Therefore he who bids the law rule may be deemed to bid
God and Reason alone rule, but he who bids man rule adds an element of
the beast; for desire is a wild beast, and passion perverts the
minds of rulers, even when they are the best of men. The law is reason
unaffected by desire. We are told that a patient should call in a
physician; he will not get better if he is doctored out of a book. But
the parallel of the arts is clearly not in point; for the physician
does nothing contrary to rule from motives of friendship; he only
cures a patient and takes a fee; whereas magistrates do many things
from spite and partiality. And, indeed, if a man suspected the
physician of being in league with his enemies to destroy him for a
bribe, he would rather have recourse to the book. But certainly
physicians, when they are sick, call in other physicians, and
training-masters, when they are in training, other training-masters,
as if they could not judge judge truly about their own case and
might be influenced by their feelings. Hence it is evident that in
seeking for justice men seek for the mean or neutral, for the law is
the mean. Again, customary laws have more weight, and relate to more
important matters, than written laws, and a man may be a safer ruler
than the written law, but not safer than the customary law.
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