The relationship between the sovereign and the subjects in More's Utopia, Machiavelli's Discourses and Hobbes's Leviathan Thomas More, Niccolò Machiavelli and Thomas Hobbes they offer models for the relationship between the ruler and the people in their works Utopia, The Discourses and Leviathan. Both argue that ensuring the common good of the people should be the sovereign's primary objective. However, they differ in the specificity of their descriptions of this relationship and their explanations of the ruler's motivation in valuing the people's prosperity. An examination of the steps specified in each of these works will clarify the comparison of their models for this relationship. More's discussion of the sovereign occurs in the context of the discussion of a monarch as a steward of the people's welfare. The king is a commoner who has been invested with the authority or "majesty" of sovereignty. It is therefore distinguished from the rest of the population by the responsibilities it has towards them and by the powers that are inherent in those responsibilities. He is required to fulfill these responsibilities and not to abuse privileges with the threat of rebellion by the poor and, therefore, the discontented that would result from an incompetent or abused sovereignty. He is also bound by his natural desire for prestige and his prestige depends on the wealth and well-being of his subjects. To desire this kind of prestige, he must be a virtuous man. Without this virtue, his vices of pride and laziness risk reducing him to taking possession of the properties of his subjects to serve his greed and attempt their pacification by reducing them to the most abject poverty. If his pride... half of the card... is largely influenced by the monarch's level of incompetence or corruption. All three sovereigns rely on "virtue", that is, effectiveness in guaranteeing the common good of their subjects; however, all three have different definitions of what constitutes "virtu". In his sovereignty, More controls human nature and channels it into the promotion of general prosperity. For Machiavelli, sovereignty is the result of the pursuit of selfish objectives, both by the ruler and by the governed. In Hobbes' sovereignty, it is the logical result of fear and human nature, seeking peace. Works Cited Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan, ed. Edwin Curley (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1994.More, Thomas. Utopia. Trans. Clarence H. Miller. 2nd ed. Yale University Press. 2001Walker, Leslie J. The Discourses of Niccolo Machiavelli Routledge, 2013