Law

Law is “a rule, particularly an established or permanent rule, prescribed by the supreme power of a state to its subjects, for regulating their actions, particularly their social actions. Laws are imperative or mandatory, commanding what shall be done; prohibitory, restraining from what is to be forborn; or permissive, declaring what may be done without incurring a penalty. The laws which enjoin the duties of piety and morality, are prescribed by God and found in the Scriptures. Law is beneficence acting by rule.
  “Law of nature is a rule of conduct arising out of the natural relations of human beings established by the Creator, and existing prior to any positive precept. Thus it is a law of nature, that one man should not injure another, and murder and fraud would be crimes, independent of any prohibition from a supreme power. Physical laws of nature: The invariable tendency or determination of any species of matter to a particular form with definite properties. The determination of a body to certain motions, changes, and relations, which uniformly take place in the same circumstances, is called a physical law. These laws or affections of matter, have been established by the Creator, and are denominated in Scripture, ordinances of heaven.
  “Moral law prescribes to men their religious and social duties, in other words, their duties to God and to each other. The moral law is summarily contained in the ten commandments delivered to Moses on mount Sinai. Ecclesiastical law is a rule of action prescribed for the government of a church; otherwise called canon law.
  “Unwritten or common law is a rule of action which derives its authority from long usage, or established custom As this law can be traced to no positive statutes, its rules or principles are to be found only in the records of courts, and in the reports of judicial decisions: A rule of direction; a directory; as reason and natural conscience.
  “In general, law is a rule of action prescribed for the government of rational beings or moral agents, to which rule they are bound to yield obedience, in default of which they are exposed to punishment; law is a settled mode or course of action or operation in irrational beings and in inanimate bodies. Law is the word of God; the doctrines and precepts of God, or his revealed will. Divine Law is the body of commandments which express the will of God with regard to the conduct of His intelligent creatures, law as communicated by express revelation, especially in the Bible, as implanted by nature in the human mind, or as capable of being demonstrated by reason. Law is what is or is considered right or proper; justice or correctness of conduct.
  “In the disciplines of science and philosophy, law is referred to as ‘natural law,’ or the ‘laws of nature’ originally viewed as commands imposed by the Deity upon nature. Nature’s laws reflect the order and regularity in Nature of which laws are the expression.”—Webster’s American Dictionary, 1828


“Laws define the nature of our relationship with our Source, God as the Light, and govern our relationships, vertically with God, and horizontally with man.”
—Edna Lister


Law, the framework of Creation, describes the nature of the Light, and how Light differentiates into innumerable living souls. Light is the origin and culmination of all being, which holds the potential for all becoming. Laws describe the infinite varieties of forms, all made of Light. Laws define the nature of our relationship with our Source, God as the Light, and govern our relationships, vertically with God, and horizontally with man. Where life does not proceed according to the rule of law, the result is without structure or form, void, the destructive chaos of confusion. Life without law is a body without a skeleton, unable to rise above the muck that nourishes protozoa.

Every absolute principle becomes many abstract laws of being and laws of doing. Being is all that God is as potential Wisdom, Love and Power, which becomes Energy. The laws of being include every instance in the Bible where God commands us to “be” some soul quality. Every law of being embodies the foundation of a soul virtue, and leads the soul toward an ideal state of being that we are destined to become.

We form laws of doing to temper abstract principle to suit individual intelligence and consciousness, to control and govern soul unfoldment, behavior and relationships, according to our present degree of understanding and development. The abstract principles of doing or expression are equilibrium, harmony and balance. The laws of doing apply to visible, material things and living souls, and deal with personal expression and action.

The 613 laws of doing include every instance in the Bible where God commands us “Thou shalt” (248 times) or “Thou shalt not” (365 times). Every law of doing directs the soul to the right choice for action; apply this rule to discover many more unrecorded laws.





Edna Lister on Law

Law is perfect, whole and complete now.—Edna Lister, Sermon on the Mount, February 1, 1933.


If you are living by the law and pouring out enough love, no one can take advantage of you.—Edna Lister, Sermon on the Mount, February 1, 1933.


“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”—Proverbs 9:10 refers to obedience to the laws of Wisdom.—Edna Lister, The Beginning of Wisdom, March 15, 1934.


