Human Nature and Motivation: Hamilton Versus Hobbes

chapter 5
Human Nature and Motivation:

Hamilton versus Hobbes
Michael J. Green
Thomas Hobbes’s account of human nature is given in the first part of

Leviathan, titled “Of Man.” In this part, he tries to answer four questions.
First, which faculties of the mind are unique to human beings? Second,
which faculties of the mind are artificial rather than natural? Third, what
explains the variation in different people’s thoughts and actions? Finally,
and most famously, are people naturally sociable? Most philosophers who
have commented on Hobbes have been far more interested in the last of
these questions than they have been in the other three. Nearly every major
monograph on Hobbes has a chapter on human nature devoted to the
question of whether Hobbes thinks that human beings are naturally
unsociable because they are exclusively motivated by egoistic concerns.
I will discuss all four of Hobbes’s questions about human nature for two
reasons. First, the fact that they are posed in Leviathan calls for explanation.
Neither the organization of this material nor Hobbes’s purposes in dis-
cussing these questions are easy to discern. I seek to expose the underlying
structure of these chapters and explain their relevance to the project of
Leviathan. My second reason for beginning with Hobbes’s questions is that
the neglected parts of Hobbes’s discussion of human nature are relevant to
the questions about motivation that predominate in the secondary litera-
ture. In particular, they give us deeper insight into Hobbes’s accounts of
conflict in the state of nature and the stability of the commonwealth. I will
begin with Hobbes’s questions, then describe the state of the debate in the
secondary literature, and finally show how Hobbes’s broader discussion of
human nature can enrich the discussion of the narrower questions about
motivation and sociability.
In Elements of Law, Hobbes proposes that “Man’s nature is the sum of
his natural faculties and powers.” He puts the faculties of the body to one
side and distinguishes between the mind’s cognitive powers, also referred
to as its “imaginative” or “conceptive” powers, and its “motive” powers,
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which concern action (EL 1.4–7). The first eleven chapters of Leviathan
likewise focus exclusively on the mind and alternate between discussions of
the cognitive and the motive faculties. The first five chapters are about
these cognitive faculties: the senses; “imaginations,” or thoughts derived
from the senses; causal reasoning based on experience; language as a way of
marking and communicating thoughts; and reason as a kind of thinking
made possible by language. The sixth chapter, on the passions, concerns
the motive faculties. As with the chapters on the cognitive faculties,
Hobbes first describes the relevant states of the mind and then describes
how they are expressed in language. The next three chapters return to
cognition: the seventh chapter is about knowledge and belief, the eighth
uses the account of the passions to explain the intellectual virtues and vices,
and the ninth contains the famous table of the sciences. Then Hobbes
returns to the motive faculties. The tenth chapter seeks to explain a wide
variety of behavior in terms of the pursuit of power, while the eleventh
concerns differences in behavior that are relevant to social life.
The first part of Leviathan ends with two chapters on social life and three
chapters about what he calls the law of nature. The twelfth chapter is about
the origins of religious belief and how it was used to establish political
authority among the Gentiles. Hobbes finds these theocratic states
unsatisfactory and proposes to start afresh without any political order at
all. Thus the thirteenth chapter presents his celebrated arguments for the
conclusion that the “natural condition of mankind” is one in which “every
man is Enemy to every man” and life is “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and
short” (Lev. 13.9). The last three chapters, on the laws of nature, present
Hobbes’s moral theory. This theory provides the material for what he
believes is a superior account of political authority based on a social
contract. While Hobbes includes the laws of nature in the parts of
Elements of Law and Leviathan devoted to human nature, he indicates
that moral theory falls outside the topic of human nature when he declares
that justice and injustice are not faculties of the mind or body (Lev. 13.13).
With this overview of the structure of Hobbes’s theory of human nature
in hand, I will turn to the questions about it that he sought to answer.
Hobbes’s first question about human nature is: Which faculties of the
mind are unique to human beings? Hobbes contends that many of the
cognitive and motive faculties are shared with other animals. Concerning
cognition, he holds that both human and non-human animals have sensa-
tions, thoughts derived from the senses, and trains of connected thoughts.
