Dorothy L. Sayers Quotes

No wonder we have a lot of violence in Rio: the corrupt and violent policemen meet the violent criminals in the streets. What else is going to happen?

We have crime without punishment.

The most malign of all these dangers today is disregard and disobedience of law. Crime is increasing. Confidence in rigid and speedy justice is decreasing.

You have seen for a long time the great disorder in the world caused by these crimes. It is so bad in some of your provinces, I am told, and you are so weak in the administration of justice, that one can hardly go along the road by day or night without being attacked by robbers; and whether at home or abroad one is in danger of being despoiled either by force or fraud.

Swindlers and murderers never agree, for they practice distinct professions

There is no more justice in France. There is only the revolver.

Never has law and order been so disdained.

There's just things that are against the law.

I was stopped in the dense Soviet wood by bandits who called themselves my judges.

Crime has always been a regrettably consistent element of the human experience.

I think there are certain crimes which the law cannot touch, and which therefore, to some extent, justify private revenge.

It's the same in real life: Notorious murderers get off scot-free and live happily all their lives, while good people die - sometimes the very best people. That's the way of the world.

Unfortunately, the truth is that people do go scot-free and it's unfair. A lot of the top drug people who have been arrested are also free.

The storm center of lawlessness in every American State is the State Capitol. It is there that the worst crimes are committed; it is there that lawbreaking attains to the estate and dignity of a learned profession; it is there that contempt for the laws is engendered, fostered, and spread broadcast.

We're living in a den of thieves

(Chicago is) the only major city in the country where you can easily buy your way out of a murder rap.

One who is by nature daring and is suffering from poverty will not long be law-abiding. Indeed, any men, save those that are truly good, if their sufferings are very great, will be likely to rebel.

The time has arrived when patience becomes a crime and mayhem appears garbed in a manner of virtue

It is a great injustice to persecute homosexuality as a crime, and cruelty too

To this war of every man against every man, this also in consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have there no place. Where there is no common power, there is no law, where no law, no injustice. Force, and fraud, are in war the cardinal virtues.

There are people who are at fault for one or another problem. These people are very avaricious and self-serving. They're not doing it just to do it; they're doing it for the money. That money, they keep here. When you say, "We're going to find these people, these guilty people, the ones who are not only breaking laws but are also hurting their own fellow country people," and you say, "We're going to punish them, specifically, that's a step in the right direction."

Steal five dollars and you're a common thief. Steal thousands and you're either the government or a hero.

The world is full of religion, and full of misery and crime.

Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms.

Thus, after a period of about two thousand years the greatest crime became to worship a god other than the God of Moses, whereas injustice became a minor sin. I began to ask myself how this change had come about. Was it linked to a new order in which the female goddesses had been replaced by one male god?