Week 6, Keats and Hobbes

When I have Fears that I May Cease to Be


By John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.



In our discussion of Hobbes's politics being founded on a fear of violent death, one of the boys in my section (his hair is dyed a little red and for about the first four weeks, he wore the same orange and black and yellow pair of shorts) posed a challenge to Hobbes: "Where I live in northern California, there are the most Great Whites. Basically, South Africa is the only place that even comes close to rivaling it. But I would rather be killed by a Great White than maimed. What would Hobbes do with that?"

I had no answer.

Well, I basically have no love for Hobbes. Not that I exactly have love for Keats's answer to the fear of death, either. But it is a beautiful poem.