In particular, both draw conclusions about relations between cause and
effect based on their experiences. On the motive side, there is no difference
Human Nature and Motivation: Hamilton versus Hobbes 95
in kind between the voluntary actions of human and non-human animals.
Both have thoughts about things that cause them to have appetites or
aversions, that is, movements toward or away from what is imagined. Both
kinds of animal deliberate about what to do by having a succession of
appetites and aversions concerning a course of action, and they both have
a will when the succession ends and the last appetite or aversion leads to
action.
As we will see, Hobbes calls some faculties of the mind “artificial,”
meaning that they develop only through deliberate instruction, unlike the
natural faculties, which are either innate or develop through experience. All
of the artificial faculties are unique to human beings. In addition, some of
the natural faculties are uniquely human. Hobbes discusses two: curiosity
and foresight. While both human and non-human animals can engage in
causal reasoning, human beings are curious in ways that other animals are
not. Both man and beast will seek the means to produce a desired effect, but
only human beings will try to identify all of the possible effects that an object
might be made to produce (Lev. 3.5). The reason why this is so, Hobbes
believes, is that human beings have a special passion of curiosity, a “lust of
the mind” to know “why and how” that non-human animals lack because
they are satisfied with physical comfort (Lev. 6.35). Human beings are also
concerned about the future to a degree that other animals are not. Non-
human animals can think about the future, but so long as they enjoy their
“quotidian Food, Ease, and Lusts,” they have “no foresight of the time to
come” (Lev. 12.4). By contrast, even a comfortable human being will have
a “perpetuall and restlesse desire of Power” because he will want to “assure
. . . the way of his future desire” (Lev. 11.2). Curiosity and foresight are not
entirely separate phenomena. Those who are concerned for the future will
think about the effects that any imagined object can produce, even if they are
not especially curious, because they will want to find potentially useful tools.
And those who know that it is possible to take care of their future interests
will pay greater attention to doing so. Non-human animals are not
indifferent to their future, but it is not a practical concern for them because
they do not know how to secure it.
Hobbes’s second question about human nature is: Which faculties are
artificial rather than natural? Natural faculties develop through experience
alone, without deliberate instruction. For example, what Hobbes calls
prudence, or the ability to make causal inferences, improves as one has
more experience of causes and their effects (Lev. 3.7, 8.11). Similarly, those
who have what Hobbes calls a good natural wit can think more quickly or
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steadily than others due to their having more experience or stronger
passions to focus their attention on a desired aim (Lev. 8.3).
The artificial faculties require language and, for that reason, are unique
to human beings. They are “acquired” rather than being “naturally
planted,” they are improved “by study and method” rather than the
accumulation of experience, and they are typically learned from others,
while an individual’s natural faculties develop spontaneously without
explicit training (Lev. 3.11).
Language is always deliberate rather than spontaneous. Hobbes begins his
account of language by imagining that individual thinkers use language to
assign arbitrary marks to their thoughts so that they can remember the
connections among them (Lev. 4.3). But languages are primarily social:
they are shared and taught. Those who share a language can do a variety
of positive and negative things. They can convey knowledge, instruct, and
entertain or sow confusion, lie, and insult one another (Lev. 4.3–4).
Language users can also form complex social relations with others, as they
can express their passions in making commands or requests, offering advice,
and asking questions (Lev. 6.55). The most significant use of language is in
reasoning and science. Because words can signify classes of things, language
users can reason about more than just particulars. Reason as a faculty of the
mind, according to Hobbes, is “reckoning,” or “adding and subtracting”
“the Consequences of generall names” (Lev. 5.2). This greatly expands the
causal knowledge that human beings have. They can express their causal
generalizations as universal rules and think about how they would apply in
particular circumstances (Lev. 5.6). Those who have “the knowledge of
Consequences, and dependance of one fact upon another” in an area have
what Hobbes calls a science of that area (Lev. 5.17). If they have been diligent
in formulating their terms, they will know why a cause produces its effect,
rather than relying on potentially spurious correlations, and so they will
know how to produce the effects they want. For example, if we know that
force is the product of mass and acceleration, we will know how much force
to apply to an object with a given mass in order to accelerate it at the rate we
desire.
