Against Hobbes
Although Parker was thought to be close to the arguments on Hobbes on state power (and this opinion is still current), he went to lengths to attack Hobbes on the grounds of atheism, a common charge brought up against him. In A Demonstration of the Divine Authority of the Law of Nature (1681) Parker developed earlier work, and also adapted arguments from the De legibus naturae (1672) of Richard Cumberland. He contradicts Hobbes on human nature as selfish, and argues that our understanding of natural law develops from our understanding of nature, without the requirement that it be innate.
Read more about this topic: Samuel Parker (bishop Of Oxford)
Famous quotes containing the word hobbes:
“I have seen in this revolution a circular motion of the sovereign power through two usurpers, father and son, to the late King to this his son. For ... it moved from King Charles I to the Long Parliament; from thence to the Rump; from the Rump to Oliver Cromwell; and then back again from Richard Cromwell to the Rump; then to the Long Parliament; and thence to King Charles, where long may it remain.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)
“The Pacts and Covenants, by which the parts of this Body Politique were at first made, set together, and united, resemble that Fiat, or the Let us make man, pronounced by God in the Creation.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)