By Shivam Kumar
Abstract
Machiavelli and Prince, although centuries apart, coming from different societies, speaking with different intentions, in different voices, tones and vocabularies, form a foundation to the western political philosophy. This essay is an analytical presentation of Machiavelli’s ‘The Prince’ and Thomas Hobbes’ ‘Leviathan’ around ten themes that also best capture their central ideas. These themes are: A. context; B influence, method and philosophy; C. goals and ends; D. state, sovereign and subject; E. power, violence and property; F. human and human nature; G. republican ideas; H. reason and religion; I. virtue and fortune; and J. obligation and self-preservation.
Introduction
Nicolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) was an Italian origin diplomat, adviser to princes, theorist and historian whose work on statecraft which comes in a manuscript called ‘The Prince’ (1532) keeps his relevance undeterred even 500 years after his death. (Quentin Skinner; 1881)
Thomas Hobbes of Malmsbury (1588-1679), on the other hand, was an English political philosopher whose magnum opus work, ‘Leviathan’ (1651), does a pathbreaking task in laying the foundations of western political philosophy by redefining nature, human and the sovereign.
Machiavelli and Hobbes, although centuries apart, but as the topic demands, similarities and differences between them can be extracted if readers undergo a simultaneous process of comparing the two on their ideas but also not missing the context, specificity and boundaries of their writings.
This consistency in thought, capturing similarities and differences, gets sufficiently reflected by Shawn Gill who observes that Machiavelli and Hobbes both rejected the classical and medieval intellectual traditions that preceded them. In this way the works of Hobbes and Machiavelli represented a break with the classical tradition and together helped form the basis of modern political theory. Hobbes and Machiavelli, though similar in their iconoclastic ambitions to unseat and defame the tradition of the medievalists and the ancients,’ however, ‘diverged in fundamental ways.’
There can not be one way of approaching this question because there are some ideas, of course, where similarities and differences can be drawn but there are several ideas which are entirely independent of each other. Take for instance, ‘Fortuna’ and ‘Free-will’ in ‘The Prince’ and ‘the social contract’ and ‘self-preservation’ in ‘Leviathan’. Therefore, one way of constructing the answer could be to search for certain themes around which a structure of similarities and differences could be developed.
These themes, here, are: a. context, b. influence, method and philosophy, c. goals and ends, d. state, sovereign and subject, e. power, violence and property, f. human and human nature, g. republican ideas, h. reason and religion, i. virtue and fortune and j. obligation and self-preservation, among others.
Context
‘The prince’ and the ‘Leviathan’ are tales of two starkly different yet deeply troubled societies. ‘The prince’, which is based on 15th-16th centuries Italy, describes its doomsday which is undergoing a sad phase of political decline, stagnation and fragmentation. ‘Leviathan’, on the other hand, has been written in the backdrop of the English Civil Wars of the 1640s between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians. (Machiavelli; 1532, Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
What adjoins both these works despite their methodological and philosophical differences is their effort to generate the tradition of political realism. (David Gardner; 2010)
Influence, Method and Philosophy
Methods and philosophies employed in ‘The Prince’ and the ‘Leviathan’ show a great deal of their individual influences that they had in their lives. Machiavelli’s upbringing and education were done in a manner to inculcate humanist values which were inspired from the old Roman empire and especially from Cicero, whose pedagogic ideals were revived by the Italian humanists of the 14th century (Quentin Skinner; 1881). Hobbes, on the other hand, seeking his inspiration from the developments in physical science and particularly from Galileo, aims to provide his method and philosophy a scientific footing. At the same time, their writings cannot be separated from the influence of renaissance thinking on them. (Sushila Ramaswamy and Subrata Mukherjee (2011)
Their ideas got further shaped by their respective life experiences. Machiavelli, a civil servant, a man of action, drew his ideas mostly by observing how people behave in real life, while, Hobbes, a tutor to the royal families, a scholar and primarily a man of words delved more on the question how people ought to behave or would behave in a certain hypothetical context like in the ‘state of nature’. (David Gardner; 2010)
Goals and Ends
Machiavelli’s ‘The prince’s one consolidated goal and end is to make the then ruler of the Florentine republic, Lorenzo de Medici, known of the science of statecraft that Italy needed and end is the ultimate glory. Within the text he further narrates where the prince needs to work on- on nature of its principality, of those whom he wants to conquer, on army, borrowed army or one’s own, arming civilians or unarming them, warfare, statecraft, lessons from history, strategic display of virtues, liberality and meanness, acknowledging the complementary relationship between fortune and ability and finally liberating Italy from the barbarians, among others. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes’ goal and end, as he narrates in his ‘Leviathan’, is to create a ‘sovereign’ through an agreement between each member of the commonwealth where contracting members would be transferring their individual rights and power into the body of the sovereign who in return would ensure that the contractors live up to the terms of the contracts and covenants made with one another and not let commonwealth fall into a ‘state of nature’ like situation. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
State, Sovereign and Subject
Machiavelli, in general, considers two types of states- republican and principalities but in ‘The prince’, he restricts himself to principalities alone. In chapter 1 he discusses them and distinguishes between two kinds of principalities- hereditary and new. While he considers hereditary to be ruled easily but new ones come with its own challenges. He further distinguishes them between mixed and homogenous principalities where he prescribes different rules for the two. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Sovereign in Machiavelli’s imagination is an active, able, adventurous, heroic, charismatic personality like Moses, Cyrus, Romulus, Theseus and such who places the state’s interests above all. (Machiavelli; 1532)
He is one who could be either reputed liberal or miserly; reputed generous or rapacious; cruel or compassionate; faithless or faithful; effeminate or cowardly, bold or brave; affable or haughty; lascivious or chaste; sincere or cunning; hard or easy; grave or frivolous; religious or unbelieving, and the like. He must know what is virtue and vice but shouldn’t feel obliged to appear virtuous all the time if by doing so he might endanger his position or lose his state. ‘Therefore, it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated but it is very necessary to appear to have them’. (Machiavelli; 1532)
He is one who is taught by Centaur Chiron who is half man-half beast. He is both a fox and a lion and knows how and where to use them. He can choose either to be loved or feared but not hated by his subjects. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes’ idea of state and the sovereign, on the other hand, draws its legitimacy from a hypothetical social contract theory unlike Machiavelli who relies on ancient successful leaders, empires and texts to justify his position.