Obeying the letter of the law is not enough; you must include the spirit of the law. Passive obedience to law never satisfies aggressive intellect.—Edna Lister, Recognizing Your Good, April 22, 1934.


Law attempts to define the relation of elements and their behavior toward each other. Law governs relationship. The law governing the relationship of a part to the whole also governs and controls the relationship of part to part, which explains the basis of attaining perfect harmony in all outer relationships.—Edna Lister, Freedom, October 31, 1934.


"Fear of the Lord" is obedience to the law.—Edna Lister, Cooperation in Service, November 18, 1934.


The unity of the law is exact: It comes forth from the invisible and returns into the invisible, all under exact principle or law.—Edna Lister, God as Government, Sunday, January 6, 1935.


“Sufficient unto the day is the evil there of” describes the reaction of law, and the world’s darkness.—Edna Lister, Consider the Lilies, September 8, 1935.


Earth’s expression is how you learn life’s lessons, and how laws work.
  Law reacts perfectly until we are perfected as creator gods.—Edna Lister, The Lord’s Prayer, October 13, 1935.


A miracle is an accelerated natural law, for instance, an increase in life expectancy or freedom.—Edna Lister, Loaves and Fishes, February 21, 1937.


Laws are given from above, not made by created beings. Laws are everlasting, and remain when all Light is withdrawn from a cycle of manifestation. Laws move forth again on wings of Light when a new Day of Manifestation dawns. The heavenly Councils of God apply self-existent universal laws and orders to meet certain creative needs. They release them through mediators such as Moses, Jesus Christ, and prophets. No questioning is allowed. Lights are turned on all alike, groups or individuals.
  Teachers give laws to groups, according to the group’s degree of responsibility. Then the Councils at every degree of ascension watch the colors of individuals and groups, and apply necessary laws and orders impersonally. No group is held back by the lazy or indifferent ones.
  Many places are open to selfless, sacrificial service, and for living in sweetly, firmly final ways. Many high rewards are being freely given to the earth-born for obedience to universal laws and orders. Put your house in order, then allow nothing to disturb your soul’s serenity.—Edna Lister, August 8, 1938.


Greater delight in law will bring you greater results.—Edna Lister, December 14, 1938.


God’s law is your protection and is why you may release heavenly Power on earth. Appropriate much Light and let your words create strongly. You are accountable for the vibration your words release.—Edna Lister, January 2, 1939.


Prayer expresses the soul’s delight in obedience to law.—Edna Lister, February 7, 1939.


Law is Light, which holds no darkness at all. Law is Power, which is the white Christ Light, undiluted by any self, even thoughts of bodily weakness. Law is substance moving into those things that are of the Light. Law is life going forth as strength of mind, heart, body and affairs.—Edna Lister, September 1, 1939.


“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.”—Romans 8:2. We need no other law than the “Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” through us.—Edna Lister, October 20, 1939.


Only constant and continued repetition familiarizes you with law.—Edna Lister, October 26, 1939.


You may see others using law for personal gain and watch them get away with it, which they may apparently do for a time. Law is exact. Rest assured of this one fact. You cannot gainsay it. You cannot set aside law without paying the debt for so doing. God is principle and you cannot change Him, though some may twist statements about His Law, written in statutes and commandments, to suit their convenience here upon earth.
  Each has free choice and may interpret anything written or heard to suit his personal gain and advantage. You color your interpretation by your peculiar viewpoint, which is the sum of your experiences, thoughts, pictures and emotional life. Yet if you sift each interpretation to the bottom, you find the underlying fundamental principles by which you move onward and upward to be enfolded again in the Heart of God, the Source of Life and Being.—Edna Lister, A Design for Ascension, 1941.


Law establishes you in the highest of all earthly places when you take the lowly place on earth.—Edna Lister, April 29, 1941.


Do not toss Divine Law aside thinking it does not work. It has worked throughout the ages, works now, and shall continue to work until the end of time.—Edna Lister, July 24, 1941.


Law is exact. Neither God nor man may set aside one jot or tittle of it, and it fulfills itself, exactly in perfect balance.
  God never allows anyone to suffer beyond his payment of broken laws.
  When God makes a promise, it becomes a heavenly law. Your every promise becomes a law that you must fulfill.—Edna Lister, October 14, 1943.


