ABSTRACT
A s Thomas Hobbes famously opined, law exists in large part to reduce the violence of our unregulated lives and thereby improve our well-being. Life in a state of nature-life outside law-is brutal, nasty, and short, Hobbes taught. Life under law, by contrast, is less violent and much safer, and for that reason, more pleasurable: with the order given by law, we are freed to enjoy not just longevity, but also commerce, transportation, culture, education, gentility, family ties, and the pleasures and affections of intimacy. Without legal order, we have no time or energy for any of that; our waking lives are fully absorbed with the fearful project of defending ourselves against the lethal aggressions of others.1
