Machiavelli, Hobbes, and the Formation of a Liberal Republicanism in England

It is said that Thomas Hobbes, after considering James Harrington's Oceana, surmised that Henry Neville “had a finger in that pye.” Even if Hobbes's conjecture that Neville was coauthor with Harrington is mistaken, Neville may, in fact, still be held partly responsible for Harrington's great work of political thought, though in an entirely different manner. According to John Aubrey, Harrington's contemporary and chronicler of the lives of prominent Englishmen, Neville encouraged Harrington to turn his literary aspirations from poetry to political discourse. If true, Neville's advice helped produce a prolific political writer passionately dedicated to the establishment of a commonwealth in England.

Harrington published his great work Oceana in 1656 as a blueprint for the republican future he hoped to help usher into England, and between the occasion of the publication of his great work and the Restoration, Harrington attempted to make that future a reality by writing furiously to justify his model further and to defend it against its critics. In the process he collected a number of converts to his plan, who joined him in his efforts. The chaotic year of 1659 seemed to them to present an opportunity for the founding of that very republic. In July, Neville presented Parliament with “The Humble Petition of Divers Well Affected Persons,” which contained Harringtonian ideas for the establishment of a new government, but his effort was rebuffed. In the fall and winter of that year Harrington's famous Rota Club, which met in the evenings at a London coffeehouse, flourished.