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Ignorance of the law excuses no man not that all men know the law, but because 'tis an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to refute him.

John Selden

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John Selden
Age: 69 †
Born: 1584
Born: December 16
Died: 1654
Died: November 30
Jurist
Politician
Writer
Men
Refute
Plead
Excuses
Excuse
Ignorance
Law
Tell
Every

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The world cannot be governed without juggling.
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Opinion is something wherein I go about to give reasons why all the world should think as I think.
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The House of Commons is called the Lower House, in twenty Acts of Parliament but what are twenty Acts of Parliament amongst Friends?
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Pride may be allowed to this or that degree, else a man cannot keep up dignity. In gluttony there must be eating, in drunkenness there must be drinking 'tis not the eating, and 'tis not the drinking that must be blamed, but the excess. So in pride.
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Prayer should be short, without giving God Almighty reasons why He should grant this or that He knows best wheat is good for us. If your boy should ask you for a suit of clothes and give you reasons, would you endure it? You know his needs better than he let him ask for a suit of clothes.
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Few men make themselves masters of the things they write or speak.
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All things are God's already we can give him no right, by consecrating any, that he had not before, only we set it apart to his service - just as a gardener brings his master a basket of apricots, and presents them his lord thanks him, and perhaps gives him something for his pains, and yet the apricots were as much his lord's before as now.
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Idolatry is in a man's own thought, not in the opinion of another.
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No man is the wiser for his learning
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He that hath a scrupulous conscience is like a horse that is not well weighed he starts at every bird that flies out of the hedge.
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There was never a merry world since the fairies left off dancing.
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No man is the wiser for his learning it may administer matter to work in, or objects to work upon but wit and wisdom are born with a man.
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The happiness of married life depends upon making small sacrifices with readiness and cheerfulness.
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A gallant man is above ill words.
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If the prisoner should ask the judge whether he would be content to be hanged, were he in his case, he would answer no. Then, says the prisoner, do as you would be done to.
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More solid things do not show the complexion of the times so well as Ballads and Libels.
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Religion is like the fashion, one man wears his doublet slashed, another lashed, another plain but every man has a doublet so every man has a religion. We differ about the trimming.
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Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet every body is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.
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The clergy would have us believe them against our own reason, as the woman would have her husband against his own eyes.
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Marriage is a desperate thing.
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