The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off
The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.
There are dreadful punishments enacted
There are dreadful punishments enacted against thieves; but it were much better to make such good provisions, by which every man might be put in a method how to live, and so to be preserved from the fatal necessity of stealing and dying for it.
The law does not pretend to punish
The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business.
I never saw a man who looked With such a
I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky.
Every crime has, in the moment of its
Every crime has, in the moment of its perpetration, Its own avenging angel--dark misgiving, An ominous sinking at the inmost heart.
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.
Show me the prison, Show me the jail,
Show me the prison, Show me the jail, Show me the prisoner whose life has gone stale. And I'll show you a young man with so many reasons why And there, but for fortune, go you or I.
The uneven impact of actual enforcement
The uneven impact of actual enforcement measures tends to mirror and reinforce more general patterns of discrimination (along socioeconomic, racial and ethnic, sexual, and perhaps generational lines) within the society. As a consequence, such enforcement (ineffective as it may be in producing conformity) almost certainly reinforces feelings of alienation already prevalent within major segments of the population.
Justice is that virtue of the soul which
Justice is that virtue of the soul which is distributive according to desert.
Steal goods and you’ll go to prison,
Steal goods and you’ll go to prison, steal lands and you are a king.
How dreadful it is when the right judge
How dreadful it is when the right judge judges wrong.
Any punishment that does not correct,
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.
If punishment reaches not the mind and
If punishment reaches not the mind and makes not the will supple, it hardens the offender.
Faults of the head are punished in this
Faults of the head are punished in this world, those of the heart in another; but as most of our vices are compound, so also is their punishment.
Definition, rationality, and structure
Definition, rationality, and structure are ways of seeing, but they become prisons when they blank out other ways of seeing.
Overlook our deeds, since you know that
Overlook our deeds, since you know that crime was absent from our inclination.
Prosecution I have managed to avoid; but
Prosecution I have managed to avoid; but I have been arrested, charged in a police court, have refused to be bound over, and thereupon have been unconditionally released - to my great regret; for I have always wanted to know what going to prison was like.
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.
A pedestal is as much a prison as any
A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space.
Man is born free, and everywhere he is
Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.
The common argument that crime is caused
The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.
The virtue of justice consists in
The virtue of justice consists in moderation, as regulated by wisdom.
Laws do not persuade just because they
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten.
A country is in a bad state, which is
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.
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.
