Quotes About Justice

A civilization must have laws, but there cannot be justice when a man with no conscience metes out sentences without compassion or mercy.

Steal five dollars and you're a common thief. Steal thousands and you're either the government or a hero.

I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are good people and bad people. You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides.

And then Jack chopped down what was the world's last beanstalk, adding murder and ecological terrorism to the theft, enticement, and trespass charges already mentioned, and all the giant's children didn't have a daddy anymore. But he got away with it and lived happily ever after, without so much as a guilty twinge about what he had done...which proves that you can be excused for just about anything if you are a hero, because no one asks inconvenient questions.

Granny was an old-fashioned witch. She didn't do good for people, she did right by them.

You can't go around building a better world for people. Only people can build a better world for people. Otherwise it's just a cage. Besides you don't build a better world by choppin' heads off and giving decent girls away to frogs.

Two types of people laugh at the law: those that break it and those that make it.

Cheery was aware that Commander Vimes didn't like the phrase 'The innocent have nothing to fear', believing the innocent had everything to fear, mostly from the guilty but in the longer term even more from those who say things like 'The innocent have nothing to fear'.

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Take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy. and yet... and yet you act as if there is some ideal order in the world, as if there is some... some rightness in the universe by which it may be judged.

Verence would rather cut his own leg off than put a witch in prison, since it'd save trouble in the long run and probably be less painful.

You just put that sword away, sir, please, said the voice of Lance-Constable Vimes. You will not shoot me, you young idiot. That would be murder, said the captain calmly. Not where I'm aiming, sir.

Truth! Freedom! Justice! And a hard-boiled egg!

It's daft, locking us up, said Nanny. I'd have had us killed. That's because you're basically good, said Magrat. The good are innocent and create justice. The bad are guilty, which is why they invent mercy.

Ah, said Mr Pin. Right. I remember. You are concerned citizens. He knew about concerned citizens. Wherever they were, they all spoke the same private language, where 'traditional values' meant 'hang someone'.

It's not lying when you do it to officers!

but what should we do when the highborn and wealthy take to crime? Indeed, if a poor man will spend a year in prison for stealing out of hunger, how high would the gallows need to be to hang the rich man who breaks the law out of greed?

YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES. So we can believe the big ones? YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

you were so worried about legal and illegal that you never stopped to think about whether it was right or wrong.

You are in favour of the common people?" said Dragon mildly. The common people?" said Vimes. "They're nothing special. They're no different from the rich and powerful except they've got no money or power. But the law should be there to balance things up a bit. So I suppose I've got to be on their side.

THERE'S NO JUSTICE, said Mort. JUST US.

Vimes had once discussed the Ephebian idea of 'democracy' with Carrot, and had been rather interested in the idea that everyone had a vote until he found out that while he, Vimes, would have a vote, there was no way in the rules that anyone could prevent Nobby Nobbs from having one as well. Vimes could see the flaw there straight away.

War, Nobby. Huh! What is it good for? he said. Dunno, Sarge. Freeing slaves, maybe? Absol—well, okay. Defending yourself against a totalitarian aggressor? All right, I'll grant you that, but— Saving civilization from a horde of— It doesn't do any good in the long run is what I'm saying, Nobby, if you'd listen for five seconds together, said Fred Colon sharply. Yeah, but in the long run, what does, Sarge?

That's the way it was. Privilege, which just means 'private law.' Two types of people laugh at the law; those that break it and those that make it.