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allowing it. The people’s vulnerabilities are like grooves or tracks on which the trains of
usurpers to come into town. Hobbes points to and describes the grooves; he catalogues
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the types of ignorance that create this receptivity to the influence of eloquent men.
Fear: The Seed Nourished by the Authors of Religion
Hobbes’s focus then moves from men’s ignorance-based vulnerabilities to their
fear-based vulnerabilities. Fear is apt to ground religious feeling and to allow the
subjection of the people to religious leaders. “Feare of things invisible is the natural seed”
of religion, a seed to which some individuals add opinions “of their own invention” in
order to better control and rule others. (p. 168). The heart of the seed of religion is our
human anxiety for the future, our “perpetuall solicitude for times to come.” (p. 169).
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This fear comes in part from the ignorance of natural causes which leaves men guessing
as to what can help and harm them. And this fear “always accompanying mankind in the
ignorance of causes, as it were in the dark, must needs have for object something.”(pp.
169-70). The people’s fear becomes focused on invisible agents or gods.
Hobbes illustrates how the “authors of the Religion of the Gentiles” cultivated the
seed of religion in their peoples. These men encouraged others to believe in ghosts, to see
gods as the intermediate causes of events, to worship idols in ceremonies, and to regard
random circumstances as predictive of future events. They encourage these beliefs and
practices to foster peacefulness and docility amongst the people, and Hobbes likely has
some sympathy for this goal. But their methods for doing so are to invent and impose
upon the people a staggering amount of superstition.
12
After listing the wild variety of
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Ignorance of the principles of right and wrong, he adds in the next pages, leads
men to rely on the appeal to custom. Ignorance of the causes of peace allows men to
attach themselves to private men who foment unrest. Thus, for example, private men
whip up the people’s anger against the paying of taxes.
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This point has been investigated by Loralea Michaelis in her paper, “The Political
Philosophy of Uncertainty: Hobbes’ Modern Prometheus,” presented at the American
Political Science Association Conference, 2001.
12
Much of Hobbes’s critique of “heathen” religions might also be applied to the Christian
religion. To give just one example, his critique of prayer could apply to Christianity. (p.
Convention