Work Classification Layer
Compare Works
Pick two or more works to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension passages, and shared school embodiments side by side. Especially useful for author-stage comparisons (Wittgenstein early vs late) and for setting a single tradition's foundational texts against each other.
Behemoth
Hobbes's history of the English Civil War
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.
| Attribute | Behemoth (Late) |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Infinite |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Non-Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Finite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | Flat |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | Local |
| Matter · Extent | Infinite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | Local |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Partial |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Embodied |
| Observer · Agency | Active |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | None |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Reason |
| Observer · Theological Method | — |
| Energy · Extent | Infinite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Granularity | Discrete |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Behemoth
Composed c. 1668; suppressed during Hobbes's lifetime (he died 1679); published posthumously 1681-82; covers events 1640-1660.
Space
Behemoth
London composition; subsequent transnational seventeenth-century-history and political-theory readership.
Matter
Behemoth
The English Civil War period — its religious, intellectual, political-economic, and dynastic-incompetence causes; the role of Presbyterian and Independent ministers, of universities, of the merchant-and-gentry class, of the Stuart monarchy's own failures.
Observer
Behemoth
Late Hobbes (in his late seventies-and-early-eighties) writing a historical-political analysis of the events he had lived through and analysed throughout his theoretical-political work.
Energy
Behemoth
Polemical-historical, sovereignty-monist-systematic, didactic-pedagogical (dialogue-form) energies.
Information
Behemoth
Four-part dialogue between master and student; combines historical-narrative, political-theoretical-analysis, and pedagogical-instructional forms; aimed at educated political-readership.
Internal Tensions
Where each work's argument pulls against itself.
Behemoth has been read since as a major idiosyncratic seventeenth-century historical-and-political source. Charles II's suppression of the work reflects its political dangerousness — its critique was aimed at both parliamentary-Presbyterian and royalist-establishment positions. Modern Hobbes scholarship (Quentin Skinner, Noel Malcolm, Paul Seaward) has restored Behemoth to centrality alongside Leviathan as essential to understanding Hobbes's mature political thought.