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Untitled - 24grammata.com

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OF POLITICAL THEORIES. 327According to him, men in the state of nature live in continued hostility to each other. When in this condition, theyare all equal, since they have a mutual rightto make warupon and even to kill each other. allThey have the will to3<strong>com</strong>mit injuries,and therefore scruple not to do so a warthus arises of all against all, and the danger be<strong>com</strong>es universal, as the weaker must ever yield to the stronger, It isnatural, meantime, that some protection should be soughtagainst these dangers ; itnay,is evident that neither individuals, nor even the whole race of man, could suffice tokeep up a war at once universal, and in all probability eternal men perceived this, and -on this account forsook thestate of nature, and formed themselves into civil society,which is therefore the offspring of fear,On this hypothesis, the instability of which is apparentfrom what we have before said, Hobbes constructed his political theory. The second step he took led him into a newhypothesis. Out of this state of nature it would have beenimpossible to advance without some specific agreement:and hence arose the principle, since considered so important, that " the state isfounded upon a <strong>com</strong>pact." 1This <strong>com</strong>pact consisted in a 2general agreement of allto submit their privatewill to the will of one it mattersnot whether this be one individual, or one assemblage ofpersons whose will should thus be<strong>com</strong>e the will of all.Whoever procures his will to be thus respected, possessesthe sovereign power and majesty: he is the prince, theothers are his subjects. As soon, therefore, as the sove-1[The idea that the state is founded upon a <strong>com</strong>pact, cannot be said tohave been originated by Hobbes, aitiioixgh he was perhaps the first who inmodern times made this the only and necessary <strong>com</strong>mencement of society.Hooker, who died half a century before the Leriathan was published, (butwhose ISccL Polity, although constantly referred to by Locke, appears to haveescaped the notice of Prof. Heeren, )holds Terr express langnage to that effect"So that in a word, all public regiment, "of what kind soever, seemethevidently to have arisen from deliberate advice, consultation, and <strong>com</strong>positionany public regiment" JSccL Pdit. i. He also speaksthere was as yet no manner of public regiment." Ib. It is also distinctlylaid down in the Parliamentary Declaration of 1648": They (the parliament)supposeit will not be denied that the first institution of the office of a tingin this nation was by agreement of the people, who chose one to that officefor the protection and good of them wno chose Mm, and for their bettergovernment, according- to such laws as they did consent unto.** TR,]-D% Owe, v. 6, Submissio volontatmn omnium iinius vokntati

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