1001Philosophers

Jean-Jacques Rousseau vs Thomas Hobbes

Rousseau and Hobbes are the two great early-modern theorists of the human condition outside political society. Their accounts of natural man are mirror opposites, and the difference drives almost every other political and ethical disagreement between them.

At a glance

Jean-Jacques RousseauThomas Hobbes
Dates1712 – 17781588 – 1679
NationalityGenevanEnglish
EraModernModern
Movements Enlightenment, Social Contract Political Philosophy, Social Contract, Early Modern Philosophy
Profile Jean-Jacques Rousseau → Thomas Hobbes →

Where they agree

Both rejected the theological grounding of political authority in favor of a rational reconstruction from human nature, both took the social contract as the source of legitimate political authority, and both treated the analysis of human passions as a core part of political philosophy.

Where they disagree

Hobbes's natural man is a creature of fear and competitive desire whose pre-political life is a war of all against all. Rousseau's natural man is a creature of self-love and natural pity, peaceful and largely independent, whose corruption begins with the introduction of property and social comparison. For Hobbes, society is what saves us from natural misery; for Rousseau, society is what introduces it. Where Hobbes legitimates the absolute sovereign, Rousseau legitimates only the general will of the citizen body acting on its own behalf.

Representative quotes

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  • “Let's go dance under the elms: Step lively, young lassies. Let's go dance under the elms: Gallants, take up your pipes.”

    Le devin du village (1752)

  • “Le devin du village (1752)”

    Let's go dance under the elms: Step lively, young lassies. Let's go dance under the elms: Gallants, take up your pipes.

  • “All that time is lost which might be better employed.”

    As quoted in A Dictionary of Quotations in Most Frequent Use: Taken Chiefly from the Latin and French, but comprising many from the Greek, Spanish, and Italian Languages, translated into English (1809) by David Evans Macdonnel

Thomas Hobbes

  • “The war of all against all.”

    The First Part, Chapter 13, p. 62

  • “Curiosity is the lust of the mind.”

    The First Part, Chapter 6, p. 26

  • “Fear of things invisible is the natural seed of that which everyone in himself calleth religion.”

    The First Part, Chapter 11, p. 51

Continue reading