John Finnis Quotes
John Finnis is an Australian-British legal and moral philosopher, emeritus professor of law at Oxford and a long-time professor at the University of Notre Dame. Natural Law and Natural Rights, his major work, reconstructed the natural law tradition of Aquinas in contemporary terms, identifying a list of basic human goods that practical reason recognizes as self-evidently choiceworthy and a set of principles for choosing reasonably among them. The quotes below are attributed to John Finnis, organized by topic.
Browse John Finnis by topic
John Finnis on God
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Attributed to John Finnis:
“Reason and faith share the goods of the human person; they are not foreign to each other.”
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“Alternately reported as: "That is my thunder, by God; the villains will play my thunder, but not my play." Reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations , 10th ed. (1919).”
See how the rascals use me! They will not let my play run; and yet they steal my thunder.
John Finnis on Justice
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Attributed to John Finnis:
“A law contrary to the basic goods is not, in the proper sense, law at all.”
John Finnis on Virtue
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Attributed to John Finnis:
“There are basic human goods that reason grasps as good in themselves.”
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Attributed to John Finnis:
“Natural law is what reason perceives in the structure of the goods of human nature.”
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Attributed to John Finnis:
“Practical reason proceeds from the basic goods to the principles of reasonableness.”