Hobbes writes, ‘For by art is created that great Leviathan called a Commonwealth, or State (in Latin, Civitas), which is but an artificial man, thought of greater stature and strength than the natural, for whose protection and defense it was intended; and in which the sovereignty is an artificial soul, as giving life and motion to the whole body; the magistrates and other officers of judicature and execution, artificial joints; reward and punishment (by which fastened to the seat of the sovereignty, every joint and member is moved to perform his duty) are the nerves, that do the same in the body natural; the wealth and riches of all the particular members are the strength; salus populi (the people’s safety) its business; counselors, by whom all things needful for it to know are suggested unto it, are the memory; equity and laws, an artificial reason and will; concord, health; sedition, sickness; and civil war, death. Lastly, the pacts and covenants, by which the parts of this body politic were at first made, set together, and united, resemble that fiat, or the Let us make man, pronounced by God in the Creation.’ (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
In Hobbes’ formulation, sovereign is above and beyond all. He writes, ‘sovereign is obliged only by the law of nature, and answerable only to the author of that law, God’. Interestingly, the subject has obligations to the sovereign authority, the authority has no obligations to its subjects. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Here, both Machiavelli and Hobbes stand alike. Except the respite Hobbes provides in imagining the principle of ‘self-preservation’.
Power, Violence and Property
In ‘The Prince’, Machiavelli’s views on power and violence shows the extent to which a prince can go in order to secure his position. Some advises in this regard are- it’s better to have a power of one’s own rather than dependent on others; where ever need arises, violence must never be done half-heartedly but in full measure and the safest way to govern a principality which formerly lived under their own laws is to ruin them entirely and several such (like Romans in Capua, Carthage and Numantia). (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes, although is relatively modest in understanding power and violence but makes no disregard to it. Violence is a means, for him, to achieve power. However, that being a thing of the ‘state of nature’, with creation of the Commonwealth and the sovereign, individual power and right to do violence are subsumed by it and the sovereign acquires absolute legitimacy to use violence or force. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
On property, both Machiavelli and Hobbes have different sets of formulations.
Machiavelli is very straight in acknowledging and establishing the fact that property is very dear to men and the prince should be cautious and ‘abstain from the property of his citizens. But when it is necessary for him to proceed against the life of someone, he must do it on proper justification and for manifest cause, but above all things he must keep his hands off the property of others, because men more quickly forget the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony.’ (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes, unlike Machiavelli, on property succinctly delineates that the sovereign posses ‘the whole power of prescribing the rules whereby every man may know what goods he may enjoy, and what actions he may do, without being molested by any of his fellow subjects: and this is it men call propriety. For before constitution of sovereign power, as hath already been shown, all men had right to all things, which necessarily causeth war: and therefore this propriety, being necessary to peace, and depending on sovereign power, is the act of that power, in order to the public peace. These rules of propriety (or meum and tuum) and of good, evil, lawful, and unlawful in the actions of subjects are the civil laws; that is to say, the laws of each Commonwealth in particular…’. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Human and Human nature
In Machiavelli’s eyes, humans appear in poor light. For him, men are ungrateful, fickle, false, cowardly, covetous, and as long as the prince succeeds, they are his entirely but when the need is far distant; they turn their back. He takes this as his foundational assumption based on which ‘The Prince’ has been written. He uses examples like Hannibal and justifies his inhuman cruelty based on this premise. (Machiavelli; 1532)
There are two ways of looking at Hobbes’s humans. One, quite like Machiavellian where he considers them as, an isolated, egoistic, self-interested, violent being but the other is an idea of humans inspired by the law of nature where he conceives humans in motion as matter in motion and presents quite a mechanistic view of men. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Republican ideas
Machiavelli’s views on republicanism become crystal clear in this book when he writes, ‘I will leave out all discussion on republics.’ Nevertheless, he does mention it but what it meets is extermination, sabotaging (ex. Agathocles, King of Syracuse) and unwilling appreciation for the glorious Roman and Athenian republics. Republican ideas, as such, are not appreciative in Machiavelli in ‘The Prince’, at all. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes is relatively republican except his absolutist monarch. According to him, people are as free under the rule of a leviathan as they were without it. If the definition of liberty and freedom is the ability to act without hindrance or fear, the natural state of life is definitely not free. Therefore, having a sovereign ruler who prevents people from injuring others ensures freedom. Equality is another central idea in Hobbes’ ‘Leviathan’. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Reason and Religion
Reason is an underlying theme in both these texts. Prince reasons the decayed state of Italy and questions every authority and institution responsible for it. Hobbes bases his reasoning to develop his scientific theory of polity.
