Henry James Sumner Maine

Sir Henry James Sumner Maine (15 August 1822 – 3 February 1888) was a British comparative jurist and historian.

Henry Sumner Maine

Quotes

• The movement of the progressive societies has hitherto been a movement from Status to Contract.
  • ‘Ancient Law’ (1861) ch. 5.

• So great is the ascendancy of the Law of Actions in the infancy of Courts of Justice, that substantive law has at first the look of being gradually secreted in the interstices of procedure; and the early lawyer can only see the law through the envelope of its technical forms.
  • ‘Dissertations on Early Law and Custom’ (1883) ch. 11.

• Except the blind forces of Nature, nothing moves in this world which is not Greek in its origin.
  • ‘Village Communities’ (3rd ed., 1876) p. 238.