Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - II. Chapter. The rise and development of the correction-system
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Can it really be imagined, that certain decided
categories can be arranged, to which degrees of
moral-debasement and criminality, supposed to be
equal, could be fitted? Are not these as numerous,
as varying as the individuality of the human soul?
Is it not one of the greatest wonders of the
wonderful creation, that of the innumerable multitudes
of human beings, that have already gone to their
last resting place, of those that now live, and of
those that are to come, no two individuals can be
found perfectly alike either in appearance or in
their mental capacities?
A great difference must be made between the
commission of crime and its cause. The former
is an occurrence, an action, and can as such.be
understood and judged, the latter is for the human
eye almost inscrutable. It is necessary to classify
the crimes themselves, in order to determine the
letter of the law accordingly, it can also be of
great utility in a statistic point of view, and farther
than this human justice can not go; to classify,
on the other hand, the different shades of vice
itself and its inward nature, belongs to God alone.
But let us even admit, that a peculiar kind
of scale had been found, by which the inward
viciousness of man could be so precisely graduated,
that each class might be composed of offenders
who were exactly alike in crime; what should we
have gained by it? It cannot surely be seriously
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