The Allegiance of Thomas Hobbes

326 Pages·2005·2.43 MB·English

by  Jeffrey R. Collins

The Allegiance of Thomas Hobbes
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The Allegiance of
Thomas Hobbes
JEFFREY R. COLLINS
1
3
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For Randall and Patricia Collins
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Acknowledgements
This book has taken the better part ofa decade to complete,and over the course
of those years I have incurred many debts.I must thank,at the start,the profes-
sional staffs ofthe following institutions:the Widener Library and the Houghton
Rare Books Library at Harvard University;the Sterling Memorial Library at Yale
University;the Regenstein Library and the Special Collections Research Center at
the University of Chicago;the Bodleian Library and the Queen’s College archive
at Oxford University;the Cambridge University Library;the Manuscripts Room
of the British Library; the Lambeth Palace Library; the British Public Record
Office; the Dr William’s Library in London; and the archive at Chatsworth in
Derbyshire.The librarians and archivists at these institutions provided me with
enormously valuable guidance through their magnificent collections ofrare books
and manuscripts.For financial support,my thanks go to the History Department
and Graduate Society ofHarvard University,and to the Jacob K.Javits Fellowship
Program ofthe United States Department ofEducation.
More pressing still are those personal debts that I have accumulated during
the course of researching and writing this book. I have benefited enormously
from outstanding colleagues in both the history department and the history
and literature program at Harvard University, the Harper Society of Fellows
at the University of Chicago, and, most recently, the history department at
Queen’s University. My sincerest appreciation goes to Susan Pedersen, James
Hankins,Matthew Maguire,Hugh McNeal,Josh Millet,Brian Domitrovic,Mark
Molesky, Caroline Elkins, Eric Lohr, Frederick Schnabel, Tony D’Elia, Adrian
Johns,Richard Strier,Paul Cheney,and Erik Grimmer-Solem.Most of these col-
leagues have either read parts of this book,or responded to presentations based
upon it.Their advice has been invaluable.I must also thank the participants in the
Early Modern European and Renaissance and Reformation seminars at Harvard
University,the Early Modern European Workshop at the University of Chicago,
the North American British Studies Association,the Early Modern History semi-
nar at Queen’s University, the Early Modern Britain seminar at the Institute of
Historical Research in London, Princeton University’s Center for the Study of
Books and Media,and the Political Thought and Intellectual HistorySeminar at
Cambridge University. Each of these forums provided me with vital feedback.
Mark Goldie, John Morrill, Blair Worden, Nigel Smith, Justin Champion, Paul
Monod, Steve Pincus, and Noel Malcolm all provided more detailed advice—
invariably sound—on various occasions. To the scholarship of Dr Malcolm, as
with all scholars ofHobbes,I am particularly indebted.For skilful editorial assist-
ance,my sincere thanks go to Ruth Parr,Anne Gelling,and Kay Rogers ofOxford
University Press.
viii Acknowledgements
Richard Tuck served on my dissertation committee, and in that capacity
provided regular encouragement and guidance. His published work has also
strongly influenced me,in ways that will be detailed in the coming chapters but
must be gratefully acknowledged here as well. Finally, my greatest intellectual
debts are to my graduate adviser,Mark Kishlansky.Professor Kishlansky has an
enormously sharp editorial eye,a tremendous appreciation for scholarship,and
the forensic capacities of a trial attorney (always as prosecutor). He has been a
model adviser,and has influenced innumerable aspects ofthis book.
This book is dedicated to my father and mother,Randall and Patricia Collins,
whose patient support oftheir son during a very long education is something for
which I will remain forever grateful.My final and most profound debts are to yet
another historian:my wife,Ana Siljak.
Contents
Note on Quotations and Dates x
Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
1. Thomas Hobbes and the Uses of Christianity 11
2. Hobbes,the Long Parliament,and the Church of England 58
3. Rise of the Independents 88
4. Leviathanand the Cromwellian Revolution 115
5. Hobbes among the Cromwellians 159
6. The Independents and the ‘Religion of Thomas Hobbes’ 207
7. Response of the Exiled Church 242
Conclusion 271
Bibliography 281
Index 305