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.
—Marquis de Sade (1740–1814) French Writer
Thwackum was for doing justice, and leaving mercy to Heaven.
—Henry Fielding (1707–54) English Novelist, Dramatist
It is as expedient that a wicked man be punished as that a sick man be cured by a physician; for all chastisement is a kind of medicine.
—Plato (428 BCE–347 BCE) Greek Philosopher, Mathematician, Educator
As one reads history, not in the expurgated editions written for schoolboys and passmen, but in the original authorities of each time, one is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed, but by the punishments that the good have inflicted; and a community is infinitely more brutalised by the habitual employment of punishment than it is by the occasional occurrence of crime.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Capital punishment would be more effective as a preventive measure if it were administered prior to the crime.
—Woody Allen (b.1935) American Film Actor, Director
The first and greatest punishment of the sinner is the conscience of sin.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
God is on the side of virtue; for whoever dreads punishment suffers it, and whoever deserves it dreads it.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
Jails and prisons are the complement of schools; so many less as you have of the latter, so many more you must have of the former.
—Horace Mann (1796–1859) American Educator, Politician, Educationalist
The whole of life and experience goes to show, that right or wrong doing, whether as to the physical or the spiritual nature, is sure in the end to meet its appropriate reward or punishment.—Penalties may be delayed, but they are sure to come.
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Clergyman, Writer
The punishment of criminals should be of use; when a man is hanged he is good for nothing.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
Men are not hanged for stealing horses, but that horses may not be stolen.
—E. F. L. Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax (1881–1959) British Politician, Diplomat
The exposition of future punishment in God’s word is not to be regarded as a threat, but as a merciful declaration.—If in the ocean of life, over which we are bound to eternity, there are these rocks and shoals, it is no cruelty to chart them down; it is an eminent and prominent mercy.
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Clergyman, Writer
In its function, the power to punish is not essentially different from that of curing or educating.
—Michel Foucault (1926–84) French Philosopher, Critic, Historian
He must have known me if he had seen me as he was wont to see me, for he was in the habit of flogging me constantly. Perhaps he did not recognize me by my face.
—Anthony Trollope (1815–82) English Novelist
I should be very willing to redress men wrongs, and rather check than punish crimes, had not Cervantes, in that all too true tale of Quixote, shown how all such efforts fail.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
Then spare the rod and spoil the child.
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902) British Victorian Novelist, Essayist, Critic
Our system is the height of absurdity, since we treat the culprit both as a child, so as to have the right to punish him, and as an adult, in order to deny him consolation.
—Claude Levi-Strauss (1908–2009) French Social Anthropologist, Philosopher
Many without punishment, none without sin.
—John Ray (1627–1705) English Naturalist, Theologian
Punishment is lame, but it comes.
—George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh Anglican Poet, Orator, Clergyman
Never was the voice of conscience silenced without retribution.
—Anna Brownell Jameson (1794–1860) Irish-born Literary, Art Critic
If your buttocks burn, you know you have done wrong.
—African Proverb
Take away the danger and remove the restraint, and wayward nature runs free.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) (65–8 BCE) Roman Poet
There is no person so severely punished, as those who subject themselves to the whip of their own remorse.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
Punishment is the last and the least effective instrument in the hands of the legislator for the prevention of crime.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Writer, Art Critic
If he who breaks the law is not punished, he who obeys it is cheated. This, and this alone, is why lawbreakers ought to be punished: to authenticate as good, and to encourage as useful, law-abiding behavior. The aim of criminal law cannot be correction or deterrence; it can only be the maintenance of the legal order.
—Thomas Szasz (1920–2012) Hungarian-American Psychiatrist, Psychoanalyst
And where the offense is, let the great axe fall.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
The generality of men are naturally apt to be swayed by fear rather than reverence, and to refrain from evil rather because of the punishment that it brings than because of its own foulness.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
I’m all for bringing back the birch, but only between consenting adults.
—Gore Vidal (1925–48) American Novelist, Essayist, Journalist, Playwright
It is hard, but it is excellent, to find the right knowledge of when correction is necessary, and when grace doth most avail.
—Philip Sidney (1554–86) English Soldier Poet, Courtier
Crime and punishment grow out of one stem. Punishment is a fruit that, unsuspected, ripens with the flower of the pleasure that concealed it.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
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