Nothing to declare? Hobbes and the advocate of injustice

Political Theory

Volumn 27, Issue 2, 1999, Pages 230-235

  Hoekstra, Kinch ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0033242293     PISSN: 00905917     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0090591799027002005     Document Type: Article

References (22)

1. Kinch Hoekstra, "Hobbes and the Foole," Political Theory 25, no. 5 (1997): 620-54. Subsequent references to this article (hereafter, Hoekstra) will be made in the text. References to Leviathan (hereafter, L) will be to chapter and paragraph number of Richard Tuck's edition (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1991). References to EW are to volume and page number of The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, ed. Sir William Molesworth (London: John Bohn, 1839-45). References to Behemoth are to the edition of Ferdinand Tönnies (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990).
2. Kinch Hoekstra, "Hobbes and the Foole," Political Theory 25, no. 5 (1997): 620-54. Subsequent references to this article (hereafter, Hoekstra) will be made in the text. References to Leviathan (hereafter, L) will be to chapter and paragraph number of Richard Tuck's edition (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1991). References to EW are to volume and page number of The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, ed. Sir William Molesworth (London: John Bohn, 1839-45). References to Behemoth are to the edition of Ferdinand Tönnies (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990).
3. Peter Hayes, "Hobbes's Silent Fool: A Response to Hoekstra," Political Theory 27, no. 2 (1999): 225-9. Subsequent references (hereafter, Hayes) will be made in the text.
4. Hayes in fact says that the Explicit Foole "may indeed" be "all talk and no action," but in what follows he ignores the Flagrant Foole, whose actions speak as loudly as words, and equates the Explicit Foole with the Loud Foole. On the other hand, Hayes never substantiates his claim that the Foole "is unreasonable notwithstanding his silence" (p. 228), except by appeal to the discovery of his actions - that is, by conflating the Flagrant Foole with the Silent Foole. See note 5, below.
5. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
6. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
7. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
8. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
9. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
10. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
11. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
12. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
13. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
14. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
15. For examples of Hobbes's treatment of actions as words, see Elements of Law xiv. 11; De cive "Preface," i.5, i.12, iii.12, xv.11, xv.19; L xiii.10, xiv.7, xiv.29, xv.20, xviii.5, xxxii.5, xlii.11; Behemoth, p. 108. Passages in which Hobbes treats words as actions include Elements of Law xxv.3; De cive "Preface"; L xviii.16, xxi.9; the Latin Leviathan xlvi.11; Considerations upon . . .Hobbes (EW IV, 438); Decameron physiologicum (EW VII, 76); An Historical Narration Concerning Heresy (EW IV, 394).
16. In saying that "a silent fool . . . is unmasked by his actions" (Hayes, p. 227), Hayes presumably means either (1) the silent violator is necessarily unmasked; or (2) the silent violator can always reasonably predict that he will be unmasked, though there will be fortuitous occasions when he goes undetected. Another possible interpretation is (3) the silent violator can sometimes reasonably predict that he will not be unmasked or that the risk of his unmasking is worth running for the potential reward. Hayes may suggest support for this position on p. 226 (on the silent resolve necessary for successful treason) and p. 228 (where the Foole is seen to act against those who are "apt to be deceived by silence"). If Hayes endorses (1) or (2), he must explain how he (or Hobbes) justifies excluding the possibility of (3); and if he endorses (3), he must explain why Hobbes thinks such a violator is unreasonable.
17. Hayes argues that "if the fool is understood primarily as an agitator who declares that others may break the law, then, paradoxically, his security within society depends on the recognition of his error by other men rather than their ignorance of it" (Hayes, p. 227). He here misinterprets a passage in which Hobbes makes clear both that the Foole is not silent but explicit and that an Explicit Foole can reasonably expect to be destroyed if he is recognized as such; "he which declares he thinks it reason to deceive those that help him, can in reason expect no other means of safety, than what can be had from his own single Power. He therefore that breaketh his Covenant, and consequently declareth that he thinks he may with reason do so, cannot be received into any Society . . . if he be left, or cast out of Society, he perisheth; and if he live in Society, it is by the erreurs of other men, which he could not foresee, nor reckon upon, and consequently against the reason of his preservation; and so, as all men that contribute not to his destruction, forbear him onely out of ignorance" (L xv.5, emphases added).
18. More precisely, the Silent Foole interpretation requires defense of (Hobbes's view of) the irrationality of breaking one's covenant as a second performer in the state of nature, and as a first or second performer in civil society. In his argument with the Foole, Hobbes understands any such covenant breaking as tantamount to injustice.
19. Hayes imports a distinction between silent atheistic fools and loud religious zealots. It is hard to see how Hobbes would be wasting his time to answer a Loud Foole, if he is right to take a loud zealot seriously. Denying that the Foole is explicit, Hayes is driven to read the reply to the Foole as incorporating a submerged but distinct reply to religious zealots never explicitly identified by Hobbes. Hayes sees two different antagonists here with a "somewhat obscure connection," and a reply rife with "multiple meanings and argument by anticipation" that amounts to "a series of overlapping thought associations," to the point that the two answers "are intermingled, and it is possible to move both forward and backward through the text with equal logic" (p. 228). Despite the extent to which he thinks "Hobbes blends his discussion" in this way, however, Hayes is able to discern clearly that the Foole addressed for some part of the reply is silent (Hayes, p. 227). I think it is preferable to see a sustained and coherent reply to the Explicit Foole. Hayes is vexed by the apparent inconsistency of the text with the Foole's atheism. A clearer route is to acknowledge that atheism is not Hobbes's primary concern here: it is brought up to introduce Hobbes's Foole (who denies justice) by allusion to the Scriptural fool (who denies God), and because for the Foole to regard injustice as potentially advantageous, he must deny that it is always disadvantageous because of divine sanctions. Hayes also objects that "those who Hobbes singles out for blame for inciting others to rebellion in [Behemoth] are not atheists; they are preachers" (Hayes, p. 227). Hobbes makes clear, however, that "the seducers were of divers sorts," several of which he lists (Behemoth, pp. 2-4): only some of these are preachers. Moreover, Hobbes does not deny that a preacher can be an atheist. In any case, the main point about the Foole's denial of God is that he does not fear that God will punish him for his uncivil views, and this is also true of the ministers that Hobbes takes to task in Behemoth. It remains to be said that Hobbes is unlikely to have regarded the unjust assault on the "Kingdome of God" that he discusses in L xv.4 as "unjust violence . . . perpetrated by the fool against men who are not omniscient and who are thereby apt to be deceived by silence" (Hayes, p. 228): this kingdom is equated by Hobbes with "the secure and perpetual felicity of Heaven," and Hobbes makes clear that no covenant breaking can even be imagined to be successful in this case (L xv.6).
20. Ben Jonson, Timber: Or, Discoveries; Made vpon Men and Matter: As They Have Flow'd Out of His Daily Readings; Or Had Their Refluxe to His Peculiar Notion of the Times (London, 1641), 93, in the first edition of the Workes, dated 1640.
21. I have translated the first edition's "Indice" as "sign." For a similar phrase,
22. see Cicero, Pro C. Rabirio Perduellionis Reo Ad Quirites Oratio, vi. 18 (Quin continetis vocem indicem stultitiae vestrae). Kinch Hoekstra is Fellow in Ancient and Modern Philosophy at Balliol College and Lecturer in Philosophy at Oxford University.