Clemency alone makes us equal to the
Clemency alone makes us equal to the gods.
Whatever is worthy to be loved for
Whatever is worthy to be loved for anything is worthy of preservation. A wise and dispassionate legislator, if any such should ever arise among men, will not condemn to death him who has done or is likely to do more service than injury to society. Blocks and gibbets are the nearest objects with legislators, and their business is never with hopes or with virtues.
I asked a man in prison once how he
I asked a man in prison once how he happened to be there and he said he had stolen a pair of shoes. I told him if he had stolen a railroad he would be a United States Senator.
A Sunday school is a prison in which
A Sunday school is a prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents.
When I was in prison, I was wrapped up
When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.
Intellectual despair results in neither
Intellectual despair results in neither weakness nor dreams, but in violence. It is only a matter of knowing how to give vent to one's rage; whether one only wants to wander like madmen around prisons, or whether one wants to overturn them.
It is better that ten guilty persons
It is better that ten guilty persons escape, than that one innocent suffer.
The English laws punish vice; the
The English laws punish vice; the Chinese laws do more, they reward virtue.
Kill a man, and you are an assassin.
Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a God.
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.
The refined punishments of the spiritual
The refined punishments of the spiritual mode are usually much more indecent and dangerous than a good smack.
Well does Heaven have care that no man
Well does Heaven have care that no man secures happiness by crime.
Educate your children to self-control,
Educate your children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future lives and crimes to society.
To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit
To my mind, to kill in war is not a whit better than to commit ordinary murder.
Crime is a logical extension of the sort
Crime is a logical extension of the sort of behavior that often [is] considered perfectly respectable in legitimate business.
We shall not yield to violence. We shall
We shall not yield to violence. We shall not be deprived of union freedoms. We shall never agree with sending people to prison for their convictions.
When is conduct a crime, and when is a
When is conduct a crime, and when is a crime not a crime? When Somebody Up There -- a monarch, a dictator, a Pope, a legislator -- so decrees.
I was put into jail as I was going to
I was put into jail as I was going to the shoemaker's to get a shoe which was mended. When I was let out the next morning, I proceeded to finish my errand, and, having put on my mended shoe, joined a huckleberry party, who were impatient to put themselves under my conduct; and in half an hour -- for the horse was soon tackled -- was in the midst of a huckleberry field, on one of our highest hills, two miles off, and then the State was nowhere to be seen.
One crime is everything; two nothing.
One crime is everything; two nothing.
The worst of prison life, he thought,
The worst of prison life, he thought, was not being able to close his door.
Liberty is rendered even more precious
Liberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.
We shall fight against them, throw them
We shall fight against them, throw them in prisons and destroy them.
Civilization is maintained by a very few
Civilization is maintained by a very few people in a small number of places and we need only some bombs and a few prisons to blot it out altogether.
To seek the redress of grievances by
To seek the redress of grievances by going to law, is like sheep running for shelter to a bramble bush.
