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i know i've used this quote before, but it's far too perfect not to repeat. It's from Bolt's play "A Man for All Seasons" which is about Sir Thomas More. Here, More chastises his overly eager son in law, Roper. It is the best defense of the practice of the rule of law that i've ever seen...and one of my all time favorite moments of cinema.
Roper: So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law!
More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
Roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that!
More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you—where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast—man’s laws, not God’s—and if you cut them down—and you’re just the man to do it—d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.
More of course looses his head to the very danger he warns of, the bending of law to accomplish convinence. I believe that we practice an imperfect and often unsatisfying system of law, even when it protects the repugnant...because the alternative is the only thing that's worse.
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For God so loved creation, that God sent God's only Son that whosoever believed should not perish, but have everlasting life.
-John 3:16
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