A Quote by Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke

It is a very easy thing to devise good laws; the difficulty is to make them effective. The great mistake is that of looking upon men as virtuous, or thinking that they can be made so by laws; and consequently the greatest art of a politician is to render vices serviceable to the cause of virtue.

Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke

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Quote Author

Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke
English - Politician
September 16, 1678 - December 12, 1751

The greatest art of a politician is to render vice serviceable to the cause of virtue.

Henry IV of England

I know some say, let us have good laws, and no matter for the men that execute them: but let them consider, that though good laws do well, good men do better: for good laws may want good men, and be abolished or evaded [invaded in Franklin's print] by ill men; but good men will never want good laws, nor suffer ill ones.

Patrick Henry

A single assembly will never be a steady guardian of the laws, if Machiavel is right, when he says, Men are never good but through necessity: on the contrary, when good and evil are left to their choice, they will not fail to throw every thing into disorder and confusion. Hunger and poverty may make men industrious, but laws only can make them good; for, if men were so of themselves, there would be no occasion for laws; but, as the case is far otherwise, they are absolutely necessary.

John Adams

Probably all laws are useless; for good men do not want laws at all, and bad men are made no better by them.

Demonax

Justice requires that to lawfully constituted Authority there be given that respect and obedience which is its due; that the laws which are made shall be in wise conformity with the common good; and that, as a matter of conscience all men shall render obedience to these laws.

Pope Pius XI

As good government is an empire of laws, how shall your laws be made? In a large society, inhabiting an extensive country, it is impossible that the whole should assemble to make laws. The first necessary step, then, is to depute power from the many to a few of the most wise and good.

John Adams

A child who has been taught to respect the laws of God will have little difficulty respecting the laws of men.

J. Edgar Hoover

There are a great many men valued in society who have nothing to recommend them but serviceable vices.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld

I'm livin' in times where my daughters are found around Kids who can't afford thinking caps... But always found drinkin' raps and eatin' off beats, Claimin' laws of the streets. But who made the laws? Everybody playin' rebel with no sign of a cause.

Kelvin Mercer

Does man's freedom consist in revolting against all laws? We say no, in so far as laws are natural, economic, and social laws, not authoritatively imposed but inherent in things, in relations, in situations, the natural development of which is expressed by those laws. We say YES if they are political and juridical laws, imposed upon men by men.

Mikhail Bakunin

Laws matter. With effective implementation and enforcement, good laws can nudge forward positive changes in social and cultural mores.

Arancha Gonzalez

Laws, in their most general signification, are the necessary relations arising from the nature of things. In this sense all beings have their laws: the Deity His laws, the material world its laws, the intelligences superior to man their laws, the beasts their laws, man his laws.

Baron de Montesquieu

A constitution, therefore, is to a government what the laws made afterwards by that government are to a court of judicature. The court of judicature does not make the laws, neither can it alter them; it only acts in conformity to the laws made: and the government is in like manner governed by the constitution.

Thomas Paine

Princes that would their people should do well Must at themselves begin, as at the head; For men, by their example, pattern out Their limitations, and regard of laws: A virtuous court a world to virtue draws.

Ben Jonson

I have used the laws of this country just like the greatest people that you read about every day in business have used the laws of this country, the chapter laws, to do a great job for my company, for myself, for my employees, for my family, et cetera.