Hobbes’s third question is: What explains the variation in human thought
and action? Experience is a source of cognitive variation: those who have
more of it will make better causal inferences than those who have less. On the
motive side, different passions are produced by different combinations of
thoughts and appetites or aversions. For example, the passion of hope
consists in an appetite combined with a belief that it is possible to get
what is desired, while despair is the combination of an appetite and the
belief that its satisfaction is impossible (Lev. 6.14–15). Hobbes notes that
there is greater variation in the passions than there is in the senses, but he
does not have much to say about why this is so beyond gesturing at
differences in bodies, customs, and education (Lev. 8.14). The variations in
the passions are used to explain natural cognitive differences. The desire for
power produces what Hobbes calls a good wit because it causes those who
have it to think quickly and steadily. By contrast, those who are indifferent to
power will be dull-witted or giddy, that is, prone to moving from thought to
thought without direction (Lev. 8.15–16).
The desire for power drives behavior as well as cognition. Hobbes’s
claim that “all mankind” have a “perpetuall and restlesse desire for Power”
is well known (Lev. 11.2). However the desire for power does not produce
uniform behavior for two reasons. First, those who have power behave
differently from those who lack it. The most important source of power is
social: a number of people working together for a common end. Because
this is so, those without power will seek to subordinate themselves to
a powerful protector, while those who have power will seek to enhance it
by gathering followers (Lev. 10.3–10). Second, people who want different
things will behave differently. While the point is obvious, it is important
for the project of securing the peace. Those who want wealth or honor,
those who are not contented with their situation, and those who desire
military command will be inclined “to stirre up trouble and sedition,”
because military honors come from war and the best chance of rapid
advancement in wealth and status comes from “causing a new shuffle”
(Lev. 11.4). For example, a young Alexander Hamilton wrote to a friend
that “I contemn the grovelling . . . of a clerk . . . and would willingly risk my
life . . . to exalt my station”; he ends his letter by saying, “I wish there was
a war” (Chernow 2004, 30–31). The young Hobbes had different ambi-
tions. After leaving Oxford, he began work in service to the Cavendish
family. In his verse autobiography he describes how pleasant this time of
his life was, saying “I at ease did live, of books” (VA lv). Hobbes was clearly
one of those whose desires run to “Ease, and sensuall Delight,” or
“Knowledge, and Arts of Peace” (Lev. 11.4–5). People who want these
things are inclined to seek protection from the powerful so that they can
devote their attention to their favored pursuits rather than self-defense.
The fourth question Hobbes addresses is: Are people naturally sociable?
It is evident that many of the faculties that he describes involve social
interaction. Language is the product of human culture, and coordinated
groups are the most important source of power. Hobbes’s question, then, is
less about whether we are capable of social life and more about whether we
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can live in peace. It is well known that his answer is that this is not possible
outside of the state. That is the lesson of his celebrated discussion of the
“natural condition of mankind” in the state of nature (Lev. 13).
What has received less attention is that before discussing the state of
nature, Hobbes describes religion as a source of political order in func-
tioning states. Hobbes argues that religious belief arises from the natural
faculties unique to human beings: curiosity and foresight. Curiosity leads
people to search for causes, and when they trace the causal chain back to
the origin of the universe, they come to the idea of an eternal God who
caused the universe to exist (Lev. 11.25). The concern for the future leads
human beings to look for causes of their good or bad fortune. When
natural causes cannot easily be found, they conclude that their lives are
controlled by supernatural agents (Lev. 12.1–12). These natural seeds of
religious belief are cultivated by leaders who claim to speak for the
supernatural agents. This produces both different religions and states.
The religious commonwealth can maintain the peace so long as its
members believe that the leaders of the commonwealth speak for God.
However, Hobbes believes, people inevitably lose faith in their leaders,
and so these states fail.
