The Burdensome Freedom of Sovereigns
This chapter shows how the regulation of personal passion is as urgent for sovereigns as for subjects, according to Hobbes's theory. Although a sovereign never agrees to identify with the union of his subjects rather than with his natural person; although he is not strictly answerable to his subjects or other sovereigns for what he does; although, in a word, he is perfectly free; it is in the interest of the natural person that he is not to make enemies, either of his subjects or of other sovereigns. This means giving his subjects scope for prosperity and even enrichment; and it means not launching into foreign war for the sake of personal glory. Treating the resources of the commonwealth as one's personal property is not only wrong but against one's long term self-interest. The sovereign has to rise above his purely personal appetites to see this. So at the level of the sovereign as much as at the level of the subject, politics counters rather than indulges the passions.
Keywords: Hobbes, sovereign, subjects, Leviathan, personal passion
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