Thomas Hobbes Quotes
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Such truth, as opposeth no man's profit, nor pleasure, is to all men welcome.
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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.
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By this we may understand, there be two sorts of knowledge, whereof the one is nothing else but sense, or knowledge original (as I have said at the beginning of the second chapter), and remembrance of the same; the other is called science or knowledge of the truth of propositions, and how things are called, and is derived from understanding.
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And seeing every man is presumed to do all things in order to his own benefit, no man is a fit Arbitrator in his own cause.
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Intemperance is naturally punished with diseases; rashness, with mischance; injustice; with violence of enemies; pride, with ruin; cowardice, with oppression; and rebellion, with slaughter.
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Good and Evil are names that signify our appetites and aversions, which in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different: And diverse men differ not only in their judgment, on the senses of what is pleasant and unpleasant to the taste, smell, hearing, touch, and sight, but also of what is conformable, or disagreeable to Reason, in the actions of the common life. Nay, the same man, in diverse times, differs from himself, and one time praiseth, that is, calleth Good, what another time he dispraiseth, and calleth Evil.
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I shall be glad then to find a hole to creep out of the world.
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Felicity is a continual progress of the desire from one object to another, the attaining of the former being still but the way to the latter.
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During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that conditions called war; and such a war, as if of every man, against every man.
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No Discourse whatsoever, can End in absolute Knowledge of Fact.
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And therefore, as when there is a controversy in an account, the parties must by their own accord, set up for right Reason, the Reason of some Arbitrator, or Judge, to whose sentence, they will both stand, or their controversy must either come to blows, or be undecided, for want of a right Reason constituted by Nature; so is it also in all debates of what kind soever.
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Appetite, with an opinion of attaining, is called hope; the same, without such opinion, despair.
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So that in the nature of man, we find three principal causes of quarrel. First, competition; secondly, diffidence; thirdly, glory. The first maketh men invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the third, for reputation. The first use violence, to make themselves masters of other men's persons, wives, children, and cattle; the second, to defend them; the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile, a different opinion, and any other sign of undervalue, either direct in their persons or by reflection in their kindred, their friends, their nation, their profession, or their name.
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Opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotion to what men fear, and talking of things casual for prognostics, consisteth the natural seeds of religion.
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Leisure is the mother of philosophy; and commonwealth, the mother of peace and leisure.
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And therefore in geometry (which is the only science that it hath pleased God hitherto to bestow on mankind), men begin at settling the significations of their words; which settling of significations, they call definitions, and place them in the beginning of their reckoning.
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A naturall foole that could never learn by heart the order of numerall words, as one , two , and three , may observe every stroak of the Clock, and nod to it, or say one, one, one; but can never know what houre it strikes.
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A Covenant not to defend myself from force, by force, is always void. For... no man can transfer or lay down his Right to save himself from Death.
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For if all things were equally in all men, nothing would be prized.
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The value of all things contracted for, is measured by the appetite of the contractors, and therefore the just value is that which they be contented to give.
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Where there is no common power, there is no law.
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If any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies.
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As, in Sense, that which is really within us, is (as I have said before) only Motion, caused by the action of external objects, but in appearance; to the Sight, Light and Color; to the Ear, Sound; to the Nostril, Odor, &c.
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A man's conscience and his judgment is the same thing; and as the judgment, so also the conscience, may be erroneous.