William Blackstone Quotes

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.

It is better that ten guilty persons escape than one innocent suffer.

No enactment of man can be considered law unless it conforms to the law of God

[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.

Free men have arms; slaves do not.

Law is the embodiment of the moral sentiment of the people.

So great moreover is the regard of the law for private property, that it will not authorize the least violation of it; no, not even for the general good of the whole community.

The public good is in nothing more essentially interested, than in the protection of every individual's private rights.

Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws.

The husband and wife are one, and that one is the husband.

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.

The Bible has always been regarded as part of the Common Law of England.

The law, which restrains a man from doing mischief to his fellow citizens, though it diminishes the natural, increases the civil liberty of mankind.

Mankind will not be reasoned out of the feelings of humanity.

That the king can do no wrong is a necessary and fundamental principle of the English constitution.

Men was formed for society, and is neither capable of living alone, nor has the courage to do it.

There is nothing which so generally strikes the imagination and engages the affections of mankind, as the right of property.

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.

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.

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

The law rarely hesitates in declaring its own meaning; but the Judges are frequently puzzled to find out the meaning of others.

The third absolute right, inherent in every Englishman, is that of . . . the sacred and inviolable rights of private property.

Time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.

No enactment of man can be considered law unless it conforms to the law of God.

It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.