Then spare the rod and spoil the child.
—Samuel Butler
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
The object of punishment is the prevention of evil; it can never be made impulsive to good.
—Horace Mann (1796–1859) American Educator, Politician, Educationalist
Don’t let us rejoice in punishment, even when the hand of God alone inflicts it. The best of us are but poor wretches just saved from shipwreck. Can we feel anything but awe and pity when we see a fellow passenger swallowed by the waves?
—George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) (1819–80) English Novelist
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
We will not punish a man because he hath offended, but that he may offend no more; nor does punishment ever look to the past, but to the future; for it is not the result of passion, but that the same thing may be guarded against in time to come.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
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
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
To make punishments efficacious, two things are necessary; they must never be disproportioned to the offence, and they must be certain.
—William Gilmore Simms (1806–70) American Poet, Novelist, Historian
There is no future pang can deal that justice on the self-condemned, he deals on his own soul.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
Faults of the head are punished in this world; those of the heart in another; but as most of our vices are compound, so is their punishment.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible but in the end, they always fall—think of it, always.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
I’m all for bringing back the birch, but only between consenting adults.
—Gore Vidal (1925–48) American Novelist, Essayist, Journalist, Playwright
If your buttocks burn, you know you have done wrong.
—African Proverb
Retaliation is related to nature and instinct, not to law. Law, by definition, cannot obey the same rules as nature.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Essayist, Novelist, Author
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
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
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
There is no greater punishment than that of being abandoned to one’s self.
—Pasquier Quesnel (1634–1719) French Jansenist Theologian
Thwackum was for doing justice, and leaving mercy to Heaven.
—Henry Fielding (1707–54) English Novelist, Dramatist
One man meets an infamous punishment for that crime which confers a diadem upon another.
—Juvenal (c.60–c.136 CE) Roman Poet
Wickedness, when properly punished, is disgraceful only to the offender; unpunished, it is disgraceful to the whole community.
—Charles Simmons (1924–2017) American Editor, Novelist
The certainty of punishment, even more than its severity, is the preventive of crime.
—Tryon Edwards American Theologian
And where the offense is, let the great axe fall.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
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
The very worst use to which you can put a man, says Wilkes, is to hang him; but the hanging is not to make the man useful, but to punish his crime and protect society.
—Charles Simmons (1924–2017) American Editor, Novelist
Distrust everyone in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German Philosopher, Scholar, Writer
The work of eradicating crimes is not by making punishment familiar, but formidable.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Let us have compassion for those under chastisement. Alas, who are we ourselves? Who am I and who are you? Whence do we come and is it quite certain that we did nothing before we were born? This earth is not without some resemblance to a gaol. Who knows but that man is a victim of divine justice? Look closely at life. It is so constituted that one senses punishment everywhere.
—Victor Hugo (1802–85) French Novelist
Take away the danger and remove the restraint, and wayward nature runs free.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) (65–8 BCE) Roman Poet
Instruction does much, but encouragement does everything.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
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
The punishment of criminals should be of use; when a man is hanged he is good for nothing.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
Never was the voice of conscience silenced without retribution.
—Anna Brownell Jameson (1794–1860) Irish-born Literary, Art Critic
The seeds of our punishment are sown at the same time we commit the sin.
—Hesiod (f.700 BCE) Greek Poet
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
Prisons are built with stones of Law. Brothels with the bricks of religion.
—William Blake (1757–1827) English Poet, Painter, Printmaker
Punishment is lame, but it comes.
—George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh Anglican Poet, Orator, Clergyman
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
Why not whip the teacher when the pupil misbehaves?
—Diogenes Laertius (f.3rd Century CE) Biographer of the Greek Philosophers
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
Next to the prosperity of a good person, I am best pleased with the confusion of a rascal.
—Unknown
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
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 Political leader, Revolutionary, Novelist, Poet, Critic
Hold you there, neither a strange hand nor my own, neither heavy nor light shall touch my bum.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
One should not lift the rod against our enemies upon the private information of another.
—The Hitopadesha Indian Collection of Fables
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
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
The public has more interest in the punishment of an injury than the one who receives it.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
We do not aim to correct the man we hang; we correct and warn others by him.
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–92) French Essayist