Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, Part 64 summary

What happens

1. The speaker traces declining respect for church leaders to their ambition and compares the Papacy to a surviving ghost of Roman imperial power.
2. He pairs clerical language, hierarchy, buildings, and immunity from civil courts with features of fairy tales.
3. He compares clerical education and political interference with enchantments that weaken reason and turn subjects against rulers.
4. He compares clerical wealth and spiritual payments with fairy practices, then grounds papal spiritual authority in fear and deception.
5. He credits Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth with expelling Roman spiritual power but warns that similar religious claims remain.
6. He closes his discussion of politics and offers his argument for his country's judgment after review.

In this part

What to notice

The warning extends beyond the Papacy. Expelling Roman authority does not remove the threat posed by religious claims to a separate governing power.

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