The Importance of Strong Central Authority: Insights from Leviathan

Here is the fuller passage from Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan (Chapter XIII), which contains the line quoted in the second answer:

“Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe. In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”

Would you like a brief explanation of this passage or how Hobbes uses it to justify strong central authority?

Two famous lines from Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan are:

1) “the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” (Leviathan, Ch. 13)

2) “during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.” (Leviathan, Ch. 13)

Would you like the fuller passage or help citing these in an essay?

Those lines come from Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan — specifically Part I, Chapter XIII (“Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as Concerning Their Felicity and Misery”). For a citation you should name the work and the chapter (and the edition you used). Example references:

• Original publication (full bibliographic): Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan, or The Matter, Forme and Power of a Commonwealth Ecclesiasticall and Civil. London: Andrew Crooke, 1651. (See Part I, ch. 13.)

• In-text/parenthetical (short): (Hobbes, 1651, ch. 13)

• MLA (example): Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan. 1651. Part I, ch. 13.

• APA (example): Hobbes, T. (1651). Leviathan. Part I, Chapter 13.

• Chicago (author-date) (example): Hobbes, Thomas. 1651. Leviathan. Part I, chap. 13.

If you used a modern edition, replace the 1651 publication details with that edition (editor, publisher, year) and still indicate Part I, Chapter 13. The full text is also available in many online archives (e.g., Project Gutenberg or Internet Archive) — if you use an online version, include the URL and access date in your citation.