WILLIAM CROOKE. CONSIDERATIONS UPON THE REPUTATION, &c. OF THOMAS HOBBES. ------- SIR, I am one of them that admire your writings; and having read over your _Hobbius Heauton-timorumenos_, I cannot hold from giving you some account of the causes why I admire it. And first I considered how you handle him for his disloyalty, in these words (page 5): _His great_ Leviathan, _wherein he placed his main strength, is now somewhat out of season; which, upon deserting his royal master in distress, (for he pretends to have been the King’s tutor, though yet, from those who have most reason to know it, I can find but little ground for such a pretence), was written in defence of Oliver’s title, or whoever, by whatsoever means, can get to be upmost; placing the whole right of government merely in strength, and absolving all his Majesty’s subjects from their allegiance, whenever he is not in a present capacity to force obedience_. That which I observe and admire here, first, is, that you left not this passage out, for two reasons; one, because Mr. Hobbes could long for nothing more than such an occasion to tell the world his own and your little stories, during the time of the late rebellion. When the Parliament sat, that began in April 1640, and was dissolved in May following, and in which many points of the regal power, which were necessary for the peace of the kingdom, and the safety of his Majesty’s person, were disputed and denied, Mr. Hobbes wrote a little treatise in English, wherein he did set forth and demonstrate, that the said power and rights were inseparably annexed to the sovereignty; which sovereignty they did not then deny to be in the King; but it seems understood not, or would not understand that inseparability. Of this treatise, though not printed, many gentlemen had copies, which occasioned much talk of the author; and had not his Majesty dissolved the Parliament, it had brought him into danger of his life. He was the first that had ventured to write in the King’s defence; and one, amongst very few, that upon no other ground but knowledge of his duty and principles of equity, without special interest, was in all points perfectly loyal.