Jendrysik, “Land or Sea Beast”
MPSA 2004
12
Those great capital cities, when rebellion is upon pretense of grievance, must
needs be of the rebel party: because the grievances are but taxes, to which
citizens, that is, merchants, whose profession is their private gain, are naturally
mortal enemies; their only glory being to grow excessively rich by the wisdom of
buying and selling.
79
Therefore the resistance of London to the King is no based on any principal. It is based solely on
the shameful money-lust of base traders.
Hobbes suggests that one of the causes for the fall of Charles I was his overgrown sense
of mercy. In a particularly chilling passage (the kind that would lead some historians of political
thought to suggest Hobbes in only joking) he suggests that a purge of the Presbyterian ministry
would have prevented the Civil War.
Our late King, the best King perhaps that ever was, you know, murdered, having
been first persecuted by war, at the incitement of Presbyterian ministers; who are
therefore guilty of all that fell in that war; which I believe, in England, Scotland,
and Ireland, near 100,000 persons. Had it not been much better that those
seditious ministers, which were not perhaps 1000, had been all killed before they
had preached? It had been (I confess) a great massacre; but the killing of 100,000
is a greater.
80
Charles was also failed by his own and his supporters mistaken beliefs about the nature of
government. “They thought the government of England was not a absolute, but a mixed
monarchy; and that if the King should clearly subdue this Parliament, this his power would be
what he pleased, and theirs as little as he pleased; which they counted tyranny.”
81
These false
beliefs lead to the King’s supporters holding back their best efforts on his behalf and prolonged
the war. Once more we see the overwhelming power of ideas on actual political events.
For Hobbes the rebels against King Charles always planned to overthrow him. Their lust
of power gave them incredibly vast “calculative powers and foresight.”
82
And indeed, they must,
because this is the only way they can fit into Hobbes’s theoretical framework for the Revolution.
He sees in Parliament’s cause a deep seated hatred toward monarchy beginning in the 1620’s and
continuing until the outbreak of the war. He suggests that every effort by Parliament toward a
settlement of the dispute between them and King Charles is really an effort to destroy monarchy
(and indeed given that for Hobbes any reduction of the King’s powers would tend toward
79
Behemoth, 126. For further analysis of this point see Perez Zagorin, “Clarendon and Hobbes.” The Journal of
Modern History Vol. 57, No. 4 (December 1985), 610.
80
Behemoth, 95. Here we can see an instance of Hobbes’s worship of naked power. In The Commonwealth of
Oceana (1656) James Harrington notes that Hobbes’s love of tyranny can be seen in his failure, alone among
political historians, to call the rule of the “Thirty Tyrants” of Athens a tyranny. Hobbes calls it an aristocracy,
thereby betraying his true feelings. For a discussion of Hobbes’s love of unlimited power see Charles D. Tarlton,
“The Despotical Doctrine of Hobbes, Part II: Aspects of the Textual Substructure of Tyranny in Leviathan”
History of Political Thought Vol. 23. No. 1 (Spring 2002), 61-89. For a discussion of contemporary reactions to
Leviathan that recognize the tyrannical nature of Hobbes’s theory see Tarlton’s “The Despotical Doctrine of
Hobbes, Part I: The Liberalization of Leviathan.” History of Political Thought XXII (Winter, 2001): 587-618.
81
Behemoth, 114.
82
Holmes, “Political Psychology,” 121. For Hobbes’s understanding of the long term planning of the king’s
enemies see Behemoth, 35-36 on what might be called the “hunting of the king.” For their cunning and evil plan see
Behemoth, 60. Thus for Hobbes Oliver Cromwell is nothing but a hypocritical seeker after power. See Behemoth
167-8 and 181-2.
Convention