"To live in the presence of great truths and eternal laws, to be led by permanent ideals - that is what keeps a man patient when the world ignores him, and calm and unspoiled when the world praises him."
Law quotes
Law
9.3K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Topics related to Law
Browse quotes that often appear alongside law — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Law quotes (page 33 of 467)
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"I know that I cannot take responsibility for other people. We are all under the law of our own consciousness."
"You cannot make men good by law."
"... the community suffers nothing very terrible if its cobblers are bad and become degenerate and pretentious; but if the Guardians of its laws and constitution, who alone have the opportunity to bring it good government and prosperity, become a mere sham, then clearly it is completely ruined."
"Thus rhetoric, it seems, is a producer of persuasion for belief, not for instruction in the matter of right and wrong ... And so the rhetorician's business is not to instruct a law court or a public meeting in matters of right and wrong, but only to make them believe."
"To believe in a just law of cause and effect, carrying with it a punishment or a reward, is to believe in righteousness."
"Even after going to law school, following the footsteps of my father (an accomplished lawyer and judge at the time); I realized that the suit would never replace the kimono!"
"Strangers are welcome because there is room enough for them all, and therefore the old Inhabitants are not jealous of them; the Laws protect them sufficiently so that they have no need of the Patronage of great Men; and every one will enjoy securely the Profits of his Industry. But if he does not bring a Fortune with him, he must work and be industrious to live."
"I have no doubt that in the future, the laws that criminalize human love and commitment will look the way the apartheid laws do to us now, so obviously wrong"
"I believe in the absolute separation of church and state and in the strict enforcement of the Constitution that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
"I am aware that the conclusions arrived at in this work will be denounced by some as highly irreligious; but he who denounces them is bound to show why it is more irreligious to explain the origin of man as a distinct species by descent from some lower from, through the laws of variation and natural selection, than to explain the birth of the individual through the laws of ordinary reproduction. The birth both of the species and of the individual are equally parts of that grand sequence of events, which our minds refuse to accept as the result of blind chance."
"The masses will not vote for their own upliftment in a higher order of society. This has to be accomplished without their support and request, despite them and indeed against them. It is absurd to pivot your whole project, as does a conventional party, on the submission of change to the decision of those who so need to be changed. You might as well make the case for law and order conditional on the approval of the criminals."
"The fact that a belief has a good moral effect upon a man is no evidence whatsoever in favor of its truth. I'm not contending in a dogmatic way that there is not a God. What I'm contending is that we don't know that there is. I don't like the word "absolute." I don't think there is anything absolute whatever. The moral law, for example, is always changing. At one period in the development of the human race, almost everybody thought cannibalism was a duty."
"Defend the weak, protect both young and old, never desert your friends. Give justice to all, be fearless in battle and always ready to defend the right." —The law of Badger Lords"
"The laws of gravity cannot be held responcible for people falling in love."
"What is crucial is there be laws."
"Law is order, and good law is good order."
"Ancient laws remain in force long after the people have the power to change them."
"I could end the deficit in 5 minutes. You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP all sitting members of congress are ineligible for reelection."
"Litigation only makes lawyers fat."