The first twelve chapters of Leviathan, then, tell a story of increasing
complexity. This story moves from sensations to thoughts, reasoning and
science, the passions, the intellectual virtues, social behavior, and finally the
complicated practices of religion and the state. At this point, however,
Hobbes throws the story into reverse. After expressing dissatisfaction with
the religious basis of the state, he removes the state entirely. Instead of
progressing to a higher level of social organization, Leviathan moves to the
natural condition of mankind without any political order. Here, Hobbes
gives his famous arguments for the conclusion that our natural faculties
render us incapable of living in peace. Without the protection of the
commonwealth, he maintains, everyone must focus on defense in order
to stay alive and, what is more, this often requires aggressive behavior.
Since this is so, he argues, the only way to secure order is by creating the
artificial body of the state.
At this point, I hope to have made the case for thinking that there is
a continuous story running through Hobbes’s account of human nature.
Why it ends abruptly with the reversion to the state of nature is just one
question about how this story works and what its role in the larger project is
supposed to be. The professional literature contains many excellent dis-
cussions of discrete topics that arise in the first part of Leviathan, but
discussions of its unity, shape, and role would be most welcome.
An excellent place to begin such a project is with Philip Pettit’s book Made
With Words (Pettit 2008). Pettit’s focus, as his title suggests, is on the role of
language in Hobbes’s philosophy, but one of his themes is that language
plays a significant and sometimes surprising role in Hobbes’s account of
human nature. For example, Pettit takes Hobbes to have held that human
beings have the unique degree of curiosity and foresight that they do
because they are language users (Pettit 2008, 26–7 and 91–2). If he is
right, the line between the natural and artificial faculties is more permeable
than it appears to be.
Most discussions of Hobbes’s thinking about human nature concern
a particular question: Is Hobbes a psychological egoist? To see why, I would
like to begin with a familiar interpretation of Hobbes that can be found in
books by J. W. N. Watkins and David Gauthier, among others (Watkins 1965;
Gauthier 1969). This interpretation attributes four theories to Hobbes:
a psychological theory, a theory of conflict in the state of nature, an ethical
theory, and a political theory. The psychological theory is described as egoism,
the view that all behavior is exclusively motivated by self-interest, but it is
actually narrower than that. According to the psychological theory, the
appetites and aversions that motivate behavior are all directed at helping the
body to maintain its vital motions (Lev. 6.10). This is said to explain both why
we are interested only in ourselves and, in particular, why we are necessarily
averse to dying. However, it also excludes an obvious kind of egoistic motiva-
tion, namely, concern with punishments or rewards after death. The second
theory, the theory of conflict in the state of nature, is that unchecked egoists
will use violence when it serves their interests. The ethical theory then holds
that the only way to justify ethical behavior is by showing that it is instrumen-
tally useful in the pursuit of self-interest. Finally, the political theory holds that
the state has to be harshly repressive because egoists can only be governed by
the threat of punishment and cannot be counted on to behave ethically on
their own.
The strength of the familiar interpretation is that Hobbes repeatedly
invokes egoistic concerns, especially the fear of death, at important points
in his argument. For example, he uses the assumption that the object of
every voluntary act is “some Good to himselfe” to establish the inalienability
of the right of self-defense (Lev. 14.8). He also repeatedly returns to the fear
of punishment or death when summarizing his argument. Thus he says
that among the “Passions that encline men to Peace, are Feare of Death”
(Lev. 13.14), that people will not keep their covenants without a “coërcive
power” to “compel” them to do so (Lev. 15.3), that they will not keep the
laws of nature unless they are bound by “feare of punishment” (Lev. 17.1),
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that the sovereign must have enough power to strike “terror” into subjects
(Lev. 17.13), and that participation in the social contract is motivated by
“fear of death” (Lev. 20.1).
