It is not wisdom but Authority that makes a law
Interpretation
Law is established through authority rather than wisdom.
In this quote, Thomas Hobbes emphasizes the distinction between wisdom and authority in the context of law. He suggests that laws are created and enforced by those in power regardless of whether they are wise, indicating that the legitimacy of law comes more from the authority that enacts it than from the moral or intellectual justification of its content.
In practice
During a debate on whether laws should be based on moral wisdom, one could use this quote to emphasize the role of authority in lawmaking.
Baptism is the sacrament of allegiance of them that are to be received into the Kingdom of God, that is to say, into Eternal life, that is to say, to Remission of Sin. For as Eternal life was lost by the committing, so it is recovered by the remitting of men's sins.
Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.
For it is not the shape, but their use, that makes them angels.
For to accuse requires less eloquence, such is man's nature, than to excuse; and condemnation, than absolution, more resembles justice.
Scientia potentia est, sed parva; quia scientia egregia rara est, nec proinde apparens nisi paucissimis, et in paucis rebus. Scientiae enim ea natura est, ut esse intelligi non possit, nisi ab illis qui sunt scientia praediti.
The end of knowledge is power ... the scope of all speculation is the performing of some action or thing to be done.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking. Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another ruler with trumpetings again. Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle. Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.
Why is geometry often described as cold and dry? One reason lies in its inability to describe the shape of a cloud, a mountain, a coastline or a tree.
Thatβs the thing with the young these days, isnβt it? They watch too many happy endings. Everything has to be wrapped up, with a smile and a tear and a wave. Everyone has learned, found love, seen the error of their ways, discovered the joys of monogamy, or fatherhood, or filial duty, or life itself. In my day, people got shot at the end of films, after learning only that life is hollow, dismal, brutish, and short.
There is no avoiding the fact that we live at the mercy of our ideas This is never more true than with our ideas about God.
Neither by nature, then, nor contrary to nature do the virtues arise in us; rather we are adapted by nature to receive them, and are made perfect by habit.
War is not in itself a condition so much as the symptom of a condition, that of international anarchy. If we wish to substitute for war the settlement of disputes by justice, we must first substitute for the condition of international anarchy a condition of international order
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