Key Ideas
1. The commonwealth is an artificial person
Political unity is constructed through human authorisation and representation.
2. Sensation begins thought
Mental contents arise from bodily interaction rather than innate immaterial forms.
3. Imagination is decaying sense
Images persist after the original sensory motion has weakened.
4. Language enables reason and error
Stable definitions support inference, while confused names generate absurdity.
5. Reason calculates consequences
Thinking proceeds by connecting and separating names according to rules.
6. Appetite and aversion move action
Desire and avoidance supply the immediate directions of voluntary conduct.
7. Felicity is continual success
Human desire does not terminate in a final state of complete satisfaction.
8. Power seeks future security
People pursue present means to preserve their ability to obtain later goods.
9. Natural equality produces mutual danger
No person is so superior that others cannot threaten that person’s life or aims.
10. The state of nature lacks assurance
Without common enforcement, mistrust makes peaceful cooperation unstable.
11. War is a disposition, not constant battle
A condition is warlike whenever people reasonably expect violence and lack security.
12. Natural right protects self-preservation
Each person initially has liberty to use available means to survive.
13. Laws of nature direct people towards peace
Reason recommends reciprocal restraint, covenant and fair conduct.
14. Covenants without enforcement are insecure
Promises cannot reliably organise cooperation where breach is safer than trust.
15. Representation creates political unity
A sovereign bears the authorised person of those who establish the commonwealth.
16. Sovereignty must be final
Rival ultimate authorities recreate uncertainty and the conditions of conflict.
17. Sovereignty may take different forms
Monarchy, aristocracy and democracy differ in the bearer of the representative office.
18. Liberty is absence of external impediment
Freedom can coexist with law, causation and political obligation.
19. Subjects retain the effort to resist death
No covenant can fully alienate the basic drive towards self-preservation.
20. Protection sustains obedience
The sovereign claim is tied to effective capacity to provide security.
21. Civil law requires authorised public signs
A rule must be commanded and made knowable before it can govern conduct.
22. Punishment belongs to public authority
Official harm is justified as a response to transgression directed towards future obedience.
23. Divided religious jurisdiction threatens peace
Independent coercive churches can impose commands competing with civil sovereignty.
24. Inward belief cannot be directly commanded
Political power governs outward acts but does not voluntarily manufacture conviction.
25. Obscurity can serve institutional power
Fear and unintelligible doctrine may sustain claims that resist public authority.
26. Security is the central political achievement
Order makes law, property, cooperation, learning and productive life dependable.