Similarity between Machiavelli and Hobbes on religion is that they both rejected the ‘divine theory of kingship’ and offered an intelligent, reasonable and scientific foundation to it.
Machiavelli neither rejects religion completely nor endorses it. He leaves it on the prince’s prudence to use it in his interest. Hobbes, however, undertakes a systemic enquiry and states that religion is undoubtedly a creation of man but he also acknowledges that one eternal, infinite, omnipotent God through which men seek to know the causes of natural bodies and their several virtues and operations. (Machiavelli; 1532, Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Virtue and Fortune
Machiavelli, in the prince, defines both these aspects of a prince’s life. Fortune is the unpredictable future whereas virtue is an individual’s ability and capacity. Fortune is although uncontrollable but he also writes that virtue could defeat fortune if it is properly applied. Machiavelli cites the example of Pope Julius’s successful enterprise against Bologna. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes also talks about virtues but in his theorization, it’s not limited to the sovereign alone but presents a generalized view. His virtues are of two sorts; natural and acquired. Natural, as he defines, is nothing but sense and acquired virtue is something that comes with use and experiences. The concept of fortune, on the other hand, is not quite coherent in Hobbes’s thinking. However, he too uses it to describe its relationship with power and prestige and in both positive and negative sense. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Obligation and Self-preservation
In Machiavelli’s ‘The Prince’, terms such as these are not well pronounced. Prince is under obligation to none; neither to state, religion or masses. A good alternative term for ‘obligation’ in Machiavelli’s ‘The Prince’ would be ‘prudent’. In relation to masses, obligation is something that is to be cultivated by the prince and it does not come naturally. Self-preservation, honestly, appears neither in text nor in spirit. However, he does warn the prince against some measures like harming the dignity and property of men which during the time of crisis might cause harm to him. (Machiavelli; 1532)
Hobbes appears very categorical while discussing these concepts. Obligation, for him, is although a unilateral yet a multi-fold concept. Meaning, sovereign is not obliged to people but the reverse is there. This obligation, as he views, is physical, moral and rational. Self-preservation, unequivocally, is a revolutionary concept here. If creation of a sovereign was an escape from the state of nature, self-preservation is also an escape from the tyranny of the sovereign. Hobbes’ idea of self-preservation is his discovery of peace. (Thomas Hobbes; 1651)
Analysis
The biggest difference between Machiavelli and Hobbes’ writing is that Machiavelli is over prescriptive while Hobbes is extremely descriptive. Machiavelli is relying on his own empirical studies of human and state’s behavior which in Hobbes’ case is not alike and his study, in a limited sense, can be termed as normative legal positivist. However, they both are advocating for an absolutist monarchy but none of them seems appreciative towards changing social character. One interesting thing that can be noticed in their writings is that ‘Leviathan’ begins by writing on ‘man’ and takes that to a ‘kingdom of darkness’ for men’s spiritual awakening. ‘The Prince’, on the other hand, begins with principalities and princes and does no direct communication with general masses until it reaches its final chapter where masses become a part of its exhortation to free Italy from the barbarians.
Conclusion
Hobbes and Machiavelli, two greatest minds of 16th and 17th century Europe, through their seminal works ‘The Prince’ and the ‘Leviathan’ open a world of knowledge for us. Beyond similarities and differences, the texts are full of new, original, unique and thought provoking ideas. As a student of political science, one key takeaway that we can pick is that they sincerely studied their societies, problematized and questioned existing prevalent systems, probed the problems and honestly looked for solutions.
References:
*Gardner, David (2010), ‘Thomas Hobbes and Niccolo Machiavelli: A Comparison’, E-International Relations.
*Gill, Shawn, ‘Differences and similarities in the political thought of Thomas Hobbes and Niccoló Machiavelli’.
*Hobbes, Thomas (1651), Leviathan, Green Dragon in St. Paul’s Church-yard, London.
*Machiavelli, Niccolò (1532), The Prince, The Federalist Papers Project.
*Ramaswamy, Sushila and Mukherjee, Subrata (2011), A History of Political Thought – Plato to Marx, Prentice Hall India Learning Private Ltd.
*Skinner, Quentin (1981), Machiavelli- A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press.
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