H. Belloc (1870-1953), "The Barbarians,"
This and That and the Other (New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1912), pp. 273-283 (at 281-282):
The Barbarian hopes—and that is the very
mark of him—that he can have his cake and
eat it too. He will consume what civilisation
has slowly produced after generations of selection and effort but he will not be at the pains
to replace such goods nor indeed has he a comprehension of the virtue that has brought them
into being. Discipline seems to him irrational,
on which account he is for ever marvelling that
civilisation should have offended him with priests
and soldiers.
The Barbarian wonders what strange meaning may lurk in that ancient and solemn truth,
"Sine Auctoritate nulla vita."
In a word, the Barbarian is discoverable
everywhere in this that he cannot make; that he
can befog or destroy, but that he cannot sustain; and of every Barbarian in the decline or
peril of every civilisation exactly that has been true.
Herbert Weir Smyth,
Aeschylean Tragedy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1924), p. 231, attributes "Sine Auctoritate nulla vita" to Augustine, but he doesn't cite a source and I can't find one.
Cf. Antonio-Maria Bensa,
Juris Naturalis Universi Summa, Vol. I (Paris: Leroux et Joury, 1855), p. 351:
nam sicuti societas nulla est sine auctoritate, ita etiam auctoritas nulla esse potest sine societate.
From Joel Eidsath:
John Milton said something similar (and far more Miltonic): Sine magistratibus enim, et civili gubernatione, nulla respublica, nulla societas humana, nulla vita esse potest.
https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Works_of_John_Milton/8QUzAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=nulla+vita&pg=PA61&printsec=frontcover
Milton's version seems far superior and possibly worth quoting and summarizing by others. But maybe Milton was adapting from some source. Maybe not even a Latin source?
It reminds me of Mimnermus, who had a far different set of priorities: τίς δὲ βίος, τί δὲ τερπνὸν ἄτερ χρυσῆς ᾿Αφροδίτης;
Kevin Muse draws my attention to Belloc's
Marie Antoinette, 5th ed. (London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1923), p. 78:
The Idea was that of the Gallic formula "without Authority there is no life"—for Authority is Authorship: this Gallic formula also sustains the Faith.
Cf. Metternich,
Mémoires, Troisième partie:
La Période de repos (1848-1859), Tome 8 (Paris: Plon, 1884), p. 205:
[S]ans ordre il n'y a pas de vie sociale, et ... sans autorité il n'est point d'ordre possible.