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52 HOBBES, Thomas. Leviathan. Amsterdam: Jacobus Wagenaar, 1667 first translation of leviathan First edition of the first translation of Leviathan , into Dutch, almost certainly the second edition overall following the English edition of 1651, and the edition most likely read by Spinoza. Leviathan offers the fullest and most famous expression of the indivisibility of sovereignty, the necessity for the state’s leader to be absolute in their power, unchecked by constitutional or institutional limitations. Leviathan ’s thesis is encapsulated in the iconic frontispiece: “the State, it seemed to Hobbes, might be regarded as a great artificial monster made up of individual men . . . the individual (except to save his own life) should always submit to the State, because any government is better than the anarchy of the natural state” ( PMM ). Much influenced by the chaos of the English Civil War, Hobbes deemed stable monarchies as the most rational and effective system of governance; any restrictions or attempts at power sharing will fracture the state and risk disintegration of social order, a prospect more fearful to Hobbes than any regimen of an absolute leader. That the first translation of Hobbes’s masterpiece was into Dutch was significant, especially for its potential influence on Spinoza. The edition’s “appearance may be related to the debate over toleration in the Netherlands, where the pro-toleration States party was campaigning against the orthodox Calvinist Counter- Remonstrants. As in the English context, Hobbes’s anticlericalism
made Leviathan a useful resource in support of a toleration agenda. Perhaps the best example of this is the use made of Leviathan ’s theological ideas by Spinoza in the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus (1670), a work whose political theory already owed much to a Dutch republican tradition informed by Hobbes’s De Cive . The many links with Spinoza’s works would ensure that Hobbes and Leviathan would be closely associated with the Dutch freethinker and condemned in the same terms, both in England and on the Continent” (Parkin, p. 450). Although it is possible Spinoza first read the text in the Latin translation of 1668 (he could not read English), it is more probable that this is the version he read – the translator, Abraham van Berkel, was an associate of Spinoza and a member of his circle. This edition, translated from the first English edition, almost certainly precedes the “Bear” and “Ornaments” English editions with their fictitious 1651 imprints, which are widely accepted to be printed c. 1678 and 1700 respectively (see Schoneveld p. 58). Octavo (162 × 103 mm). Contemporary vellum, spine lettered by hand at a later date, free endpapers renewed using old paper, blue speckled edges. Engraved title page and portrait of Hobbes, printed folding table. 18th- and 19th-century ownership signatures to front pastedown. Vellum lightly soiled, binding professionally tightened, intermittent staining and general light browning to contents, slight chip to T4 shaving a couple of letters in shoulder note. A very good copy. ¶ Macdonald & Hargreaves 47. Atsuko Fukuoka, The Sovereign and the Prophets , 2018; Jon Parkin, “The reception of Hobbes’s Leviathan ”, in Patricia Springborg, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Hobbes’s Leviathan , 2007; Cornelis W. Schoneveld, Intertraffic of the Mind , 1983. £6,500 [151709]
All items are fully described and photographed at peterharrington.co.uk
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