Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
1755 · 92 pages
The first man to fence a field and say this is mine founded civil society, Rousseau writes, and ruined it. His case against progress split the Enlightenment and still unsettles readers.
★ 7.2
The Books canon
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Browse all 1,178 books or filter by subject, era, place, and author.
Two Treatises of Government
1689 · 464 pages
People are born free and equal, Locke argues, own what their labor makes, and create government by consent. One that breaks the trust may be thrown out. Jefferson took the argument whole.
★ 7.4
Leviathan
1651 · 688 pages
Strip away the state, Hobbes argues, and life becomes a war of everyone against everyone, nasty, brutish, and short. The remedy is to hand all our power to one sovereign.
★ 8.2