English philosopher Thomas Hobbes was famously known for his authoritarian philosophy that praised the rights of Absolute Monarchs. Hobbes seems to suggest that Laws, despite limiting the freedoms of individual people, is ultimately for their own Good. Laws are only lawful if they can be enforced by a Sovereign. Hobbes says that nothing a Sovereign does can properly be called an injustice. Furthermore, any liberties individuals do have only exist because the Sovereign chooses to ignore such excesses.

“If we take Liberty, for an exemption from Lawes, it is absurd, for men to demand as they doe, that Liberty, by which all other men may be masters of their lives. And yet as absurd as it is, this is it they demand; not know that the Lawes are of no power to protect them, without a Sword in the hands of a man, or men, to cause those laws to be put in execution. The Liberty of a Subject, lyeth therefore only in those things, which in regulating their actions, the Soveraign hath praetermitted… The Soveraign Power of life, and death, is never abolished, or limited. For it has been already shewn, that nothing the Soveraign Representative can doe to a Subject, on what pretense soever, can properly be called Injustice, or Injury; because every Subject is Author of every act the Soveraign doth.”

Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan. (264-265)

Citations: Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan. Buy here!

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