Law Quotes
1,095 quotes
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets."
"Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour ... If at my convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?"
"Any fool can make a ruleAnd any fool will mind it."
"I have gained this by philosophy … I do without being ordered what some are constrained to do by their fear of the law."
"Almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so."
"My cat is ignorant of the law. But then so am I. That means I am not his master, because we are both slaves."
"It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important."
"Your religious beliefs are your business. They are not and should not be the basis for law. If you use them as justification to discriminate against others, don’t be upset when others decide you’re an asshole."[Blog post of July 26, 2011]"
"It is impossible to enslave, mentally or socially, a bible-reading people. The principles of the bible are the groundwork of human freedom."
"It's not the law of religion nor the principles of morality that define our highways and pathways to God; only by the Grace of God are we led and drawn, to God. It is His grace that conquers a multitude of flaws and in that grace, there is only favor. Favor is not achieved; favor is received."
"Errors do not cease to be errors simply because they’re ratified into law."
"The first law of nature is self-preservation. Cut off that which may harm you. But if it is worth preserving, and is meaningful, nourish it and have no regrets. Ultimately, this is true living and love of self...from within."
"Religion is never more tested than when our emotions are ablaze. At such a time, the timeless grandeur of the Law and its ethics stand at our mercy."
"Laws of nature have no physical properties of mass /energy. They are platonic truths in transcendent realm that create & govern the Universe."
"Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of production and trade..."
"Divide the constant tide and random noisiness of energetic flow, with conscious recurring moments of empty mind, solitude, gratitude and deep...slow...breathing. Of this, the natural law of self-preservation demands."
"FOCUS = Follow On Course Until Successful."
"In the end, only God can see the heart of an individual and distinguish the difference between legalistic deadweight and the passion of holy solemnity."
"Jigga, Kells, Not Guilty"
"Men are not generally sufficiently aware of the distinction between the law of God and his purpose; they are apt to suppose, that as the temper of the sinner is contrary to the one, so the outrages of the sinner are able to defeat the other; than which nothing can be more false."
"The execution of the laws is more important than the making of them."
"The laws sometimes sleep but never die."
"All things obey fixed laws."
"Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Cae-"
"Everything in life has a yin and yang – an interconnected, complementary and opposite force. Just as we need the light to distinguish it from the dark, we recognize injustice in the world demands justice to provide a balance."
"There will always be cases that cry out to me for ultimate punishment. That is not the true issue. The pivotal question instead is whether a system of justice can be constructed that reaches only the rare, right cases, without also occasionally condemning the innocent or the undeserving."
Scott Turow, Ultimate Punishment: A Lawyer's Reflections on Dealing with the Death Penalty
"Laws are confusing documents. They get in the way if justice."
"Never let the law interfere with justice."
"Often it takes outer authority to send us on the path to our own inner authority."
Richard Rohr, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life
"One reason current discussions of justice are so impoverished is that our heterogeneous society does not have many shared texts. Shakespeare's plays are among the few secular texts that remain common enough and complex enough to sustain these conversation. His answers to our dilemmas may not "bear on all points." Yet they teach us not to underestimate the action of the flower."
Kenji Yoshino, A Thousand Times More Fair: What Shakespeare's Plays Teach Us About Justice
"Your edict, King, was strong,But all your strength is weakness itself againstThe immortal unrecorded laws of God.They are not merely now: they were, and shall be,Operative for ever, beyond man utterly.I knew I must die, even without your decree:I am only mortal. And if I must dieNow, before it is my time to die,Surely this is no hardship: can anyoneLiving, as I live, with evil all about me,Think Death less than a friend?"
Sophocles, The Oedipus Cycle: Oedipus Rex/Oedipus at Colonus/Antigone
"If a theory of justice is to guide reasoned choice of policies, strategies or institutions, then the identification of fully just social arrangements is neither necessary nor sufficient."
"An age cannot bind itself and ordain to put the succeeding one into such a condition that it cannot extend its (at best very occasional) knowledge , purify itself of errors, and progress in general enlightenment. That would be a crime against human nature, the proper destination of which lies precisely in this progress and the descendants would be fully justified in rejecting those decrees as having been made in an unwarranted and malicious manner.."
Immanuel Kant, An Answer to the Question: What Is Enlightenment?
"Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias."
"It's when you take somebody's innocence that you also take their life."
"Everybody is guilty. It's only the innocent that aren't."
"Always seek justice, but love only mercy. To love justice and hate mercy is but a doorway to more injustice."
"Law is made by the winner to preserve victory over the loser."
"He told us that nations of men fell into disorder, so nations of law were set up instead. He told us that nations of law then forgot justice and let the law become a Game, a Game in which the moves and the winning were more important than truth. He told us to seek justice rather than the Game."
"Goldstone has done terrible damage to the cause of truth and justice and the rule of law. He has poisoned Jewish-Palestinian relations, undermined the courageous work of Israeli dissenters and—most unforgivably—increased the risk of another merciless IDF assault."
Norman G. Finkelstein, Goldstone Recants: Richard Goldstone Renews Israel's License to Kill
"Justice based purely on laws is about as accurate as a portrait created out of large low-resolution color pixels.If you stand back far enough it looks good.Come any closer and the glaring approximations overtake all semblance of the original.Justice should be viewable under the microscope, not from a telescope.And for that it needs to be based not on law but on truth."
"...there is therefore now no condemnation for two reasons: you are dead now; and God, as the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, has been dead all along. The blame game was over before it started. It really was. All Jesus did was announce that truth and tell you it would make you free. It was admittedly a dangerous thing to do. You are a menace. Be he did it; and therefore, menace or not, here you stand: uncondemned, forever, now. What are you going to do with your freedom?"
Robert Farrar Capon, Between Noon & Three: Romance, Law & the Outrage of Grace
"It (trying to keep the law) grants you the power to judge others and feel superior to them. You believe you are living to a higher standard than those you judge. Enforcing rules, especially in its more subtle expressions like responsibility and expectation, is a vain attempt to create certainly out of uncertainty. And contrary to what you might think, I have a great fondness for uncertainty. Rules cannot bring freedom; they only have the power to accuse."
"The love of Christ is always there and unchanging, no matter what we do, but it is when we are obedient that we actually begin to feel it."
"Life, faculties, production-in other words, individuality, liberty, property-this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it."
"God gave laws to His people to bless them, not to burden them. Every rule either elevates the quality of human life or restores one's relationship with God after a breach. He makes no extraneous demands and He is never capricious."
"Jesus didn't come to earth to establish a new religion. He came to restore a broken relationship. He came to make the primary, primary again. The secondary activity of obedience to the law of God was always intended to serve the primary activity: to love God and enjoy Him forever. When that is primary, the secondary becomes a labor of love, a joyful, and "easy" burden to bear. (Matthew 11:28-30"
"It is worth remembering one of the important lessons of the Buck story: a small number of zealous advocates can have an impact on the law that defies both science and conventional wisdom."
Paul A. Lombardo, Three Generations, No Imbeciles: Eugenics, the Supreme Court, and Buck v. Bell
"Belief is a wonderful way to pass the time until the facts come in."
"Happiness Is Dependent Upon Choosing To Function Within The Laws And Principles Of Kingdom Of God"
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