A Comparison of a Hobbsian World and the World of Candide Essay

The unlikeness between a Hobbsian World and the World of Candide In an anarchistic Hobbsian world, human race leads a purely selfish existence, perpetually waging war against his fellow men. In this world Nature subsists as a playing field for phylogenesis only the strong and cunning survives, and even survival results in heart that is nasty, brutish, and short (Hobbes). However, with restraints (that is, government), a Hobbsian world can blossom into society. According to Hobbes, those who beseech to subside from natural anarchy must implicitly surrender or so personal freedom in exchange for societal order. Hobbes philosophies influenced many of his propagation and subsequent intellectuals, including Voltaire, demonstrated in his satire, Candide. At first glance, Candide seems to be a strict manifestation of Hobbsian philosophy an anarchistic world centered around war, relieved only by the yield of personal freedom for common order-Eldorado and the garden. Yet after a th orough examination of the work, one recognizes that the characters in Candide are non Hobbsian. Hobbsian man is innately selfish and ambitious eon Voltaires characters are not. Perhaps some characters in Candide are driven through their misfortunes as a result of their avarice however, this foible can not be ascribed as innately human. Instead, avarice, in the world of Candide, arises as a byproduct of the fallibility of synthetic institutions (that is, religious and educational), which are the primary targets of Voltaires satire. Thus, the world of Candide, although coordinate like a Hobbsian world, contains men that are not Hobbsian. This d... ...the inability to cooperate. Or perhaps Voltaire suggests that the world can be controlled more effectively if the man-made institutions that he is satirizing could be somehow reorganized. All in all, Voltaires subtle deflexion from strict Hobbsian philosophy enables him to pose perhaps unanswerable questions about populace and our potentials.Works CitedBottiglia, William. Candides Garden. Voltaire A Collection of Critical Essays. invigorated Jersey Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1968. Hobbes, Thomas. Of Religion. ed.Smith,Lacey Baldwin and blue jean Reeder Smith. The Past Speaks. 2nd ed. 1 vol. Lexington Heath, 1993. Richter, Peyton. Voltaire. Boston Twayne Publishers, 1980. Tsanoff, Radoslav. Voltaires Candide and the Critics. California Wadsworth Publishing Company, Inc., 1966. Voltaire. Candide. New York Viking Publishers, 1996.