Quotes

Prison continues, on those who are entrusted to it, a work begun elsewhere, which the whole of society pursues on each individual through innumerable mechanisms of discipline.

Pardon is the virtue of victory.

The contagion of crime is like that of the plague. Criminals collected together corrupt each other; they are worse than ever when at the termination of their punishment they re-enter society.

A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space.

Clemency alone makes us equal to the gods.

One crime has to be concealed by another.

I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.

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 public have more interest in the punishment of an injury than he who receives it.

It is certain that the study of human psychology, if it were undertaken exclusively in prisons, would also lead to misrepresentation and absurd generalizations.

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

Every crime has, in the moment of its perpetration, Its own avenging angel--dark misgiving, An ominous sinking at the inmost heart.

Two men look out the same prison bars; one sees mud and the other stars.

If you strike at, imprison, or kill us, out of our prisons or graves we will still evoke a spirit that will thwart you, and perhaps, raise a force that will destroy you! We defy you! Do your worst!

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.

Mere factual innocence is no reason not to carry out a death sentence properly reached.

The thoughts of a prisoner - they're not free either. They keep returning to the same things.

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

Once we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our mind, our duty is to furnish it well.

There is a point at which even justice does injury.

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

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

No written law has been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.

Assassination is the extreme form of censorship.

Man is condemned to be free.