However, there is textual evidence that Hobbes was not a psychological
egoist. This is ably discussed by Bernard Gert, Gregory Kavka, and
S. A. Lloyd, so I will merely note a few illustrative examples (Gert 1972,
5–12; Gert 2010, 30–67; Kavka 1986, 44–51; Lloyd 2009, 60–94). First,
Hobbes seems to have intentionally moved away from psychological ego-
ism (see McNeilly 1968, 118–19; Gert 2010, 30). For example, in Elements of
Law, Hobbes analyzes “good will or charity” as desires to express one’s
own power (EL 9.17). Later, in Leviathan, he defines these passions as
simply “Desire of good to another,” apparently removing the egoistic
thought (Lev. 6.22). Second, Hobbes asserts that there are things people
value more than their lives, such as avoiding the infamy of killing a parent
(De Cv. 3.12). Third, he proposes a duty to defend the commonwealth in
war, even though that obviously involves putting one’s life at risk (Lev.
R&C.5). In addition to this direct textual evidence, Gert and Lloyd note
that Hobbes holds that education can influence our desires (Gert 2010,
38–44; Lloyd 2009, 85–8). Thus even if Hobbes holds that people are
naturally egoistic, it does not follow that they must be that way in society.
Most of Hobbes’s readers are reluctant to attribute pure psychological
egoism to him. How far they depart from it depends on the extent to which
they think Hobbes is committed to the other theories in the familiar
interpretation. Kavka, for instance, interprets Hobbes as having held that
people are predominantly, rather than exclusively, egoistic. He believes they
are especially concerned to avoid death and that whatever concerns they have
for others are limited. This, he maintains, is all that Hobbes needs in order to
support the other elements of the familiar interpretation (Kavka 1986,
64–82). Jean Hampton and Stephen Darwall take a similar approach
(Hampton 1986; Darwall 1995). Gert, by contrast, believes that Hobbes
has a quite different kind of ethical theory than the one identified in the
familiar interpretation. Gert’s Hobbes believes that ethics involves the
triumph of reason over passion, and so Gert attributes a motivational theory
to Hobbes that allows reason to play this role (Gert 2010). In addition to
disagreeing with the ethical theory, Lloyd rejects the political theory. She
notes that Hobbes was concerned with what she calls transcendent interests,
most notably the interest in serving God. Since Hobbes knew that many
people fear God more than they fear earthly punishment, she believes, he
cannot have thought that the political order could be maintained through
the threat of punishment alone (Lloyd 1992; Lloyd 2009).
In what follows, I would like to show that Hobbes’s fuller theory of
human nature is relevant to the familiar interpretation in two ways
that have not received much attention. These concern the explanation
of conflict in the state of nature and prospects for a stable state.
The relationship between psychological egoism and the causes of war
in the state of nature is not as obvious as it is taken to be.
In addition, the familiar interpretation exaggerates the difficulty of
establishing political order in one respect while underestimating it in
another.
The relevance of psychological egoism to the account of conflict in the
state of nature seems obvious. Egoistic people will use violence to get
what they want whenever it suits them, and so a society of unrestrained
egoists will be at war, assuming even a modest degree of scarcity. But what
is interesting about Hobbes’s account of conflict in the state of nature has
more to do with what is unique to conflict among human beings than
with their self-interested motivations. Take, for example, the alleged
physiological basis of egoism. Human beings are said to be exclusively
egoistic because they are mechanically determined to have appetites for
what helps their bodies to function and to be averse to anything that
hinders their bodies from functioning. Non-human animals also have
bodies, of course, and they also tend to have appetites for things that
maintain their bodies and aversions to things that harm them. Yet
different species behave differently. Ants and bees are naturally social
and work for the common good without being directed to do so (Lev.
17.6). Other animals, including human beings, are naturally prone to
conflict. Since all animals are material with apparently similar desires to
maintain working bodies, something else must explain why they act the
way they do.
Human beings stand out even among animals that are prone to conflict.
As Azar Gat notes, while many animals kill helpless young members of
their own species, violent conflict among adult members of the same
species is rare among non-human animals. The risk of severe wounds is
too high, even for the likely winner. Among human beings, however,
adults fight and kill adults. They do so not primarily in pitched battles
but rather through catching one another by surprise in raids and ambushes.
