Thomas Hobbes, “Of the Liberty of Subjects.” In Leviathan, Reprint of the 1651 Edition, (London: Clarendon Press, 1929) 161–171.
This Chapter from the Leviathan is the germ of the liberal (negative) notion of freedom. The first four sections along with a little excursion into Chapter VI for making sense of Hobbes’ understanding of the will (especially important as a contrast to the views of theorists of positive freedom such as Kant and Green) should be sufficient. The rest of Chapter relates this idea of freedom to his larger philosophical project. I leave out the what is really the last section that inventories the liberties that the individual subject is left with after making the covenant.
Liberty What
Liberty, properly understood, is the absence of “Opposition”. Opposition means “externall Impediments of motion”. Note three aspects of Liberty: (a) liberty has to do with (the lack of) an impediment or interference; (b) that impediment is external i.e., the source of that impediment is someone or something else; and (c) the impediment “stops” motion, i.e., the impediment is physical. This idea is as applicable to rational subjects as to inanimate objects. A man chained to a bed is unfree in the same way that water in a vessel is unfree. If the impediment is not external, say a man is so sick that he us unable to move, it is not liberty that is wanting but merely the power to move.
What It Is To Be Free
A FREE-MAN, thus, is “he, that in those things, which by his strength and wit he is able to do, is not hindred to doe what he has a will to.” Liberty has relevance only with respect to movable bodies [stone, water, man] but not to non-bodies because what cannot be moved [free gift, free way, free speech] cannot be impeded. Consider especially free-will. It makes sense to talk about free-action [meaning there is “no stop” or impediment] of a person arising from his will but it makes no sense to talk about free-will in itself as a faculty.
When in the mind of man, Appetites and Aversions, Hopes and Feares, concerning one and the same thing, arise alternately; and divers good and evill consequences of the doing, or omitting the thing propounded, come successively into our thoughts; so that sometimes we have an Appetite to it, sometimes an Aversion from it; sometimes Hope to be able to do it; sometimes Despaire, or Feare to attempt it; the whole sum of Desires, Aversions, Hopes and Feares, continued till the thing be either done, or thought impossible, is that we call DELIBERATION.
In Deliberation, the last Appetite, or Aversion, immediately adhaering to the action, or to the omission thereof, is that wee call the WILL; the Act, (not the faculty,) of Willing.
[Leviathan, Chapter VI: Of the Interiour Beginnings of Voluntary Actions]
Feare And Liberty Consistent
“Feare and Liberty are consistent.” To act out of fear is nevertheless to act freely. Consider a sailor throwing overboard his goods so that the ship may not sink. Consider further a person who obeys the laws of the Commonwealth for fear that he might be punished. Both are not impeded externally from throwing the goods overboard or from disobeying the laws. Their actions are those of a free person.
Liberty And Necessity Consistent
“Liberty and Necessity are Consistent.” All actions that men perform are ultimately necessary actions. The Liberty of man “in doing what he will, is accompanied with the Necessity of doing that which God will”.
[E]very act of mans will, and every desire, and inclination proceedeth from some cause, which causes in a continuall chaine (whose first link in the hand of God the first of all causes) proceed from Necessity.
Artificiall Bonds, Or Covenants
Men have made an Artificial Man (i.e., the Common-wealth) for the preservation of peace and have made Artificial Chains (i.e., Civil Laws) to which they have tied themselves through mutual covenants or contracts. These chains/bonds hold because of the danger that arises in breaking them.
These Bonds in their own nature but weak, may neverthelesse be made to hold, by the danger, though not by the difficulty of breaking them.
Liberty Of Subjects Consisteth In Liberty From Covenants
[I]n all kinds of actions, by the laws praetermitted [intentionally disregarded], men have the Liberty, of doing what their own reasons shall suggest, for the most profitable to themselves.
If we understand liberty properly [see the first section], then men are manifestly free and it is absurd for them to clamour for liberty. Therefore, it is in the context of the artificial bonds (or civil laws) that liberty will be discussed. But the existence of these bonds is, “without a Sword in the hands of a man, or men”, no guarantee for liberty. “The Liberty of a Subject, lyeth therefore only in those things, which in regulating their actions, the Soveraign hath praetermitted.”
Liberty Of The Subject Consistent With Unlimited Power Of The Soveraign
To say that the sovereign has disregarded certain things which men are at liberty to do does not mean that the sovereign “Power of life, and death, is either abolished, or limited”. Nothing that the sovereign does to a subject can be unjust or injurious for the subject himself is the author of the sovereign’s actions. David did no injustice in killing Uriah for, by the covenant, Uriah had given David the right [2 Sam. 11].
The Liberty Which Writers Praise, Is The Liberty Of Soveraigns; Not Of Private Men
The liberty that finds frequent and honourable mention in historical and philosophical discussions is the liberty of the the Common-wealth and not of particular men. In a state of nature without civil laws, the same liberty would indeed be available to private persons. But such a state no longer exists. This liberty of the Common-wealth, which corresponds to the liberty of individuals in the state of nature, must not be mistaken for a “Private Inheritance, and Birth right”. Such deception leads to sedition and destabilises governments.
And by reading of these Greek, and Latine Authors [Hobbes explicitly mentions Aristotle and Cicero], men from their childhood have gotten a habit (under a false shew of Liberty,) of favouring tumults, and of licentious controlling the actions of their Soveraigns; and again of controlling those controllers, with the effusion of so much blood; as I think I may truly say, there was never any thing so deerly bought, as these Western parts have bought the learning of the Greek and Latine tongues.
Clueless Political Scientist 