When you are writing laws you are testing words to find their utmost power. Like spells, they have to make… — Hilary Mantel
When you are writing laws you are testing words to find their utmost power. Like spells, they have to make things happen in the real world, and like spells, they only work if people believe in them. If your law exacts a penalty, you must be able to enforce it—on the rich as well as the poor, the people on the Scottish borders and the Welsh marches, the men of Cornwall as well as the men of Sussex and Kent.
p. 533Source: Wikiquote · CC BY-SA 4.0
More from this book
The cardinal used to say, the English will forgive a king anything, until he tries to tax them.
p. 332
A lie is no less a lie because it is a thousand years old.
p. 525
When have I, when have I ever forced anyone to do anything, he starts to say: but Richard cuts in, “No, you don’t, I agree, it’s just that you are practiced at persuading, and sometimes it’s quite difficult, sir to distinguish being persuaded by you from being knocked down in street and stamped on.”
p. 406
