_P._ If you had said that no act could pass without their knowledge, then indeed they had been bound to take notice of them; but none can have knowledge of them but the members of the houses of Parliament; therefore the rest of the people are excused. Or else the knights of the shire should be bound to furnish people with a sufficient number of copies, at the people’s charge, of the acts of Parliament, at their return into the country; that every man may resort to them, and by themselves, or friends, take notice of what they are obliged to. For otherwise it were impossible they should be obeyed: and that no man is bound to do a thing impossible, is one of Sir Edward Coke’s maxims at the common-law. I know that most of the statutes are printed; but it does not appear that every man is bound to buy the book of statutes, nor to search for them at Westminster or at the Tower, nor to understand the language wherein they are for the most part written. _L._ I grant it proceeds from their own faults; but no man can be excused by ignorance of the law of reason, that is to say, by ignorance of the common-law, except children, madmen, and idiots. But you exact such a notice of the statute-law, as is almost impossible. Is it not enough that they in all places have a sufficient number of the penal statutes? _P._ Yes; if they have those penal statutes near them. But what reason can you give me why there should not be as many copies abroad of the statutes, as there be of the Bible? _L._ I think it were well that every man that can read, had a statute-book; for certainly no knowledge of those laws, by which men’s lives and fortunes can be brought into danger, can be too much. I find a great fault in your definition of law; which is, that every law either forbiddeth or commandeth something. It is true that the moral law is always a command or a prohibition, or at least implieth it. But in the Levitical law, where it is said that he that stealeth a sheep shall restore fourfold, what command or prohibition lieth in these words? _P._ Such sentences as that are not in themselves general, but judgments; nevertheless, there is in those words implied a commandment to the judge, to cause to be made a fourfold restitution. _L._ That is right. _P._ Now define what justice is, and what actions and men are to be called just. _L._ Justice is the constant will of giving to every man his own; that is to say, of giving to every man that which is his right, in such manner as to exclude the right of all men else to the same thing. A just action is that which is not against the law. A just man is he that hath a constant will to live justly; if you require more, I doubt there will no man living be comprehended within the definition.