Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan

Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) was a hugely influential and controversial philosopher and political theorist. His Leviathan (1651) is frequently deemed to be the greatest work of political theory written in the English language. Its impact on global political thought has been immeasurable, influencing many subsequent philosophers as well as the American Declaration of Independence (1776) and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789). The work's discussion of society and the creation and nature of government was a response to the destructive division experienced during the English Civil War (1642–1651). Hobbes's response was to create an absolute government that would prevent such damaging internal state conflict while shaping government and society under the power of one sovereign.