Tuesday, May 05, 2020
Harmful and Pernicious Measures
Cicero, On the Laws 2.5.13 (tr. Niall Rudd):
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What of the fact that many harmful and pernicious measures are passed in human communities—measures which come no closer to the name of laws than if a gang of criminals agreed to make some rules? If ignorant unqualifed people prescribe a lethal, instead of a healing, treatment, that treatment cannot properly be called 'medical'. In a community a law of just any kind will not be a law, even if the people (in spite of its harmful character) have accepted it.The Latin text with an image of the critical apparatus from J.G.F. Powell, ed., M. Tullius Ciceronis De Re Publica, De Legibus, Cato Maior De Senectute, Laelius De Amicitia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 199:
Quid quod multa perniciose, multa pestifere sciscuntur in populis, quae non magis legis nomen attingunt quam si latrones aliquas consessu suo sanxerint? Nam neque medicorum praecepta dici vere possunt, si quae inscii imperitique pro salutaribus mortifera conscripserint, neque in populo lex cuicuimodi fuerit illa, etiamsi perniciosum aliquid populus acceperit.