Law works through you perfectly when you allow it to.—Edna Lister, May 15, 1944.


Your life and the universe are based on law, exact, uncompromising, and unchangeable.—Edna Lister, November 2, 1944.


Law is your only safety and security.—Edna Lister, November 6, 1944.


Law is hard to become, but is glorious to be when you get there.—Edna Lister, December 15, 1944.


Only law can hold you from failing and falling. Study, practice, perform.—Edna Lister, January 29, 1945.


When you have been tried by law, polished by law, led by law, governed by law, held by law, secure in law, lifted by law, ascended because of continued attention to law—you are ready to know law.—Edna Lister, February 19, 1945.


Some read law. Some watch law. Some misuse law. Some destroy law. Some distort law for unlawful ends. Some substitute law for love. Only the very few, even of the Elect, know law.
  Become law. Let law use you for its own unalterable fulfillment of all good things, and your rewards shall be of the greatest and shall be divided according to your just earning.
  To know law is to comprehend its meaning as applied to the self.—Edna Lister, February 19, 1945.


Determine to become law in an ever greater degree.
  You create room to comprehend law only by emptying your subconscious mind of all “little self” negatives of impulsive-appetitive soul.—Edna Lister, February 19, 1945.


Until you understand what law means, you cannot ascend beyond a certain point, or truly adjust to the world. Your ability to adjust to people and to affairs will always lack full balance.
  ny minute deviation from law causes disharmony from the cells on up, which causes an unbalance in body, heart, mind and soul with all affairs reacting instantly from the first departure from perfect law.
  Law is the embodied soul’s only perfect expression of God as man on earth. Man is law, and the Word made flesh. To bring a cell together means law acting as a harmony and under cohesion, drawing Light together into form. From the tiny particle of Light in the beginning to the body of the living God, or a universe, all is acting according to law.—Edna Lister, February 22, 1945.


Considering a law a week until it is yours is not difficult—52 adhered-to laws for a year’s work. Think of your wasted years, then work to adjust to more than two laws a week. Be faithful in this and law will be faithful and true to you in all ways. Be faithful unto law.—Edna Lister, February 26, 1945.


Law is now perfect. No man makes law. It is. It can be twisted and perverted, yet, left alone, it shall strengthen itself and revert to its own absolute perfection. To become law is the perfection supreme. To know law is well, but only to become law creates perfection. Law cannot be stopped. Therefore, let law use you to its own perfect advantage of perfection.—Edna Lister, May 24, 1945.


Law is unchangeable. Law is your fortress. Law is a shield and a buckler, a glory and a defense, fullness of life and your planned creations.—Edna Lister, May 25, 1945.


To become law is the only shortcut to God. To become law is the short Path of the Master. You have nothing else to hold to on this climb to law except law. Law itself forms the rungs in its own ladder. Principle is the ladder; law becomes each rung. As you accept law, you form the next higher rung. To the one who becomes law, nothing is impossible. Law is inexhaustible Mind, Substance and Power. Each portion of God comes with its own law, to be used as Light or dark. Each cell is a law in form. Therefore, to become law, you must be used by law. What good is law without an instrument to express itself? Surrender to be used by law. Be prepared to let the law of love fulfill itself through you.—Edna Lister, June 4, 1945.


Law shall stand as time stands. Law shall still be law when all else is fully indrawn. Law shall still be God as God is now all law. Hence, you are now law because you are made in God’s image and likeness. Let His law use you. Let His law strengthen you.—Edna Lister, June 11, 1945.


Watch hourly for the least forgetfulness or failure to be the law, for in this way shall your greatest strength be born from and of your greatest weakness.—Edna Lister, June 25, 1945.


Learn when to persevere and when to pause. Ask the degree in which law applies to you.—Edna Lister, July 9, 1945.


One law encompasses all laws.—Edna Lister, July 17, 1945.


Ascend instantly in surrender to the Heart of Being when you need an answer. Stand in Light, become law. Look for it in Light and the Light will find what you seek.—Edna Lister, July 20, 1945.


One law well learned until it becomes a life habit, is worth more than a book full of knowledge soon mislaid or forgotten in life’s turmoil of actions.—Edna Lister, August 1, 1945.


