Browsing by Subject "Thomas Hobbes."
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Item Aquinas on justice, judgment, and the unity of peace.(2014-06-11) Mathie, Mary Elise.; Nichols, Mary P.; Political Science.; Baylor University. Dept. of Political Science.St. Thomas Aquinas's chief contribution to politics is generally taken to be centered around his understanding of the law, and primarily focused on finding a transcendent basis for the authority of particular laws. In this dissertation, I argue that Aquinas is concerned rather to show that law is only properly understood as part of a regime. Nature, in Aquinas's political teaching is complex and not easily embodied in one natural ruler; on the contrary, the nature involved in natural law is best understood by means of a republican regime. My dissertation develops this focus in Aquinas's writing by exploring Aquinas's teaching on law, just war, punishment, and republican government, and their place in Aquinas's political thought. Aquinas argues that the human being is naturally and truly political—that is, the individual is ordered towards the goals of the city. The central argument of this dissertation is that Aquinas grounds the purposes of the city in the nature of the human being. In doing so, Aquinas does not appeal to human nature abstractly, but rather to the activity of human beings in community. Although Aquinas points to a transcendent basis for law, his political teaching suggests that we should discern policy from a human basis.Item Balancing liberty of contract with police power : a Hobbesian approach.(2011-05-12T15:46:09Z) Pope, Thomas R., 1983-; Nichols, David K.; Political Science.; Baylor University. Dept. of Political Science.Modern liberal society exists by negotiating a fine balance between the liberty of the citizen and the authority of the state. Yet, as the years put distance between our founding principles and their execution, we have become forgetful of the symbiosis that unites individual and common goods. Particularly in American jurisprudence, we see a growing antagonism between personal liberties and the state's ability to act in the interest of the whole (known as its "police power"). The first and paradigmatic contest between these principles can be traced to the Lochner v. New York and its later repudiation in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish. Lochner and its ilk tend to overemphasize the interest of liberty at the expense of the public good. West Coast Hotel, on the other hand, so vehemently rejects the most radical components of Lochner that government regulation on behalf of the public good effectually supersedes even moderate liberty interests. Both approaches recur throughout the Court's history, and yet fail to achieve the necessary balance of liberty and the public good because they consider the matter as a dichotomy. My dissertation will explore our constitution's roots in social contract theory, looking particularly to the thought of Thomas Hobbes for a third option that is consistent with the language and tradition of the Constitution, and is also more effectually viable than existing alternatives. Within a framework of social contract, individual liberty finds its fullest expression within the political community, which in turn exists to promote individual flourishing. When one is favored at the expense of the other, both must suffer. I begin with a review of the existing jurisprudence on the matter, highlighting the role and influence of Lochner. I then proceed to identify elements of Hobbesian social contract in the Constitution, discussing how to interpret these provisions in light of their philosophic roots. This section includes a brief explanation of why Hobbes is preferred here to the more traditional Lockean reading. Finally, I conclude with an examination of more recent cases before the Court, applying the method I have set forth.Item Meditative poetry, covenant theology, and Lucy Hutchinson's order and disorder.(2014-06-11) Wright, Seth Andrew.; Donnelly, Phillip J. (Phillip Johnathan), 1969-; English.; Baylor University. Dept. of English.I argue that Order and Disorder (1679), Lucy Hutchinson’s biblical epic on Genesis, is a meditative poem, while claiming that Hutchinson’s study of Independent theologian John Owen’s covenant theology informed her narration of the events in Genesis. I offer a reading of the poem as a whole to show how these claims illuminate Hutchinson’s construal of Genesis. These claims permit me to engage scholarly literature on three heads. First, by demonstrating that Order and Disorder is a meditative poem, I seek to extend the current discussion of seventeenth-century meditative poetry to include poems narrating the content of the poet’s meditation alongside poems narrating the process. Second, by showing Order and Disorder’s specific theological background, I challenge accounts claiming Lucretian atomism and Republican politics as the poem’s intellectual foundation. Finally, I offer the first extended account of meditation in Owen’s theology. Chapter One puts Hutchinson and her work in the historical and critical context, while Chapter Two argues that Owen understood meditation as an intellectual duty whose final cause is communion with God by understanding biblical revelation, and that Hutchinson assumed a similar view in Order and Disorder. As she discerned scriptural truth through meditation, Hutchinson rejected the Epicurean philosophy she had encountered while translating Lucretius. In Chapter Three, I argue that Theologoumena Pantodapa, Owen’s major treatise on covenant theology, which Hutchinson studied closely, implicitly confronts Thomas Hobbes’s contract theory by arguing that communion with God is the highest end of humanity. Chapters Four—Six show how Hutchinson’s approach to meditation and covenant undergird her dilations of Genesis 1—3 in Cantos 1—5. By contending that people can commune with God by meditating on Creation, Providence, and the covenant, Hutchinson denies the ontological materialism found in Lucretius. Finally, Chapters Seven and Eight argue that Hutchinson uses Cantos 6—20 to narrate Genesis 4—31 in terms of an Independent ecclesiology grounded in Owen’s covenant theology. By claiming that the Church is distinguished by acknowledging Providence through meditation, Hutchinson contests the definition of the Church in the Act of Uniformity. The Epilogue suggests Owen regarded Hutchinson’s meditative project as successful.