Quotes

Crimes generally punish themselves.

How dreadful it is when the right judge judges wrong.

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

We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.

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.

The refined punishments of the spiritual mode are usually much more indecent and dangerous than a good smack.

I have been studying how I may compare This prison where I live unto the world; And, for because the world is populous, And here is not a creature but myself, I cannot do it. Yet I'll hammer it out.

We have initiated programs for re-entry offenders, since some 500,000 to 600,000 offenders will come out of prison each year for the next three or four years. We want to have positive alternatives when they come back to the community.

Assassination is the extreme form of censorship.

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

When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.

Experts and the educated elite have replaced what worked with what sounded good. Society was far more civilized before they took over our schools, prisons, welfare programs, police departments and courts. It's high time we ran these people out of our lives and went back to common sense.

A Sunday school is a prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents.

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

The punishment can be remitted; the crime is everlasting.

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

There are few better measures of the concern a society has for its individual members and its own well being than the way it handles criminals.

Only free men can negotiate. Prisoners cannot enter into contracts.

To trial bring her stolen charms, and let her prison be my arms.

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

The world is a prison in which solitary confinement is preferable.

Crime is a logical extension of the sort of behavior that often [is] considered perfectly respectable in legitimate business.

A country is in a bad state, which is governed only by laws; because a thousand things occur for which laws cannot provide, and where authority ought to interpose.

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.