The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c16.s1.t1.4

c16.s1.t1.4

According to Hooker (1554—1600) in the *Ecclesiastical Polity* the state of nature is a state of strife. The *Leviathan* of Hobbes (1588—1670) declares similarly that the state of nature is a state of war and of no rights. In Spinoza's (1632—77) opinion also, in the *Tractatus Theologico Politicus*, the state of nature is a state of war and a state of the right of might. The non-state is thus conceived to be a war of "all against all", an "anarchy of birds and beasts", or a regime of vultures and harpies as John Stuart Mill would have remarked.