The Leviathan Absolutist State
This detail from the title-page engraving of Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan (1651) conveys Hobbes’s belief that peace and security required submission to a powerful sovereign. In this image, a giant king looms over his domain, his staff and sword symbolizing his civil and religious powers. He is the head of a body made up of the multitudes of his faceless and voiceless subjects, as they carry out his commands. What Hobbes celebrated, a majority of English politicians and people rejected. Fearing the claims of absolute power by Stuart kings, they revolted twice, executing Charles I in 1649 and deposing James II in 1688. Title page from the first edition of Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, published in 1651.