Political Philosophy and Human Nature in Early Modern Europe

Political Philosophy and Human Nature in Early Modern Europe

Political Philosophy and Human Nature in Early Modern Europe




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As nation states were developing in early modern Europe, a number of political
philosophies were written to describe the forms of government they should take. Many
authors of these treatises based their ideas around their estimation of human nature.
Niccolò Machiavelli in The Prince (1513), and Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan (1651), had
little confidence in the ability of individuals to maintain order in a state without the
existence of an all-powerful ruler. Others writers, such as King James VI of Scotland in
the Trew Law of Free Monarchies (1598), and Jean Domat in On Social Order (1697),
suggested that a king appointed by God’s wisdom would have a better understanding of
human nature than lesser subjects, and should rule as an absolute monarch. A third
perspective was offered by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who argued in The Social Contract
(1763) that human nature was essentially good and that society could be run by a
republican government that represented all people in the realm. An examination of
extracts from each of these authors demonstrates that, more than any other factor, it was
their estimation of human nature that determined their belief in the correct form of
government.
Machiavelli wrote The Prince for the Medici family during the upheaval of the
Italian Wars, events that helped to explain his low esteem for human nature. To
Machiavelli, humans were “ungrateful, fickle, false, cowardly, [and] covetous.”1 These
weaknesses validated absolutism as an instrument of statecraft. Machiavelli argued that,
ideally, a sovereign prince should possess all good qualities; he should be “merciful,
1 Niccolò Machiavelli, “Extract from Niccolò Machiavelli, ‘The Prince’ (1513),” in
Documents in the History of Early Modern Europe, ed. Ken MacMillan (Calgary:
University of Calgary, 2008), p. 12.
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faithful, humane, religious, and upright.”2 But he also admitted...