1. What were Cardinal Richelieu’s primary aims?
Cardinal Richelieu’s was focused on centralizing the power in France. He also wanted to get rid of feudalism and get as much money into the french government as possible. There was this family in France called the Habsburg family that Richelieu wanted to breakdown.
2. What factors contributed to the decline of Spain?
First of all Spain was at war pretty frequently which decreased the amount of resources by a lot. There was no free economy and a plague that hit Spain. Not to mention the taxes people had to pay to help with the war. Kicking out all their arabic citizens of the country was even worse for their economy. All this leads to the decline of Spain.
3. What is constitutionalism?
Constitutionalism is the idea that governments must be limited by something. Juan de Mariana believed that anyone was able to kill a king for only one reason, that is if he was a tyrannical ruler.
4. What do you think Hobbes’ main arguments are in the excerpts you read?
I think that Hobbes believed that in order to obtain peace that people so very much want, an absolute monarch is needed. Without some sort of government, people would be killing each other in fear of being killed. Human beings do want peace, but can’t have it because of their self-defeating behavior. With an absolute monarch government, people can set boundaries of leaving another person’s territory alone.
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