I submit that an individual who breaks a
I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.
While we have prisons it matters little
While we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells.
The English laws punish vice; the
The English laws punish vice; the Chinese laws do more, they reward virtue.
I existed in a world that never is - the
I existed in a world that never is - the prison of the mind.
It isn't true that convicts live like
It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.
Our task must be to free ourselves from
Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
The public have more interest in the
The public have more interest in the punishment of an injury than he who receives it.
I just remember that disturbing feeling
I just remember that disturbing feeling of walking into that prison, the complete loss of privacy, the complete loss of stimulation, dignity.
I have paid no poll-tax for six years. I
I have paid no poll-tax for six years. I was put into a jail once on this account, for one night; and, as I stood considering the walls of solid stone, I could not help being struck with the foolishness of that institution which treated me as if I were mere flesh and blood and bones, to be locked up...I saw that, if there was a wall of stone between me and my townsmen, there was a still more difficult one to climb or break through, before they could get to be as free as I was. I did not for a moment feel confined, and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortar.
Some laws of state aimed at curbing
Some laws of state aimed at curbing crime are even more criminal.
Before we can diminish our sufferings
Before we can diminish our sufferings from the ill-controlled aggressive assaults of fellow citizens, we must renounce the philosophy of punishment, the obsolete, vengeful penal attitude. In its place we would seek a comprehensive, constructive social attitude - therapeutic in some instances, restraining in some instances, but preventive in its total social impact. In the last analysis this becomes a question of personal morals and values. No matter how glorified or how piously disguised, vengeance as a human motive must be personally repudiated by each and every one of us.
Two men look out the same prison bars;
Two men look out the same prison bars; one sees mud and the other stars.
Women have worked hard; starved in
Women have worked hard; starved in prison; given of their time and lives that we might sit in the House of Commons and take part in the legislating of this country.
The world is a prison in which solitary
The world is a prison in which solitary confinement is preferable.
Definition, rationality, and structure
Definition, rationality, and structure are ways of seeing, but they become prisons when they blank out other ways of seeing.
The number of laws is constantly growing
The number of laws is constantly growing in all countries and, owing to this, what is called crime is very often not a crime at all, for it contains no element of violence or harm.
We shall fight against them, throw them
We shall fight against them, throw them in prisons and destroy them.
Law is merely the expression of the will
Law is merely the expression of the will of the strongest for the time being, and therefore laws have no fixity, but shift from generation to generation.
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is
A man who has no excuse for a crime, is indeed defenseless!
Corporal punishment falls far more
Corporal punishment falls far more heavily than most weighty pecuniary penalty.
The only real prison is fear, and the
The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.
Every instance of a man's suffering the
Every instance of a man's suffering the penalty of the law is an instance of the failure of that penalty in effecting its purpose, which is to deter.
It is impossible to go through life
It is impossible to go through life without trust: That is to be imprisoned in the worst cell of all, oneself.
One man meets an infamous punishment for
One man meets an infamous punishment for that crime which confers a diadem upon another.
They took away my money, my family, and
They took away my money, my family, and my security. Why couldn't they destroy my ideas? We will question them in court tomorrow as we trigger The Revolution of all revolutions!
