Thomas Hobbes (1588 - 1679)

Born in Westport, Wiltshire, England, and educated in Oxford, Thomas Hobbes began his early career as a classical scholar. At a time where the new science of Galileo, and Kepler challenged the aristotelian philosophy that he was taught as a student, Hobbes found consolation in the absolute truth of Euclid's geometry.

Though Hobbes had published a large number of works in his long life, including a translation of the Illiad and the Odyssey, Hobbes' most famous work is the Leviathan. In this magnum opus, Hobbes tackled the central question that he grappled with all his life: why do people allow themselves to be governed?

Homo homini lupus, Hobbes taught, "man is a wolf to other men." Hobbes believed that people, by nature, were selfish, and acted only to serve their own interests. He believed that governments existed to protect people from their own evil nature. He further taught that the only way for lasting peace to be achieved was for people to subjugate themselves to a supreme, sovereign monarch.

Hobbes believed that democracy would never succeed. In fact, his earliest work, a translation of Thucydides's work, was meant as a warning to those who would follow democracy, that they would share the same fate as ancient Athens.

In his later years, he came to believe in the necessity of an elected representative, who would convey the concern of the people to the monarch, and help to curb the excesses of a monarchy. In fact it was Hobbes who coined the term: "voice of the people." Hobbes maintained to his dying day, however, that while the people deserved to be listened to, the king had the absolute power to govern as he wished.


References:
Hobbes, Thomas britannica.com
Thomas Hobbes: A Short Biography http://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/nature/hobbes-bio.html