THEORY  OF  SOVEREIGNTY  249

alleged  heterodoxy,  his  hatred  of  the  Universities,
his  contempt  for  Aristotle  (of  whom  Filmer  has  so
great  an  admiration),  his  unrelieved  Erastianism,
his  scorn  of  merely  passive  obedience,  would  all  tend
to  deepen  the  dislike.  But  the  head  and  front  of
his  offending  is  different.
In  the  first  place  his  system  of  politics  is  purely
utilitarian.  It  contains  far  less  of  the  religious
sanction,  which  men  of  that  day  demanded  for  all
governments,  than  do  the  writings  of  the  opponents
of  non-resistance.  His  point  of  view  is  eminently
modem;  and  his  thought,  therefore,  for  that  very
reason  tends  to  be  out  of  relation  to  that  of  the  time
in  which  he  lived.  It  has  been  shewn  above  that
in  many  ways  his  connection  with  his  contemporary
theories  of  politics  is  far  closer  than  was  once  thought.
Yet  at  bottom  his  system  is  divided  from  all  others
of  his  time  by  a  far  deeper  gulf  than  that  by
which  they  were  separated  from  one  another.
