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Chapter 17
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Leviathan, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Nature, War, and Civil Society
Power, Common-wealths, and Monarchies
Religion
Fear
Reason, Fact, and Philosophy
Summary
Analysis
A common-wealth is created when an assembly of people agree to a covenant in which a person (or persons) is to be their representative, and that representative, or sovereign power, is given all the rights and faculties of the assembly. First, since this power is contrived from a covenant, the people are not obliged to any former contracts, nor can they enter into a new contract that gives sovereign power to another person or persons. For subjects of a monarchy, a monarch cannot be dethroned or power transferred to another person or assembly. To dispose of a monarch is an injustice, and to kill a monarch is to assume a right no one person can ever have.
Here, Hobbes implicitly calls out the English Civil War as an injustice. During the war, King Charles I, the rightful sovereign of England, was overthrown and executed by the parliamentarians for tyranny. In Hobbes’s view, the parliamentarians did not have the right to usurp the King’s power, nor did they have the right to execute him for tyranny. Only the sovereign power can declare what is justice and what is tyranny, and since the parliamentarians were not the sovereign power, they did not have the authority to make that call.
Themes
The power of a sovereign cannot be forfeited, either by the sovereign power itself or by the people, and anyone who disagrees with the sovereign’s right to power must agree to that right once it is decided by the majority. A sovereign can do no injury onto subjects, and subjects are not permitted to accuse a sovereign of injustice or attempt to kill or punish the sovereign in any way for any perceived offense. The sovereign alone is judge of what is necessary for the peace and defense of a common-wealth, and the sovereign also has the power to decide which doctrines are appropriate to be taught to subjects to avoid dissention and civil war.
In a common-wealth, the sovereign is supreme power and can never break the law, which means that nothing a sovereign ever does can be considered illegal or unjust. This, of course, gives a sovereign free reign to do whatever they want to subjects. According to Hobbes, the sovereign is bound by the Laws of Nature to do what is in their subjects’ best interest; however, since there is no power above the sovereign, there is no power to enforce this law.
Themes
The sovereign power has the right to make the rules of a common-wealth, whereby every subject and their property is protected from injustice, and the sovereign power also has the right to sit in judgement over controversies. A sovereign power is responsible for doing what they see best in times of peace and war, and they are also responsible for selecting any needed counselors or ministers. The sovereign power is responsible for rewarding and punishing subjects and for keeping honor and order in the common-wealth. Lastly, the rights of a sovereign power cannot be taken away, and the power and honor of individual subjects does not exist in the presence of the sovereign power.
Once a covenant is entered, one is released from responsibility under two conditions: the terms of the covenant are fulfilled, or the one who entered into the covenant releases the other from obligation. The terms of a common-wealth are never considered fulfilled, as the purpose of the common-wealth is to offer continuous protection. If the assembly wished to release the sovereign from its obligation, the entire assembly would have to be in agreement to void the contract.
Themes
Literary Devices
