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Herein indeed consists the excellence of the English government, that all parts of it form a mutual check upon each other.

William Blackstone

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William Blackstone
Age: 56 †
Born: 1723
Born: July 10
Died: 1780
Died: February 14
Barrister
Judge
Jurist
Politician
University Teacher
Writer
the City
Sir William Blackstone
Political
Checks
Form
Mutual
Government
Excellence
English
Parts
Indeed
Herein
Politics
Check
Upon
Consists

More quotes by William Blackstone

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Punishments of unreasonable severity, especially where indiscriminately afflicted, have less effect in preventing crimes, and amending the manners of a people, than such as are more merciful in general, yet properly intermixed with due distinctions of severity.
William Blackstone
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The most universal and effectual way of discovering the true meaning of law, when the words are dubious, is by considering the reason and spirit of it or the cause which moved the legislator to enact it. for when this reason ceased, the law itself ought likewise to cease with it.
William Blackstone
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By marriage the husband and wife are one person in law, that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during marriage.
William Blackstone
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If [the legislature] will positively enact a thing to be done, the judges are not at liberty to reject it, for that were to set the judicial power above that of the legislature, which would be subversive of all government.
William Blackstone
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Men was formed for society, and is neither capable of living alone, nor has the courage to do it.
William Blackstone
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Until the content of a belief is made clear, the appeal to accept the belief on faith is beside the point, for one would not know what one has accepted. The request for the meaning of a religious belief is logically prior to the question of accepting that belief on faith or to the question of whether that belief constitutes knowledge.
William Blackstone
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Man..must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being..And, consequently, as man depends absolutely upon his Maker for everything, it is necessary that he should in all points conform to his Maker's will.
William Blackstone
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Free men have arms slaves do not.
William Blackstone
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Every wanton and causeless restraint of the will of the subject, whether practiced by a monarch, a nobility, or a popular assembly, is a degree of tyranny.
William Blackstone
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The law, which restrains a man from doing mischief to his fellow citizens, though it diminishes the natural, increases the civil liberty of mankind.
William Blackstone
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The law rarely hesitates in declaring its own meaning but the Judges are frequently puzzled to find out the meaning of others.
William Blackstone
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No outward doors of a man's house can in general be broken open to execute any civil process though in criminal cases the public safety supersedes the private.
William Blackstone
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Mankind will not be reasoned out of the feelings of humanity.
William Blackstone
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In all tyrannical governments the supreme magistracy, or the right both of making and of enforcing the laws, is vested in one and the same man, or one and the same body of men and wherever these two powers are united together, there can be no public liberty.
William Blackstone
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The royal navy of England hath ever been its greatest defence and ornament it is its ancient and natural strength, - the floating bulwark of our island.
William Blackstone
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No enactment of man can be considered law unless it conforms to the law of God
William Blackstone
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[Self-defense is] justly called the primary law of nature, so it is not, neither can it be in fact, taken away by the laws of society.
William Blackstone
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Man must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator. This will of his Maker is called the Law of Nature. This Law of Nature is superior to any other. No human laws are of any validity if contrary to this.
William Blackstone
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The Bible has always been regarded as part of the Common Law of England.
William Blackstone
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There is nothing which so generally strikes the imagination and engages the affections of mankind, as the right of property.
William Blackstone