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1651
LEVIATHAN
by Thomas Hobbes
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
NATURE (the art whereby God hath made and governs the world) is by
the art of man, as in many other things, so in this also imitated,
that it can make an artificial animal. For seeing life is but a motion
of limbs, the beginning whereof is in some principal part within,
why may we not say that all automata (engines that move themselves
by springs and wheels as doth a watch) have an artificial life? For
what is the heart, but a spring; and the nerves, but so many
strings; and the joints, but so many wheels, giving motion to the
whole body, such as was intended by the Artificer? Art goes yet
further, imitating that rational and most excellent work of Nature,
man. For by art is created that great LEVIATHAN called a COMMONWEALTH,
or STATE (in Latin, CIVITAS), which is but an artificial man, though . . .