He who lives by laws of life will never be distressed, in darkness, doubt, or fear. Nothing will cause him to waver or to grow lukewarm. He who lives by laws of life, his creations will wax strong, be alive and complete. The only need is an ever deeper desire, and the praise increased enough to raise your vibration to that white point of Shekinah glory where miracles are more than possible. The warmth of God’s love will forever hold him who lives by laws of life; he will forever find God’s arms and wings upholding him. He will be protected from all that disturbs in the world and be saved forever.—Edna Lister, August 20, 1945.


The laws of creation are love, joy and praise. Do this for every task always, for whatever comes.—Edna Lister, September 19, 1945.


Law must be formula and made into formula. Each is right after his degree and place. Yet, strict laws of responsibility are not for the world, which still resists taking full responsibility.—Edna Lister, April 8, 1946.


You must live the law to become the law and rise above lesser laws.—Edna Lister, January 14, 1947.


Primary laws are based on principles such as love, joy, peace, goodness, Light, color, tone, number, name (Logos or Word) and form.—Edna Lister, May 26, 1947.


Consult the dictionary and make new laws for daily use. Declare each day that you comprehend and live up to high law.—Edna Lister, June 20, 1947.


Regularity in all laws, physical plus moral, holds and builds you beyond your imagination.
  Be on guard with law to uncover each small hidden weakness in your life, lest it cast you from heights of consciousness that may be regained only by deep travail of soul.—Edna Lister, January 8, 1948.


Light is the only law, and can uncover any thought, word or deed.—Edna Lister, December 7, 1948.


Pure law is always hard to obey at first. Yet, only as you become that law can you ascend.—Edna Lister, February 26, 1949.


Until you have translated your experiences into law, you have not formulated a philosophy of law. People dance around the issues of ethics and morality because they refuse to translate their experiences into law.—Edna Lister, May 24, 1954.


Always hold yourself open for a new interpretation of law.—Edna Lister, November 21, 1955.


“If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.”—Genesis 4:7. “Sin lies at the door” when you do not live up to the law.—Edna Lister, July 10, 1958.


Use every opportunity to match the events in your life to the law.—Edna Lister, September 4, 1958.


The law is a slide rule, a divining rod to find your way back to God. You are being trained to take your place in the courts of heaven, and you must practice courtly ways and demeanor to lift and guide others.—Edna Lister, October 9, 1958.


Every person has the absolute right to live up to the laws in his life.—Edna Lister, December 4, 1958.


“Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron’s beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments; as the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore.”—Psalm 133.
  The Law of God is a precious ointment. Law is the orderly unfolding of God’s Mind to man. God’s Mind is the balance of Wisdom’s unfailing principles and laws with Love’s sustaining and enfolding life, and Power’s animating activity. God derives varying degrees of law from principle to govern, regulate and control the action of creators among humanity.—Edna Lister, February 8, 1959.


Law is exact and only harsh when you have turned your back on it in pity for your self as having too many burdens.—Edna Lister, February 23, 1959.


No one can say what experience another needs. Law is the ruling framework above the embodied soul’s lesson-experiences, yet each must keep the grades, the degrees, perfectly. Have compassion for those who fail.—Edna Lister, May 4, 1959.


The practice of metaphysics is living the law of truth as revealed to you personally. Knowledge of metaphysics gives us the background beyond physical science that enables us to make the abstract fundamental principles of God as Being understandable. Using metaphysical correspondences, you move from primary into secondary law, from absolute to relative.—Edna Lister, The Pioneering Mystic, May 5, 1959.


Wisdom, Love and the Logos form all foundation absolute principles and abstract laws, the first rank in any series of original laws, and break one principle into many laws to simplify how we apply absolute principles to govern our daily lives. Primary laws of being and doing control and govern all soul unfoldment, human behavior, relationships and expression, according to our present degree of understanding. The law that humanity recognizes comes from a higher set of principles, many of which yet remain undiscovered.
  We derive relative laws from absolute laws, modifying and diluting them to meet individual needs in intelligence and state of consciousness. Yet you never set aside principle when you modify it into law, for every relative law must conform to the principle behind it. Nor may you divorce law from its unchanging principle. For instance, God cannot set aside law to quench your grief, but you master the situation by conquering your emotions to understand without being disturbed emotionally.—Edna Lister, God as Personality and Principle, June 9, 1959.


