Saturday, August 22, 2015

"To Each His Due"

The shortest definition of justice which I am familiar with is: "to give each his due." That particular definition is used in the Four Cardinal Virtues of Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, Temperance.

They can be considered Natural Laws, which means they are discovered (like the laws of physics) and not "created" (which is generally called Political Law).

The problem is that if one person "escapes" his consequences, somebody, somewhere down the line, pays for it. I think of Paul Krugman, a catastrophe as an economist, yet the public are the ones who pay for his destructive influence, not him.

And I'm sure there are serial killers who were never caught. The ones who paid for their transgressions were their victims.

If Natural Law is indeed Law, then there is no escaping it. Someone has to pay, one way or the other.

If someone is not prudent, or just, or brave, or temperate, and they don't pay for it, then someone else will.

It's not fair, of course.

It's too bad people who transgress the Law don't immediately pay for it. It'd be a much better world. It works that way with the laws of physics. There's no "morality" to it, just cause-and-effect. They're amoral, i.e., without morality.

The less "evolved" something is, the easier it is to understand it. The laws of physics are easier to understand than the laws of civilization and people. Apparently, the more self-consciousness the harder it is to figure out. Too bad.

I figure this is how the concept of Hell was created. If you escape what you've done in this world, you'll pay for it in the next.

For some bizarre reason, people always give the government a pass. And even more bizarre is that when they do, they're the ones who pay for it, not the officials in the government. They're not the ones who die in wars, just the public.

In fact, the greatest offenders of the Law throughout history have been governments. And people defend them, even though they're the ones who suffer the consequences.

Unfortunately, governments are never prudent, just, brave or temperate. It's their nature.

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