Dentro del conjunto de cumbres intelectuales colombianas, al lado de Rufino José Cuervo, Félix Restrepo S.J., Marco Fidel Suárez, Miguel Antonio Caro, Alberto Lleras Camargo y más recientemente de juristas como Rafael Nieto Navia y Hugo Palacios Mejía, el nombre de uno de los pensadores más importantes que ha tenido Colombia debe aparecer: Nicolás Gómez Dávila. Su aporte a las ciencias jurídicas desde el punto de vista filosófico es innegable. Desde sus escolios deja ver su formación que permite delinear y componer de manera profunda conceptos sintéticos y analíticos de increíble profundidad sobre lo que es el derecho, o en otras palabras, sobre el “deber ser” de las leyes. Con este ensayo de revisión se presenta una paráfrasis de los “sucesivos escolios” creados por Nicolás Gómez Dávila, uno de los máximos filósofos y pensadores colombianos y se presentan adicionalmente puntos de vista sobre conceptos fundamentales y cardinales de las ciencias jurídicas: Estado, constitución, ley, voluntad, ética, etc., para concluir y soportar una tesis central que el autor ha sostenido ya varias veces: el derecho efectivo es el consuetudinario. 

In the universe of intellectuals and Colombian thinkers, along with Rufino José Cuervo, Félix Restrepo, S.J., Marco Fidel Suárez, Miguel Antonio Caro, Alberto Lleras Camargo and more recently, professors and jurists such as Rafael Nieto Navia and Hugo Palacios Mejía, the name of one of the most important Colombian philosophers and thinkers appears: Nicolás Gómez Dávila. His contribution to juridical sciences from the philosophical point of view is without question remarkable. With his particular technique of writing by using “escolios” (annotations) in composing in-depth axiomatic, synthetic and analytical pieces of amazing clarity regarding among other topics what law is and means, or in other words what “laws ought to be like,” a profound wisdom and scholarship can be seen and discovered. With this essay (a revision-type essay) we present several paraphrases of the “escolios” (annotations) created by Nicolás Gómez Dávila, one of the most notable Colombian philosophers; hence, his viewpoints and our analytical paraphrases of pivotal concepts of juridical science such as State, Constitution, Laws, Will, Law, Ethics, Democracy, Patriotism, etc., are presented and analyzed, to arrive at and support a conclusion-thesis we have presented on other occasions: the effective law and effective laws are those that are customary.