Thomas Hobbes

During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man.

The life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

For by Art is created that great LEVIATHAN called a COMMON-WEALTH, or STATE, (in Latin CIVITAS) which is but an Artificial Man; though of greater stature and strength than the Natural, for whose protection and defence it was intended.

Covenants, without the sword, are but words and of no strength to secure a man at all.

The condition of man... is a condition of war of everyone against everyone.

Leisure is the mother of philosophy.

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

I put for a general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death.

For where no law is, there is no injustice.

The passion that above all others is most difficult to conquer is pride.

The right of nature... is the liberty each man hath, to use his own power, as he will himself, for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say, of his own life.

A man's conscience and his judgment are the same thing; and as the judgment, so also the conscience, may be erroneous.

The value or worth of a man is, as of all other things, his price; that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power.

To this war of every man against every man, this also is consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have there no place.

Ignorance of causes makes men fear every event.

The obligation of subjects to the sovereign is understood to last as long, and no longer, than the power lasteth by which he is able to protect them.

Words are the counters of wise men, and the money of fools.

For seeing life is but a motion of limbs, the beginning whereof is in some principal part within; why may we not say, that all automata (engines that move themselves by springs and wheels as doth a watch) have an artificial life?

The only way to erect such a common power, as may be able to defend them from the invasion of foreigners, and the injuries of one another... is to confer all their power and strength upon one man, or upon one assembly of men.

No man can be bound to a covenant, whereof he is not himself the author; nor consequently to any covenant, but by a voluntary act of his own.