Conspiracy : James Martel

5. Reading Leviathan

In the Introduction to Leviathan, Hobbes famously tells the reader:

[T]here is there a saying much usurped of late, That Wisedom is acquired, not by reading of Books, but of Men. Consequently whereunto, those persons, that for the most part can give no other proof of being wise, take great delight to shew what they think they have read in men, by uncharitable censures of one another behind their backs. But there is another saying not of late understood, by which they might learn truly to read one another, if they would take the pains; and that is Nosce teipsum, Read thy self: which . . . teach[es] us, that for the similitude of the thoughts, and Passions of one man, to the thoughts, and Passions of another, whosoever looketh into himself, and considereth what he doth, when he does think, opine, reason, hope, feare, &c; and upon what grounds; he shall thereby read and know, what are the thoughts and Passions of all other men, upon the like occasions.¹⁸

The idea of the author telling the reader to “read thy self” amounts to what Raia Prokhovnik calls Hobbes’ “statement of procedure,” the central organizing principle of his text and his chief metaphor for politics.¹⁹ It can already be said to be peculiar for an author, who is well-known for calling for the sovereign authority to have the last word in all things, to exhort the reader to exercise the power of interpretation, to read not only her or himself but “all other men.” This suggests a wish for the reader to exercise their own independent judgment, even if it risks multiplying those judgments exponentially (the very thing that Hobbes appears to fear most). It suggests multiple, and indeed, conspiratorial readings against the very authority that Leviathan is purported to be devoted to.

If reading becomes Hobbes’ operating model for engaging in politics (as scholars ranging from Victoria Kahn to David Johnston have argued) it suggests an active and interpreting public rather than an obedient and unified one.²⁰ Here, Hobbes seems to be offering his readers the veritable keys to the kingdom: the right to interpret as they see fit.

It is perhaps precisely because of this possibility that in the sentences that follow, Hobbes appears to retract this democratizing power. He goes on to write:

But let one man read another by his actions never so perfectly, it serves him onely with his acquaintance, which are but few. He that is to govern a whole Nation, must read in himself, not this, or that particular man; but Man-kind.²¹

Here, Hobbes seems to be replacing the possibility of each reader reading not only themselves but “all other men” with one overriding reader, the sovereign him or herself (as Hobbes is generally known to argue for). The sovereign alone reads “Man-kind” and thus, it would appear, trumps any individual readings.

Yet, even this reading is complicated by what Hobbes writes next:

yet, when I shall have set down my own reading orderly, and perspicuously, the pain left another [i.e. the sovereign], will be onely to consider, if he also find not the same in himself. For this kind of Doctrine, admitteth no other Demonstration.²²

Here, the trumping sovereign is trumped in turn. It turns out that for the sovereign to read “Man-kind” properly he or she need only read Leviathan. Hobbes, a private citizen, has in effect spoken for the sovereign and replaced the sovereign reading with his own. Although one might say that as “sovereign” of the text, Hobbes is merely asserting his right to control meaning in his own book, the effect of doing so just after he appeared to cede that power to a sovereign is telling. It suggests once again a usurpation of sovereign authority in the guise of promoting it. More generally, in setting various interpretations of the text in contestation (the individual readers’ the sovereign’s and Hobbes’ own), the entire question of reading becomes extremely (and perhaps conspiratorially) complicated.

This idea is further reinforced in Leviathan when Hobbes considers a moment in the days of the early Christian church when there was as yet no authoritative sovereign over the community. In that case:

When a difficulty arose, the Apostles and Elders of the Church assembled themselves together, and determined what should bee preached, and taught, and how they should interpret the Scriptures to the People; but took not from the People the liberty to read, and interpret them to themselves. The Apostles sent divers Letters to the Churches, and other Writings for their instruction; which had been in vain, if they had not allowed them to Interpret, that is, to consider the meaning of them. And as it was in the Apostles time, so it must be till such time as there should be Pastors, that could authorize an Interpreter, whose Interpretation should generally be stood to: But that could not be till Kings were Pastors, or Pastors Kings.²³

During a period when the sovereign’s power to trump and dominate interpretation is absent, we see more clearly the ongoing role of public, multiple forms of interpretation. The seeming absolute stranglehold that Hobbes formally gives to sovereign interpretation is at least somewhat undermined; that reading must share the text with a more democratic style of reading that opposes or at least matches one kind of authority (the sovereign/author’s) with another (the public reader’s).

^{18. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, (ed.) Richard Tuck (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996), Introduction, 10.↩}

^{19. Raia Prokhovnik, Rhetoric and Philosophy in Hobbes’ Leviathan (New York: Garland Publishing, 1991), 174.↩}

^{20. See Victoria Kahn, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985); David Johnston, The Rhetoric of Leviathan: Thomas Hobbes and the Politics of Cultural Transformation (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986).↩}

^{21. Hobbes, Leviathan, 11.↩}

^{22. Hobbes, Leviathan, 11.↩}

^{23. Hobbes, Leviathan, 3.42, 355–56.↩}