Quotes

I know not whether laws be right, or whether laws be wrong; All that we know who lie in gaol is that the wall is strong; And that each day is like a year, a year whose days are long.

Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.

The number of laws is constantly growing in all countries and, owing to this, what is called crime is very often not a crime at all, for it contains no element of violence or harm.

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.

The idea that the sole aim of punishment is to prevent crime is obviously grounded upon the theory that crime can be prevented, which is almost as dubious as the notion that poverty can be prevented.

Taught from infancy that beauty is woman's sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison.

I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky.

The worst prison is not of stone. It is of a throbbing heart, outraged by an infamous life.

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

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

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

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

The punishment can be remitted; the crime is everlasting.

Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrist? And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists? And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air? Oh they're taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.

We don't seem to be able to check crime, so why not legalize it and then tax it out of business.

Three hundred years ago a prisoner condemned to the Tower of London carved on the wall of his cell this sentiment to keep up his spirits during his long imprisonment: “It is not adversity that kills, but the impatience with which we bear adversity.”

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

Prisons don't rehabilitate, they don't punish, they don't protect, so what the hell do they do?

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

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

I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.

Overlook our deeds, since you know that crime was absent from our inclination.

He had drawn many a thousand of these rations in prisons and camps, and though he'd never had an opportunity to weight them on scales, and although, being a man of timid nature, he knew no way of standing up for his rights, he, like every other prisoner, had discovered long ago that honest weight was never to be found in the bread-cutting. There was short weight in every ration. The only point was how short. So every day you took a look to soothe your soul - today, maybe, they haven't snitched any.

It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.

We who live in prison, and in whose lives there is no event but sorrow, have to measure time by throbs of pain, and the record of bitter moments.