Quote

The law is more easily understood by few than many words. For all words are subject to ambiguity, and therefore multiplication of words in the body of the law is multiplication of ambiguity. Besides, it seems to imply (by too much diligence) that whosoever can evade the words is without the compass of the law.

Thomas Hobbes

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Thomas Hobbes
Age: 91 †
Born: 1588
Born: April 5
Died: 1679
Died: December 4
Economist
Historian
Mathematician
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Politician
Translator
Westport
Wiltshire
Hobbes
Thomas Hobbsted
Thomas Hobbes of Malflutry
Words
Compass
Seems
Besides
Body
Easily
Whosoever
Without
Subject
Evade
Many
Therefore
Multiplication
Much
Subjects
Imply
Understood
Diligence
Law
Ambiguity

More quotes by Thomas Hobbes

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To conclude, The Light of humane minds is Perspicuous Words, but by exact definitions first snuffed, and purged from ambiguity Reason is the pace Encrease of Science, the way and the Benefit of man-kind, the end.
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The value or worth of a man is, as of all other things, his price that is to say, so much as would be given for the use of his power.
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Thoughts are to the Desires as Scouts and Spies, to range abroad, and find the way to the things Desired.
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The Present only has a being in Nature things Past have a being in the Memory only, but things to come have no being at all the Future but a fiction of the mind.
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Life is nasty, brutish, and short
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The oath adds nothing to the obligation. For a covenant, if lawful, binds in the sight of God, without the oath, as much as with it if unlawful, bindeth not at all, though it be confirmed with an oath.
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But yet they that have no Science , are in better, and nobler condition with their naturall Prudence than men, that by their mis-reasoning, or by trusting them that reason wrong, fall upon false and absurd generall rules.
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Every man may think his own cause just till it be heard and judged.
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Understanding is nothing else than conception caused by speech.
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Scientia potentia est, sed parva quia scientia egregia rara est, nec proinde apparens nisi paucissimis, et in paucis rebus. Scientiae enim ea natura est, ut esse intelligi non possit, nisi ab illis qui sunt scientia praediti.
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He that is taken and put into prison or chains is not conquered, though overcome for he is still an enemy.
Thomas Hobbes
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This I know God cannot sin, because his doing a thing makes it just, and consequently, no sin.... And therefore it is blasphemy to say, God can sin but to say, that God can so order the world, as a sin may be necessarily caused thereby in a man, I do not see how it is any dishonor to him.
Thomas Hobbes
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Let a man (as most men do) rate themselves as the highest Value they can yet their true Value is no more than it is esteemed by others.
Thomas Hobbes
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Seeing then that truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that seeketh precise truth, had need to remember what every name he uses stands for and to place it accordingly or else he will find himself entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twigs the more he struggles, the more belimed.
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The law is the public conscience.
Thomas Hobbes
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No Discourse whatsoever, can End in absolute Knowledge of Fact.
Thomas Hobbes
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The first cause of Absurd conclusions I ascribe to the want of Method.
Thomas Hobbes
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It is not easy to fall into any absurdity, unless it be by the length of an account wherein he may perhaps forget what went before. For all men by nature reason alike, and well, when they have good principles.
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As, in Sense, that which is really within us, is (as I have said before) only Motion, caused by the action of external objects, but in appearance to the Sight, Light and Color to the Ear, Sound to the Nostril, Odor, &c.
Thomas Hobbes
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True and False are attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither Truth nor Falsehood.
Thomas Hobbes