Gat speculates that human adults are more vulnerable to surprise than non-
human adults because they rely on tools for self-defense and so they can be
caught unarmed, while non-human animals always have the teeth and
claws that they use to defend themselves. However, there are also social
reasons why humans are vulnerable to surprise. The pervasive tactic in
what Gat calls primitive warfare is to catch one’s opponent by surprise,
often by attacking at night (Gat 2006, 114–32). Some raiders may set fire to
shelters, while others wait by the door to shoot arrows or throw spears at
those trying to escape. For this to work, the raiders have to use language to
coordinate their attack and weapons to kill at a distance that minimizes the
risk to themselves. The result, as Gat puts it, is that human beings are
“quintessential first-strike creatures” (Gat 2006, 129).
Language, for Hobbes, is a uniquely human creation, and weapons, like
all tools, are a product of human curiosity into how anything one encoun-
ters could be used. Human beings are uniquely vulnerable to surprise
because of the products of their curiosity and language: weapons and social
coordination. This is why striking first, which Hobbes calls “anticipation,”
is the best tactic for winning conflicts in the state of nature (Lev. 13.4). It is
only because this is so that what Hobbes calls “diffidence” is a cause of
conflict in the state of nature. Those who fear being caught by surprise can
avoid this fate by striking first themselves. Because everyone in the state of
nature knows this, and knows that the others know it, each will constantly
raid the others if only for defensive purposes. Other animals lack the
capabilities that human beings have, and so they are not prone to the
same cycle of insecurity and violence.
The other causes of conflict in the state of nature that Hobbes describes,
competition and glory, are also the products of the faculties unique to
human beings. Competition is a source of conflict when the available
resources are believed to be scarce. This is true of many animals, of course,
but human beings have a lower threshold for perceiving scarcity than other
animals. Human beings are concerned about the future to an extent that
other animals are not, and so they think that their resources are inadequate
so long as they are uncertain about their ability to provide for the future.
This means they will believe that resources are scarce even when their
immediate needs are met, while non-human animals will not. For this
reason, human beings are more likely to come to blows over a perceived
shortage of resources than other animals are.
In addition to competition for resources, Hobbes says that “glory” or
“reputation” are causes of conflict. To illustrate the phenomenon he has in
mind, he says that people respond violently to “trifles” that are a “signe of
undervalue” directed at themselves, their friends, their nation, their profes-
sion, or their family (Lev. 13.7). The term “reputation” refers to a kind of
power based on alliances with other people: “Reputation of power, is
Power; because it draweth with it the adhaerence of those that need
protection” and “So is Reputation of love of a mans Country . . . for the
same Reason” (Lev. 10.5–6). Insults are a form of dishonor that undermine
their target’s reputation for having power. We only dishonor those who
lack power, and we assume that those who tolerate being dishonored do so
only because they cannot respond (Lev. 10.24–6). The failure to react to an
insulting trifle undermines one’s standing in the eyes of others. So the
desire for glory or reputation causes conflict among human beings because
they rely on social alliances to a greater extent than other animals do.
Conflict among human beings in the state of nature, then, is driven by
tools, foresight, and social groups made possible by language. Because this
is so, Hobbes could dispense with psychological egoism entirely and reach
the same conclusions about the state of nature. Psychological egoism is
a theory about what people want. But Hobbes only needs to establish the
negative point that people are not averse to harming others. This could be
true regardless of what their affirmative aims are. They could be selflessly
attached to their families or community and still fall into war, so long as
they put less value on the interests of those who are outside their favored
group. Even people who would sacrifice themselves for their group will
fight if they think their group will not have enough resources, if they worry
that the group is vulnerable to surprise attack, or if they believe that the
group’s honor has been impugned. That is why Hobbes treats the behavior
of states in international relations as confirmation of his theory of the
causes of conflict in the state of nature (Lev. 13.12). Even if the sovereigns of
the world are merely protecting their subjects rather than advancing their
own interests, Hobbes thinks they will be hostile toward one another for
the same reasons that drive individuals to war in the state of nature.
