Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General preface
- Full contents: Volumes 1–3
- Acknowledgements
- Conventions
- 1 Introduction: Hobbes's life in philosophy
- 2 Hobbes and the studia humanitatis
- 3 Hobbes's changing conception of civil science
- 4 Hobbes on rhetoric and the construction of morality
- 5 Hobbes and the classical theory of laughter
- 6 Hobbes and the purely artificial person of the state
- 7 Hobbes on the proper signification of liberty
- 8 History and ideology in the English revolution
- 9 The context of Hobbes's theory of political obligation
- 10 Conquest and consent: Hobbes and the engagement controversy
- 11 Hobbes and his disciples in France and England
- 12 Hobbes and the politics of the early Royal Society
- Bibliographies
- Index
2 - Hobbes and the studia humanitatis
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General preface
- Full contents: Volumes 1–3
- Acknowledgements
- Conventions
- 1 Introduction: Hobbes's life in philosophy
- 2 Hobbes and the studia humanitatis
- 3 Hobbes's changing conception of civil science
- 4 Hobbes on rhetoric and the construction of morality
- 5 Hobbes and the classical theory of laughter
- 6 Hobbes and the purely artificial person of the state
- 7 Hobbes on the proper signification of liberty
- 8 History and ideology in the English revolution
- 9 The context of Hobbes's theory of political obligation
- 10 Conquest and consent: Hobbes and the engagement controversy
- 11 Hobbes and his disciples in France and England
- 12 Hobbes and the politics of the early Royal Society
- Bibliographies
- Index
Summary
Hobbes's philosophical ideas, we are frequently told, were ‘formed’ by the scientific revolution spanning the seventeenth century. I shall argue that this orthodoxy rests to a misleading extent on emphasising the period in which Hobbes began to put into print his ideas on the natural and moral sciences, beginning with his first major treatise, De Cive, in 1642. We need to remember that, by the time he made his public debut as a writer on scientia civilis, Hobbes was already in his early fifties. By the standards of the age he already had a lifetime of study behind him. If we turn, moreover, to examine the nature of his studies during the first half of his long life, a picture in strong contrast with the prevailing orthodoxy begins to emerge. Hobbes is revealed not as a product of the scientific culture to which he later contributed so extensively, but rather as a student and exponent of the predominantly literary culture of humanism.
A number of commentators have already noted that Hobbes's intellectual development passed through a ‘humanist period’ before he turned to the sciences, natural and moral, in the course of the 1630s. Little attempt has been made, however, to explore the extent to which his earlier studies may be said to conform to the ideal of the studia humanitatis, and thus to the distinctively ‘humanist’ range of genres and disciplines.
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- Visions of Politics , pp. 38 - 65Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002
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