Quotes About Authority

Whenever law ends, tyranny begins

Hence it is a mistake to think, that the supreme or legislative power of any common-wealth, can do what it will, and dispose of the estates of the subject arbitrarily, or take any part of them at pleasure.

the law of the land, which is not to be violated.

So that God, by commanding to subdue, gave authority so far to appropriate: and the condition of human life, which requires labour and materials to work on, necessarily introduces private possessions.

That all government is absolute monarchy." And the ground he builds on is this, "That no man is born free.

flatter princes with an opinion, that they have a divine right to absolute power, let the laws by which they are constituted and are to govern, and the conditions under which they enter upon their authority, be what they will ; and their engagements to observe them ever so well ratified by solemn oaths and promises.

El fin de la ley no es abolir o restringir, sino preservar y ampliar la libertad. Para todos los estados de seres creados, capaces de derecho, donde no hay ley, no hay libertad.

Por ser cada hombre, según se mostró, naturalmente libre, sin que nada alcance a ponerle en sujeción, bajo ningún poder de la tierra, como no sea su propio consentimiento

This makes it lawful for a man to kill a thief

governments must be left again to the old way of being made by contrivance and the consent of men

or a man's own consent subjects him to a superior.

To avoid this state of war (wherein there is no appeal but to Heaven, and wherein every the least difference is apt to end, where there is no authority to decide between the contenders) is one great reason of men's putting themselves into society, and quitting the state of nature:

And therefore the punishment of those who would not follow him, was to lose their souls, i. e. their lives

Freedom, then, is not what sir Robert Filmer tells us, O.A. 55, " a liberty for every one to do what he lists, to live as he pleases, and not to be tied by any laws :" but freedom of men under government is, to have a standing rule to live by, common to every one of the society

The great and cheif end, therefore, of men uniting into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property; to which in the state of Nature there are many things wanting

having by his fault forfeited his own life, by some act that deserves death; he, to whom he has forfeited it, may (when he has him in his power) delay to take it, and make use of him to his own service, and he does him no injury by it:

Kings are above the laws

Though it be ever so plain, that there ought to be government in the world

submission to government be every one's duty

man can never be obliged in conscience to submit to any power, unless he can be satisfied who is the person who has a right to exercise that power over him.

distinction between pirates and lawful princes; he that has force is without any more ado to be obeyed, and crowns and sceptres would become the inheritance only of violence and rapine.

If kings, who are not heirs to Adam, have no right to sovereignty, we are all free

equality which all men are in, in respect of jurisdiction or dominion one over another; which was the equality I there spoke of, as proper to the business in hand, being that equal right that every man hath to his natural freedom, without being subjected to the will or authority of any other man.

it will destroy the authority of the present governors, and absolve the people from subjection to them, since they, having no better claim than others to that power, which is alone the fountain of all authority, can have no title to rule over them.