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On Law​

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1 What is law?

Law is thus “reason without desire”. This shows that to seek justice is to seek neutral standards, and the law is neutral. (Aristotle Politics Oxford p. 128)

There is only one law, the law of ethics. (Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime e Castigo (Editora 34)

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Where does law start?

Since the law is a standard of measurement, there are two ways it exists in things. Firstly, in what does the measuring and regulating, and since that is the proper role of reason, law in this sense exists in reason alone. Secondly, in what is measured and regulated, and law in this sense exists in everything which tends towards something in obedience to law. (Aquinas - Selected Philosophical Writings (Oxford) p.411)

Cicero told us: law starts with what nature produces, then by use of reason certain things become customs, and finally things produced by nature and tested by custom are sacrificed with the awe and religious weight of laws. (Aquinas - Selected Philosophical Writings (Oxford) p.420)

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The consequences of law 

For one the principal advantages of Law is not to merely that it enforces honesty, but that is makes men act in the same way, and requires them to produce the same evidence of their acts. (Plato - The Sophists p. 560)

Man, when perfected, is the best of animals: but if he be isolated from law and justice he is the worst of all. (Aristotle Politics Oxford p. 11)

 To live by the rule of the constitution ought not to be regarded as slavery but rather as salvation. (Aristotles Politics Oxford p. 209)

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It is never perfect

A comprehension of never existing a perfect law: A perfect simple principle can never be applied to a state of thing which is the reverse of simple. (Plato The statesman p. 1322)

 Pusis “nature” same everywhere. nomos “law” costum. (Aristotles Politics p.viii)

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The foundation

All law has to do with pleasure and pain; these are to fountains which are ever flowing in human nature, and he who drinks of them when and as much as he ought, is happy, and he who indulges in them to excess, is miserable. (Plato Laws p. 16)

We thus come to the conclusion that the best way of life, both for the cities and for individuals, is the life of goodness, duty equiped with such a stare of requisites - i.e. external goods and goods of the body - as makes it possible to share in the activities of goodness. (Aristotles Politics Oxford p. 251)

Let us not, certainly lose our tempers: but let each man defend what he believes: judgement is free. (Cicero - Selected Works - Penguin - p.14)

Law is a standard of measurement for behaviour, fostering certain actions and discouraging other; for law derives from binding, since binds one to act. (Aquinas - Selected Philosophical Writings (Oxford) p.411)

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Should be Sovereign

 No body of people, but law should be sovereign. (Aristotles Politics Oxford p. 106)

There are arguments on either side: personal rule has the quality of initiative: the rule of law has that of impartiality. (Aristotles Politics Oxford p. 123) 

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Civic law and universal law

True law is Reason, right and natural, commanding people to fulfil their obligations and prohibiting and deterring the, from doing wrong. (Cicero - Selected Works - Penguin - p.7)

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Methods of combating crimes

Another result is passionate desire for excessive wealth, for unendurable tyranny and ultimately for the most horrible and repulsive things imaginable. The perverted intelligence of men who are animated by such feelings are competent to understand the material rewards, but not the penalties. I do not mean penalties established by such feelings are competent to understand the material rewards, but not the penalties. I do not mean penalties established by the law, for these they often escape. I mean the most terrible of all punishment: their own degradation. (Cicero - Selected Works - Penguin - p.171)

Now law and philosophy have their different met those of combating sharp practice. The law attempts its conquest by forcible coercion, the philosophy by reasoning and logic, which they argue, make any employment of deception, preference of trickery out of the question. (Cicero - Selected Works - Penguin - p.184)

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Lawyers

Pretending one thing and doing another a masterly reply, characteristic of a lawyer so expert in farming definitions. (Cicero - Selected Works - Penguin - p.181)

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On punishment for a crime

The punishment for crime frightens the criminal much less, because he himself complains (morally) monumentally. (Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime e Castigo (Editora 34)

The individual is a victim of his environment. (Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime e Castigo (Editora 34)

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Law on extraordinary people

Better people: it would be folly to attempt to legislate for them; they might reply to such an attempt with the words used by the lions in the fables of Antisthenes (“where are your claws and teeth?”), when the hares were making orations and claiming that all the animals should have equal status. (Aristotles Politics Oxford p. 117)

Ordinary (Can not do crime) Ex: you. He tried to be an extraordinary man, but he found happiness not ordinary, love. (Every lie leads to a truth) (Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Crime e Castigo (Editora 34)

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