While it seems easy to explain why predominantly egoistic people would
fight in the state of nature, it is hard to understand how they could live
together in the commonwealth. They will be committed neither to obeying
the law nor to promoting the common good. Consequently, it seems, the
state will have to secure order through repression. The threat of punish-
ment will be its sole instrument for regulating antisocial behavior and the
threats will have to be terrifying if order is to be maintained. While living
with a boot on one’s throat might be preferable to living in the state of
nature, it is not an inspiring picture of political life. What is worse, few
commentators believe that the attempt to establish order through force
alone would succeed.
Hobbes’s remarks about the variation in human behavior suggest that
the situation would not in fact be so bad. In those remarks, he distinguishes
those whose ambitions are best achieved through war from those whose
desires are best achieved by accepting the state’s authority. Alexander
Hamilton wanted a war, while Thomas Hobbes sought a library. What will
most people want once the omnipresent dangers of the state of nature have
been left behind and peaceful pursuits are possible? The answer would
depend on many factors, of course, and Hobbes did not venture an opinion
of his own. That said, it is unlikely that society would be full of Hamiltons.
Few people are willing to risk their lives for social advancement when
a comfortable life is an available alternative. The relentless desire for power
that Hobbes describes as a constant in human psychology is a desire for the
means to secure one’s future desires. It is not necessarily a desire for
political power. Instead, on Hobbes’s own analysis, it is typically expressed
through subordination to those who are more powerful in the hopes of
enjoying their protection. So most people’s ambitions in life would be best
pursued peacefully, without challenging the state’s authority. Hobbes
expected this kind of desire to develop on its own without any effort at
education. Furthermore, those whose ambitions in life are best pursued
through peaceful means will be accommodating even if they do not have
particularly strong ethical commitments. The energies of those who are not
satisfied with pursuing the arts of peace can be channeled into competition
for honors distributed by the state (Lev. 10.34–6, 10.52). Accordingly, the
state need not be repressive even if its subjects are determined to follow
their own pursuits.
This is one reason, derived from Hobbes’s account of human nature,
for thinking that securing social order would not be as difficult to
achieve as it seems to be. However, other considerations point in the
other direction. Our natural curiosity and concern for the future
inevitably lead to belief in God. While Hobbes does not think that
fear of divine punishment is an adequate basis for the state, he is also
quite aware that it is a potential threat to the political order.
Punishment cannot be effective against people who believe that com-
pliance with the sovereign runs the risk of offending God. So Lloyd’s
point that Hobbes’s political theory cannot rely on the fear of punish-
ment alone is strongly supported by his account of human nature.
In closing, I would like to address the question of whether Hobbes is
pessimistic about human nature. He certainly gives the impression of
holding humanity in low esteem, and even those who think he has fairly
noble ambitions for his ethical theory regard him as having a pessimistic
view of human nature (Gert 2010, 35). Hobbes’s apparently sour attitude
toward human beings colors the reception of everything he writes. Why
should we look for guidance from someone who seems not to like us very
much?
Hobbes may well be a pessimist about human nature or the prospects for
ethical thought. But he is very much an optimist about humanity.
The natural condition of mankind is not very good. But human beings do
not live in their natural condition. Unlike every other animal, they have
changed their condition. Human beings have altered their cognitive abilities
through the artificial faculties of language, reason, and science. They have
thus vastly expanded their insight into the natural world and their power to
shape it to fit their needs. They have also created the artificial body of the
commonwealth to radically alter their social condition. Other animals live by
tooth and claw, but human beings can live at peace and, as a consequence,
have developed arts, culture, commerce, science, and industry. Every other
animal remains in its natural condition. Human beings have made their own
world through their own efforts and insights. Compared with the other
animals, they are like gods.
Hobbes worries that these achievements might be lost. He is not an
optimist in the sense that he takes for granted that history will have
a progressive arc. But he is an optimist in thinking that the progress that
human beings have achieved through their artificial creations of language
and the state can continue if they make the right choices. If we are not
destined to succeed, neither are we destined to fail. The inspiring thing
about us, for Hobbes, is that our future is in our own hands.

Human Nature and Motivation: Hamilton Versus Hobbes

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chapter 5

Human Nature and Motivation:

Thomas Hobbes’s account of human nature is given in the ﬁrst part of

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