Law is and has always been God’s alphabet.—Edna Lister, June 29, 1959.


Law is perfect. It may seem grievous and binding to access, but it grows a flower of joy and beauty.—Edna Lister, December 7, 1959.


Common sense is the application of modified laws of being and doing. The soul virtues you strive to become and perfect derive from great absolute principles. Principle is the ladder, law forms each rung, and you step to the next higher rung as you accept a law. You may progress only by obeying law, not only the great universal principles, but minor, everyday laws, especially those governing your attitudes toward others.—Edna Lister, How Can I Apply Law to My Life? June 7, 1960.


If you refuse a law as your own, as applying to you, you never become that law.
  Law is a vibration that you translate into thoughts, words and acts. Accept that law is part of the whole, God as life. You cannot apply law in any greater proportion than you have learned to accept law. When you vibrate with that law, you don’t know there is a law, because you have become it.—Edna Lister, December 11, 1960.


The law will initiate you each time you slip.—Edna Lister, January 23, 1961.


Practice every law in everything, and leave no laws scattered along the path as unexplained stumbling blocks.—Edna Lister, March 27, 1962.


The requirements of law are higher now than last year.—Edna Lister, June 7, 1962.


You fulfill law by tying your earth to heaven, proving to earth what the Power of God can do.—Edna Lister, January 19, 1964.


A Master of Law cannot speak out of turn and remain a Master of Law.—Edna Lister, April 30, 1964.


Do not break an outer law, even if it doesn’t appear to conform to a principle. A Master of Law cannot go to God over broken hearts or dead bodies, nor can you break outer law to get to God.—Edna Lister, September 20, 1964.


Christ was the application of law as flesh, and by applying and becoming all the laws he taught, you express the Christ principle to live with him in eternal, infinite consciousness. The essential Way of the Christ is to ever come closer to him, and to be law made manifest. If you take time and make the effort to understand how principles operate the universe, you will comprehend all laws of being and doing, abstract and absolute principles.—Edna Lister, April 5, 1965.


The Law of One states that no more than the three Primal Unities can exist: They are 1. One God, 2. One Truth, and 3. One point of Liberty where all opposites preponderate. “I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree. Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found.”—Psalm 37:35-36. The Primal Unities deal with Absolute Reality, but can be scaled down under the law of degree and kind. Their opposites sink into oblivion as they expand, which is the meaning of to flourish like the green bay tree, then be no more. For example, law remains when all Light is withdrawn from a cycle of manifestation. The law of liberty is Light itself absorbing darkness.—Edna Lister, November 9, 1965.


Two sentences contain the whole of the law: “This is good” and “Let there be Light!”—Edna Lister, December 10, 1965.


You must gather up every law to ascend into a perfect mental body. Review early laws, integrate and coordinate them with the new laws given. Fold the simplest laws into the highest, obedience being very important.—Edna Lister, May 15, 1966.


You have been given full knowledge of law. Apply it. Live it and ascend on it.—Edna Lister, October 26, 1966.


Supreme law binds God to carry out your positive declarations, but the law of action and reaction fulfills your every negative declaration.—Edna Lister, May 11, 1967.


The Law of God is a state of being.—Edna Lister, June 25, 1967.


You cannot be confused if you operate under divine law.—Edna Lister, How to Make a Just Appraisal, May 14, 1968.


Laws are an overflowing happiness when obeyed.—Edna Lister, November 21, 1968.


You must respect the laws of God.—Edna Lister, June 19, 1969.


Law credits worry about another as self-indulgence, and as possession of that person.—Edna Lister, August 3, 1969.


It takes comprehension of law to hold what you have gained, otherwise law becomes a vague detail of the universe.—Edna Lister, February 1, 1970.


Ascension to a new high place is not as important as to become the law of that height. The greatest Law of Ascension is to become each law as you ascend.—Edna Lister, June 18, 1970.


Rules teach us humility, and that we are no better than others nor are others better than us.—Edna Lister, Undated Papers, 1933-1971.

Top ↑


New Testament on Law

Is it not written in your law I said, ye are gods? John 10:34.


