Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
Justice Quotes
By a wide margin the most quotes here are Shakespeare’s, and the two judges who follow him, Lord Mansfield and Lord Kenyon, are a sign that this page leans on the bench as much as the stage. Seneca and John Rawls fill out the top five.
Among the sourced entries, Bierce’s definition from 1911 describes justice as a commodity the State sells to citizens as a reward for their allegiance, taxes and personal service. Sartre’s Dirty Hands (1948) and Wilde’s Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898) are here for what they say about guilt, not courts.
Three lines carry flags: Marlowe’s “the justice of my quarrel,” Augustine on charity and withheld justice, and a Martin Luther King Jr. line about peace and justice being goals for man.
It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing.
Jesus wanted to liberate everyone from the law — from all laws.
It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing.
I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions.
That which is not just, is not Law; and that which is not Law, ought not to be obeyed.
True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is the presence of justice.
The law will never make men free; it is men who have got to make the law free.
Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe.
As man seeks justice in equality, so society seeks order in anarchy.