Quotes About Justice

God's law is 'right reason.' When perfectly understood it is called 'wisdom.' When applied by government in regulating human relations it is called 'justice.

We are bound by the law, so that we may be free.

They who say that we should love our fellow-citizens but not foreigners, destroy the universal brotherhood of mankind, with which benevolence and justice would perish forever

Here is a man whose life and actions the world has already condemned - yet whose enormous fortune...has already brought him acquittal!

Lucius Cassius ille quem populus Romanus verissimum et sapientissimum iudicem putabat identidem in causis quaerere solebat 'cui bono' fuisset. The famous Lucius Cassius, whom the Roman people used to regard as a very honest and wise judge, was in the habit of asking, time and again, 'To whose benefit?

Those wars are unjust which are undertaken without provocation. For only a war waged for revenge or defense can be just.

The good life is impossible without a good state; and there is no greater blessing than a well-ordered state.

There is no doubt that a person who is called generous and open-handed has duty in mind, not gain. So likewise justice looks for no prize and no price; it is sought for itself, and is at once the cause and meaning of all the virtues.

We are all servants of the laws in order to be free

Legum servi sumus ut liberi esse possimus

Il y a encore de certains devoirs à remplir envers même de qui nous avons reçu une injure; car la vengeance et la punition ont aussi leurs bornes. Je ne sais même si repentir de celui qui a fait l'injure ne suffirait pas et pour l'empêcher d'en faire une semblable à l'avenir et pour retenir les autres dans le devoir.

Justice looks for no prize and no price; it is sought for itself, and is at once the cause and meaning of all the virtues. . . . The worst kind of injustice is to look for profit from injustice.

Salus populi suprema est lex [the good of the people is the chief law].

An unjust peace is better than a just war.

Men think they may justly do that for which they have a precedent.

We are born for justice, and . . . what is just is based, not on opinion, but on nature.

Nothing is more damaging to a state, nothing so contrary to justice and law, nothing less appropriate to a civilized community, than to force through a measure by violence where a country has a settled and established constitution.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Nothing that is devoid of justice can be honorable. It was well said by Plato: "Not only is knowledge, when divorced from justice, to be termed subtlety rather than wisdom; but also the soul prompt to encounter danger, if moved thereto by self-interest, and not by the common good, should have the reputation of audacity rather than of courage.

NOXIAE POENA PAR ESTO (let the punishment fit the crime).

A good country does not begin a war except to defend its honor or to protect itself. ... Wars are unjust if they are undertaken without cause. Only a war waged in retaliation or defense can be considered just. ... No war is honorable unless it is announced and declared or it is for the recovery of property.

It is the function of justice not to do wrong to one's fellow-men; of considerateness , not to wound their feelings; and in this the essence of propriety is best seen.

Magistratum legem esse loquentem, legem autem mutum magistratum

The extreme of right is the extreme of wrong.