Quotes

Prison, dungeons, blessed places where evil is impossible because they are the crossroads of all the evil in the world. One cannot commit evil in hell.

The reformative effect of punishment is a belief that dies hard, chiefly I think, because it is so satisfying to our sadistic impulses.

Any punishment that does not correct, that can merely rouse rebellion in whoever has to endure it, is a piece of gratuitous infamy which makes those who impose it more guilty in the eyes of humanity, good sense and reason, nay a hundred times more guilty than the victim on whom the punishment is inflicted.

The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.

If you share the crime of your friend, you make it your own.

Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass, Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron, Can be retentive to the strength of spirit; But life, being weary of these worldly bars, Never lacks power to dismiss itself.

Steal goods and you’ll go to prison, steal lands and you are a king.

Crimes generally punish themselves.

It is better that ten guilty persons escape, than that one innocent suffer.

The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business.

While we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells.

The world itself is but a large prison, out of which some are daily led to execution.

Here the great art lies, to discern in what the law is to be to restraint and punishment, and in what things persuasion only is to work.

The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.

He who profits by a crime commits it.

If you want total security, go to prison. There you’re fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking…is freedom.

We have our own system, ... and journalists in our system are not put in prison for embarrassing the government by revealing things the government might not wish to have revealed. The important thing is that our system, under which journalists can write without fear or favor, should continue.

The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.

The perfection of a thing consists in its essence; there are perfect criminals, as there are men of perfect probity.

Crime succeeds by sudden despatch; honest counsels gain vigor by delay.

Wherever any one is against his will, that is to him a prison.

Crimes lead one into another; they who are capable of being forgers are capable of being incendiaries.

The difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion is the thickness of a prison walls.

On a planet that increasingly resembles one huge Maximum Security prison, the only intelligent choice is to plan a jail break.

To make punishments efficacious, two things are necessary. They must never be disproportioned to the offence, and they must be certain.