The political theory of Plato and Hobbes

By comparing and contrasting the requirements necessary for the appropriation of knowledge or wisdom in the examples of both Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan and Plato in The Republic an explanation will be given as to the relationship between nature and reason. In using this explanation it will illustrate the differing implications for each ruler in the aforementioned literature concluding that both rulers in each regime act as the guiding reason of the state. In Plato's …

…reason within the coming to have knowledge ultimately both imply that the relationship between nature and reason is different for each. Plato sees both reason and nature as ends where Hobbes sees both as ends to a means. Ultimately both rulers, for Plato the philosopher and for Hobbes the Leviathan, reason both serves as the ultimate reason of the society. By Plato this conclusion is a natural one and for Hobbes it is an improvement