William Blackstone Quotes

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

William Blackstone

Men, Law, Conform

58 Copy quote
Law is the embodiment of the moral sentiment of the people.

William Blackstone

Law, People, Embodiment

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

William Blackstone

Justice, Suffering, Innocence

"Abridgment of Blackstone's Commentaries".

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[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.

William Blackstone

Taken, Self, Law

Sir William Blackstone, John Fletcher Hargrave, George Sweet, Sir Richard Couch, William Newland Welsby (1852). “Commentaries on the Laws of England: In Four Books : with an Analysis of the Work”, p.3

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

William Blackstone

Rights, Liberty, Internet

Sir William Blackstone, Edward Christian, John Frederick Archbold, Joseph Chitty (1827). “Commentaries on the Laws of England”, p.101

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Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture.

William Blackstone

Men, Rights, Law

William Blackstone (1922). “Commentaries on the Laws of England: In Four Books”, p.45, The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.

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Man must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator. This will of his Maker is called the Law of Nature. This Law of Nature is superior to any other. No human laws are of any validity if contrary to this.

William Blackstone

Men, Law, Makers

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The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state: but this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published. Every freeman has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public: to forbid this, is to destroy the freedom of the press: but if he publishes what is improper, mischievous, or illegal, he must take the consequence of his own temerity.

William Blackstone

Liberty, Matter, Criminals

Sir William Blackstone, Joseph Chitty, Edward Christian, John Eykyn Hovenden, Thomas Lee (1861). “Commentaries on the laws of England: in four books, with an analysis of the work”

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Free men have arms; slaves do not.

William Blackstone

Men, Arms, Slave

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THIS law of nature, being co-eval with mankind and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all their force, and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original.

William Blackstone

God, Country, Law

Sir William Blackstone (1973). “The Sovereignty of the Law: Selections from Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England”, p.29, Springer

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And these great natural rights may be reduced to three principal or primary articles: the right of personal security; the right of personal liberty; and the right of private property; because as there is no other known method of compulsion, or of abridging man's natural free will, but by an infringement or diminution of one or other of these important rights, the preservation of these, inviolate, may justly be said to include the preservation of our civil immunities in their largest and most extensive sense.

William Blackstone

Wisdom, Men, Rights

Sir William BLACKSTONE, Samuel Warren (1856). “Blackstone's Commentaries systematically abridged and adapted to the existing state of the law and constitution, with great additions. By Samuel Warren”, p.101

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

William Blackstone

Husband, Wife, Husband And Wife

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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.

William Blackstone

Law, Community, Violation

William Blackstone (2016). “The Oxford Edition of Blackstone's: Commentaries on the Laws of England: Book I: Of the Rights of Persons”, p.206, Oxford University Press

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

William Blackstone

God, Law, Two

Sir William Blackstone, Edward Christian, John Frederick Archbold, Joseph Chitty (1827). “Commentaries on the Laws of England”, p.28

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

William Blackstone

Bible, Christian, Law

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Trial by jury is a privilege of the highest and most beneficial nature [and] our most important guardian both of public and private liberty. The liberties of England cannot but subsist so long as this palladium remains sacred and inviolate, not only from all open attacks, ... but also from all secret machinations, which may sap and undermine it.

William Blackstone

Long, Secret, Important

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If [the legislature] will positively enact a thing to be done, the judges are not at liberty to reject it, for that were to set the judicial power above that of the legislature, which would be subversive of all government.

William Blackstone

Government, Judging, Rejection

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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.

William Blackstone

Degrees, Assembly, Tyranny

Sir William Blackstone, John Fletcher Hargrave, George Sweet, Sir Richard Couch, William Newland Welsby (1852). “Commentaries on the Laws of England : in Four Books, with an Analysis of the Work”, p.126

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Punishments of unreasonable severity, especially where indiscriminately afflicted, have less effect in preventing crimes, and amending the manners of a people, than such as are more merciful in general, yet properly intermixed with due distinctions of severity.

William Blackstone

Punishment, People, Hell

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

William Blackstone

Men, Law, Liberty

Sir William Blackstone (1794). “Commentaries on the laws of England”, p.128

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

William Blackstone

Kings, Government, Political

Commentaries on the Laws of England bk. 3, ch. 17 (1768) See Proverbs 160

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Man..must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being..And, consequently, as man depends absolutely upon his Maker for everything, it is necessary that he should in all points conform to his Maker's will.

William Blackstone

Men, Law, Conformity

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

William Blackstone

Men, Living Alone, Capable

Sir William Blackstone (1865). “The Student's Blackstone: Commentaries on the Laws of England, in Four Books”, p.2

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And, lastly, to vindicate these rights, when actually violated and attacked, the subjects of England are entitled, in the first place, to the regular administration and free course of justice in the courts of law; next to the right of petitioning the king and parliament for redress of grievances; and, lastly, to the right of having and using arms for self preservation and defense.

William Blackstone

Kings, Rights, Self

William Blackstone (2016). “Commentaries on the Laws of England: Of the Rights of People”, p.97, Oxford University Press

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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.

William Blackstone

Husband, Law, Wife

Sir William Blackstone, Edward Christian, John Frederick Archbold, Joseph Chitty (1827). “Commentaries on the Laws of England”, p.343

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Born: July 10, 1723
Died: February 14, 1780
Occupation: Jurist
Cite this Page: Citation

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