Thomas Hobbes
Born in 1588
plato.stanford.edu
History
Philosophy
Politics
Thomas Hobbes was a 17th-century British philosopher who profoundly shaped modern political thought.
His seminal work, Leviathan, published in 1651, established the foundation for social contract theory and Western political philosophy.
Hobbes's ideas were characterized by a mechanistic materialist worldview and a pessimistic view of human nature, emphasizing greed and fear of death as driving forces.
He advocated for absolute monarchy as the ideal form of government to maintain social order.
Beyond political philosophy, Hobbes was a scholar of classical Greek literature and history, producing English translations of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, as well as Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War.