These, having not the law as a law to themselves. Romans 2:12.


But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. Romans 7:1.


Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.—Romans 13:8.


Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.—Romans 13:10.


All the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.—Galatians 5:14.


If ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.—Galatians 5:18.


The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.—1 Corinthians 15:56.

Top ↑


Old Testament on Law

The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.—Genesis 49:10.


One law shall be to him that is homeborn, and unto the stranger that sojourneth among you.—Exodus 12:49.


And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them.—Exodus 24:12.


Ye shall have one manner of law, as well for the stranger, as for one of your own country: for I am the Lord your God.—Leviticus 24:22.


One ordinance shall be both for you of the congregation, and also for the stranger that sojourneth with you, an ordinance for ever in your generations: as ye are, so shall the stranger be before the Lord. One law and one manner shall be for you, and for the stranger that sojourneth with you.—Numbers 15:15-16.


Ye shall have one law for him that sinneth through ignorance, both for him that is born among the children of Israel, and for the stranger that sojourneth among them. But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously, whether he be born in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly be cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him.—Numbers 15:29-31.


Now therefore hearken, O Israel, unto the statutes and unto the judgments, which I teach you, for to do them, that ye may live, and go in and possess the land which the Lord God of your fathers giveth you. Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.—Deuteronomy 4:1-2.


What nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day? Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life: but teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons.—Deuteronomy 4:8-9.


The Lord thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thine hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy land, for good: for the Lord will again rejoice over thee for good, as he rejoiced over thy fathers: If thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, and if thou turn unto the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul. For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it.—Deuteronomy 30:9-14.


And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee.—Deuteronomy 31:24-26.


[Moses] said unto them, Set your hearts unto all the words which I testify among you this day, which ye shall command your children to observe to do, all the words of this law. For it is not a vain thing for you; because it is your life.—Deuteronomy 32:46-47.

Top ↑




Edna Miriam Lister
1884—1971
The original Pioneering Mystic,
Christian Platonist philosopher, American Idealist, Founder, Society of the Universal Living Christ, minister, teacher, author, wife, and mother.


Edna Lister


Etymology of law: Old English lagu, from Old Norse lagu “law,” collective pl. of lag, literally “something laid down or fixed.” The modern word is thus a twin of “lay” as “that which is set or established.”


Law is absolute principle.

Law is abstract principle.


Quotes

“Law is order, and good law is good order.”—Aristotle

“The law is reason, free from passion.”—Aristotle

“The doctrines thus delivered we call the revealed or divine law, and they are to be found only in the holy scriptures…are found upon comparison to be really part of the original law of nature. Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these.”—William Blackstone

“I know no human being exempt from the law. The law is the security of the people of England; it is the security of every person that is governed, and of every person that governs. There is but one law for all, namely, that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity,—the Law of Nature and of Nations. So far as any laws fortify this primeval law, and give it more precision, more energy, more effect by their declarations, such laws enter into the sanctuary, and participate in the sacredness of its character.”—Edmund Burke

“Of Law there can be no less acknowledged, than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world: all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power.”—Richard Hooker

“Wherever law ends, tyranny begins.”—John Locke


References

Aristotle. Politics, 2 Volumes. Benjamin Jowett, translator. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1885, 270, 388.

Blackstone, Sir William. Commentaries on the Laws of England, Book 1 Part 1, Section 2. Vol 1 of 5 Volumes. St. George Tucker, editor. Philadelphia: William Y. Birch and Abraham Small, 1803.

Burke, Edmund. "Law," Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. S. Austin Allibone, compiler. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1880.

Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, 2024.

The Holy Bible. King James Version (KJV).

Hooker, Richard. "Ecclesiastical Polity, Book I." Familiar Quotations. John Bartlett, comp. Boston: Little, Brown, 1919.

Locke, John. Two Treatises of Government, London: Whitmore, Fenn and C. Brown, 1821, 362.

The Oxford English Dictionary: Compact Ed., 2 vols. E.S.C. Weiner, ed. Oxford University Press, 1971.

Webster, Noah. s.v. Law. Webster’s American Dictionary. New York: S. Converse, 1828.


Related Topics

Laws of Being
Laws of Doing
Principle