RICHARD HOOKER AS POLITICAL
NATURALIST *
SIMON P. KENNEDY
Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Queensland
ABSTRACT . Richard Hooker’s understanding of political society has engendered significant
debate. Does he hold that society is natural, in keeping with his commitment to aspects of
Aristotelianism? Or does he believe that society is conventional, leading somehow to a social contrac-
tarian conception of society? My contention is that he is a political naturalist, though his naturalism
is tempered by his Augustinian theological anthropology. Hooker emphasizes human sin in his
account of the nature and purpose of civil government, and gives humankind agency in the estab-
lishment of society. But, ultimately, he considers political life to be natural to the human condition.
In this way, Hooker navigates a via media between Aristotelian naturalism and conventionalism.
In the opening chapters of his Second treatise of government (), John Locke
quotes the Elizabethan divine, Richard Hooker (–), at some length
in support of his anthropology and his doctrine of the state of nature. Men,
writes Locke, are equal ‘by Nature’, something which ‘the Judicious Hooker
looks upon as self-evident’.
Locke begins to paint Hooker as proto-contractar-
ian in this passage. Later, Locke goes on to bring this assertion home with a long
quote about the truth of his own conception of the state of nature. Locke’s
response to those objecting to his conception of the state of nature was to
paint them as opposing ‘the Authority of the Judicious Hooker’.
But was
Locke representing Hooker accurately? Or was he, as Robert Eccleshall puts
it, ‘unacquainted with the substance of Hooker’s thought’, and instead using
* I am grateful to Peter Harrison, Leigh Penman, George Duke, and W. Bradford Littlejohn
for commenting on earlier drafts of this article. My thanks also extend to the two anonymous
readers who offered a number of helpful comments on the manuscript. The research for this
article was made possible by an Australian Government Research Training Program
Scholarship and a Fellowship from the Davenant Institute.
John Locke, Two treatises of government, ed. Peter Laslett (Cambridge, ), ..–,
p. .
Ibid., ..–, p. .
Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, Level Forgan Smith Building, University of
Queensland, St Lucia qld s.kennedy@uq.edu.au
The Historical Journal, , (), pp. – © Cambridge University Press
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