All which makes me remember the ancient opinions, “That ’tis of necessity a man must do wrong by retail who will do right in gross; and injustice in little things, who would come to do justice in great:  that human justice is formed after the model of physic, according to which, all that is useful is also just and honest:  and of what is held by the Stoics, that Nature herself proceeds contrary to justice in most of her works:  and of what is received by the Cyrenaics, that there is nothing just of itself, but that customs and laws make justice:  and what the Theodorians held that theft, sacrilege, and all sorts of uncleanness, are just in a sage, if he knows them to be profitable to him.”  There is no remedy:  I am in the same case that Alcibiades was, that I will never, if I can help it, put myself into the hands of a man who may determine as to my head, where my life and honour shall more depend upon the skill and diligence of my attorney than on my own innocence.  I would venture myself with such justice as would take notice of my good deeds, as well as my ill; where I had as much to hope as to fear:  indemnity is not sufficient pay to a man who does better than not to do amiss.  Our justice presents to us but one hand, and that the left hand, too; let him be who he may, he shall be sure to come off with loss.

In China, of which kingdom the government and arts, without commerce with or knowledge of ours, surpass our examples in several excellent features, and of which the history teaches me how much greater and more various the world is than either the ancients or we have been able to penetrate, the officers deputed by the prince to visit the state of his provinces, as they punish those who behave themselves ill in their charge, so do they liberally reward those who have conducted themselves better than the common sort, and beyond the necessity of their duty; these there present themselves, not only to be approved but to get; not simply to be paid, but to have a present made to them.

No judge, thank God, has ever yet spoken to me in the quality of a judge, upon any account whatever, whether my own or that of a third party, whether criminal or civil; nor no prison has ever received me, not even to walk there.  Imagination renders the very outside of a jail displeasing to me; I am so enamoured of liberty, that should I be interdicted the access to some corner of the Indies, I should live a little less at my ease; and whilst I can find earth or air open elsewhere, I shall never lurk in any place where I must hide myself.  My God! how ill should I endure the condition wherein I see so many people, nailed to a corner of the kingdom, deprived of the right to enter the principal cities and courts, and the liberty of the public roads, for having quarrelled with our laws.  If those under which I live should shake a finger at me by way of menace, I would immediately go seek out others, let them be where they would.  All my little prudence in the civil wars wherein we are now engaged is employed that they may not hinder my liberty of going and coming.