, and evil, are names that signify our appetites, and aversions which in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different.
Thomas Hobbes
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When all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is war, which provideth for every man, by victory or death.
Thomas Hobbes
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What reason is there that he which laboreth much, and, sparing the fruits of his labor, consumeth little, should be more charged than he that, living idly, getteth little and spendeth all he gets, seeing the one hath no more protection from the commonwealth than the other?
Thomas Hobbes