We do not need more laws. No country suffers from a shortage of laws. We need a new model.

It would be better to have no laws at all than to have them in such profusion as we do.

All laws which can be violated without doing any one any injury are laughed at. Nay, so far are they from doing anything to control the desires and passions of men that, on the contrary, they direct and incite men's thoughts the more toward those very objects, for we always strive toward what is forbidden and desire the things we are not allowed to have. And men of leisure are never deficient in the ingenuity needed to enable them to outwit laws framed to regulate things which cannot be entirely forbidden... He who tries to determine everything by law will foment crime rather than lessen it.

The moderate person contains opposing capacities to the nth degree. A moderate person can start out hot on both ends, both fervent in a capacity for rage and fervent in a desire for order, both Apollonian at work and Dionysian at play, both strong in faith and deeply doubtful, both Adam I and Adam II. A moderate person can start out with these divisions and rival tendencies, but to live a coherent life, the moderate must find a series of balances and proportions. The moderate is forever seeking a series of temporary arrangements, embedded in the specific situation of the moment, that will help him or her balance the desire for security with the desire for risk, the call of liberty with the need for restraint. The moderate knows there is no ultimate resolution to these tensions. Great matters cannot be settled by taking into account just one principle or one viewpoint. Governing is more like sailing in a storm: shift your weight one way when the boat tilts to starboard, shift your weight the other way when it tilts to port — adjust and adjust and adjust to circumstances to keep the semblance and equanimity of an even keel.

The reason to moderate is to avoid having to quit.

Moral laws are set as a curb and restraint to these exorbitant desires, which they cannot be but by rewards and punishments, that will over-balance the satisfaction any one shall propose to himself in the breach of the law.

When mores are sufficient, laws are unnecessary. When mores are insufficient, laws are unenforceable.

I am further of opinion that it would be better for us to have [no laws] at all than to have them in so prodigious numbers as we have.

good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws

Moderation, in the pursuit of honors or riches, is the only security against disappointment and vexation. A wise man, therefore, will prefer the simplicity of rustic life to the magnificence of courts.

Things tend to organise themselves. If there is any message from contemporary science, it is surely that. I am very fond of the anarchist proverb regarding laws – good people have no need for them, bad people pay no attention to them, what are they there for, other than as a symbol of power – ‘We can say this is law’. I could say I rule the universe, it depends on whether anyone believes me or not. To some degree, I don’t think the authorities care whether the law is observed or not, as long as it is there, and everyone accepts the idea of law. As long as they buy into the idea of law.

We do not need to get good laws to restrain bad people. We need to get good people to restrain us from bad laws.

He who seeks to regulate everything by law is more likely to arouse vices than to reform them. It is best to grant what cannot be abolished, even though it be in itself harmful. How many evils spring from luxury, envy, avarice, drunkenness and the like, yet these are tolerated because they cannot be prevented by legal enactments.

Laws, at best, are attempts to control a population, and work only sporadically with great expense and hardship. Other common behaviorcontrol methods are patriotism, religion, propaganda, and nationalism. All manmade laws are developed to preserve the established order.