Theological Origins of Modernity

234 chapter seven
Hobbes’ reconstruction of the world is thus diff erent from Descartes’
mathesis universalis, which is always a literal mathesis or mathematics that
captures the reality of things. For Hobbes, the geometric method is metaphorical.
It is not the actual numbers or fi gures that capture the world but
the precise defi nitions and the process of construction based upon these
defi nitions. Geometry is one form of such a construction, but it is not the
only or even the primary one. Hobbes’ representation of the world thus
depends upon signs that provide a useful reconstruction of reality that
specifi es the necessary connections among things and thus allows for certain
deduction on the basis of the assumed truth of hypothetical premises
rather than upon numbers that portray the actual essence of things.
Th is does not mean that science is merely a story. It is diff erent from
both experience and history. It is not description but indubitable reasoning
on the basis of self-evident truths. 94 Hobbes’ science is thus quite distant
from the historical and prudential thought of Renaissance humanism
and even from the empirical or experimental thought of Bacon. Indeed, its
goal is not to understand the causal relations that govern the world God
ordained and created but to understand the causal power of God himself
and use this power to reconstruct the world in ways that will facilitate
human thriving. Hobbes nominalism in this case places him close to the
Reformers, but he is less concerned with salvation and eternal life than
with preserving and improving life in this world. We see this most clearly
in his account of man and the state.
hobbes’ anthropology
In almost any metaphysical system the transition from physics to anthropology
presents real diffi culties. Almost everyone agrees that humans are
natural beings, but few are willing to assert that they are only natural beings.
Descartes saw man as res extensa but also as res cogitans. He did not
thereby mean to suggest that human bodies were not subject to natural
causes but only that they were also moved by a free human will. Hobbes,
by contrast, argues that humans are governed by the same mechanical
causality that governs all beings. He rejects the idea that humans have a
supernatural component as a ploy of priests to gain power over others.
Th is does not mean that there is nothing unusual or distinctive about
humans for Hobbes. Indeed, in his view we are complex automata, mechanisms
like clocks that are, as it were, spring-loaded, and when the energy
stored in these “springs” is released we move. We seem to ourselves to be
freely self-moving, but this is an illusion. Our so-called actions are always