Wealth & Money Quote by Anacharsis

Written law, in Anacharsis's framing, is less a shield than a trap: intricate, elegant, and selectively sticky. The spiderweb image does two jobs at once. It flatters the law's craft (webs are engineered) while exposing its predatory function. A web doesn't fail when a fly is caught; it fails only when something big tears through. That is the point. The problem isn't that rules exist, but that enforcement and consequence scale by status. The poor are "held" not because they're uniquely immoral, but because they lack the resources to wiggle free.

The subtext is a blunt sociology of justice: written codes pretend to be neutral, yet they operate inside a hierarchy that can hire advocates, purchase time, and shape outcomes. The wealthy "break through" not by openly rejecting legality but by exploiting its seams - exceptions, delays, technicalities, influence. Law becomes less a common standard than a terrain advantage for those who can navigate it.

Context matters. Anacharsis, a Scythian outsider moving through Greek city-states, is positioned to notice civic pride and hypocrisy with fresh eyes. Greek poleis celebrated nomos (law and custom) as a mark of civilization against "barbarism". The barb in the remark is that civilization's signature instrument can still reproduce domination. It's an early indictment of legalism: when a society worships the fact of having laws, it can ignore who the laws actually catch.

What makes it endure is its refusal to romanticize reform as mere better drafting. A stronger web is still a web.