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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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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
Two
Powers
Together
Supreme
Government
Laws
Body
Liberty
Enforcing
Right
Public
Tyrannical
Men
Law
Vested
United
Governments
Making
Wherever

More quotes by William Blackstone

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No enactment of man can be considered law unless it conforms to the law of God
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Free men have arms slaves do not.
William Blackstone
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The Bible has always been regarded as part of the Common Law of England.
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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.
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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.
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There is nothing which so generally strikes the imagination and engages the affections of mankind, as the right of property.
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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.
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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.
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The public good is in nothing more essentially interested, than in the protection of every individual's private rights.
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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.
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Gaming is a kind of tacit confession that the company engaged therein do in general exceed the bounds of their respective fortunes, and therefore they cast lots to determine upon whom the ruin shall at present fall, that the rest may be saved a little longer.
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 sciences are of a sociable disposition, and flourish best in the neighborhood of each other nor is there any branch of learning but may be helped and improved by assistance drawn from other arts.
William Blackstone
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It is better that ten guilty persons escape than one innocent suffer.
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.
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Time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.
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Law is the embodiment of the moral sentiment of the people.
William Blackstone