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It is therefore necessary that memorable things should be committed to writing, (the witness of times, the light and the life of truth,) and not wholly betaken [i.e., committed] to slippery memory which seldom yields a certain reckoning.

— Edward Coke Les Reports de Edward Coke (1660)

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Memory

More quotes by Edward Coke

A man's house is his castle — et domus sua cuique est tutissimum refugium.

Institutes of the Laws of England (1628)

Magna Charta is such a fellow, that he will have no sovereign.

It is better to endure every evil than to consent to evil.

Institutes of the Laws of England (1628)

Fraud and deceit abound in these days more than in former times.

Twyne's Case (1602)

Reason is the life of the law; nay, the common law itself is nothing else but reason... The law, which is perfection of reason.

Institutes of the Laws of England (1628)

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In the practical use of our intellect, forgetting is as important a function as recollecting.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Edward Coke (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.