[1] By a Cabinet Order of June 3, 1740. See Carlyle’s Frederick the Great, iii. 7.

[2] Pike, History of Crime in England, ii. 283, 346.

[3] Beccaria was born in 1738, and his book appeared in 1764. Therefore he was only 26. The 28 must refer to the time he wrote the letter.

[4] Lettre 80.

[5] I Piaceri della Immaginazione, in his collected works by Villari, p. 546.

[6] Villari, Opere di Beccaria, 547.

[7] It is published in the Haarlem edition of the Dei Delitti, 1766.

[8] The letter is in Diderot’s Œuvres, ix. 451-66.

[9] See the two volumes of their Lettere published at Milan by Dr. C. Casati, 1880.

[10] Lettere, ii. 221: ‘Il suo libro d’oro sicuro È chiuso.’

[11] Lettere, ii. 150.

[12] Pietro had sent some of his manuscripts to Morellet, perhaps in the hope that the latter would offer to translate them. Anyhow Beccaria brought back no compliments to Pietro from Paris, and the key to Pietro’s feelings lies in the words he wrote to his brother the day after Beccaria’s return: ‘Non mi ha detto una sillaba che mostri che alcuno sappia in Parigi, che io sono al mondo.’

[13] Lettere, i. 391; ii. 70, 127, 151, 211, 295. It is satisfactory for this point to be settled, for even so lately as 1862, Sig. CantÙ, in his work on Beccaria, attributes the Risposta to him, saying that all the intrinsic proofs are in favour of its being his work. P. 58.

[14] Ibid. ii. 159.

[15] Lettere, ii. 225.

[16] Morellet, MÉmoires, i. 167: ‘Revenu À Milan il a fait peu de chose, et sa fin n’a pas rÉpondu À son dÉbut, phÉnomÈne commun parmi les gens de lettres d’Italie, qui ont un premier feu bien vif, mais qui, À 25 et 30 ans, se dÉsabusent comme Salomon et reconnaissent que la science est vanitÉ, sans avoir attendu d’Être aussi savant que lui.’

[17] CantÙ, Beccaria, 42.

[18] In a book called Cautio Criminalis, published in 1718.

[19] Jardine’s Reading on Torture.

[20] Tooke’s Catharine II., 441-8. Rambaud’s Russie, 476. ‘Dans l’instruction pour la confection du nouveau Code, Catharine II., suivant sa propre expression, avait pillÉ les philosophes d’Occident, mais surtout Montesquieu et Beccaria.’

[21] Morellet, MÉmoires, i. 165.

[22] General C. Lee’s Memoirs.

[23] This fact rests on the authority of a gentleman of Pisa, who told it to Dr. Rush, the so-called ‘American Æsculapius,’ who wrote against capital punishment towards the end of the last century.

[24] By Gustavus III. It had, however, been discontinued long before, as Beccaria speaks of it as non-existent when he wrote.

[25] Turnbull’s Visit to Philadelphia Prison, 1797.

[26] Times, March 1, 1880.

[27] For most of the above facts the writer is indebted to the papers published by the Howard Association, kindly sent to him by the Secretary, Mr. Tallack.

[28] Diodorus Siculus, i. 65: ??t? ??? t?? ?a??t?? t??? ?atad??as???ta? ?????a?e ?e?t????e?? ta?? p??es? dede?????.

[29] Gibbon, c. 48: ‘During his government of twenty-five years the penalty of death was abolished in the Roman Empire.’ A.D. 1118-1143.

[30] Beccaria doubtless got the expression from Helvetius, who used it in his L’Esprit, i. 228, 291.

[31] Vicar of Wakefield, c. 27; and Citizen of the World, letter 79. Johnson was more outspoken in the Rambler, No. 114 (1751), in which he advocated the restriction of capital punishment to cases of murder.

[32] Lord Kames’ Historical Law Tracts. Criminal Law. 1776.

[33] Enquiry into the Late Increase of Robbers (1751).

[34] Meredith’s speech of May 13, 1777, in Parl. Deb., xix. 239.

[35] Lecky’s England, i. 506.

[36] Speech, May 11, 1810.

[37] Romilly’s Memoirs, ii. 322.

[38] Hansard, and Campbell’s Chief Justices, iii. 233. The arguments are almost Paley’s word for word.

[39] Stephen’s English Criminal Law, 156, 178.

[40] Sir G. Staunton’s Penal Code of China, 347, 416.

[41] See several instances in Baring Gould’s Curiosities of Olden Times, in the chapter on Queer Culprits.

[42] So Seneca, De Ira., i. 16: ‘Nemo prudens punit quia peccatum est, sed ne peccetur. Revocari enim prÆterita non possunt, futura prohibentur.’ Compare ibid., ii. 31, and Plato, Laws, xi. 934 A.

[43] The same is the philosophy of the nursery-rhyme book:—

So said also a more serious authority, Periander, tyrant of Corinth, sometimes counted among the Seven Wise Men of Greece: ? ???? t??? ?a?t????ta? ???? ?a? t??? ?????ta? ???a?e. ‘Punish not only those who have done wrong, but those who are going to.’

[44] Judicial Statistics, 1878, xi.

[45] White’s Three Years in Constantinople, ii. 331.

[46] Pierson, Aus Russland’s Vergangenheit, 31, 32.

[47] See Sir G. Staunton’s Penal Code of China, lxxi. 278-9, 285, 345, 367, 381, 449, for tables apportioning punishment to different crimes according to an exact mathematical scale. There is no reason to suppose that this scale was never acted upon, even if it is not observed now, about which there is no good evidence.

[48] Farinaccius: ‘Potest pro tribus furtis, quamvis minimis, poena mortis imponi.’ The philosophy of this was, that to do anything twice was the same as doing it frequently: ‘Quod bis fit, frequenter fieri dicitur.’

[49] The French have two words, rÉcidive and rÉcidiver, to signify a relapse into crime, the word being applied as a metaphor from medicine, where it means the recurrence of a disease. In English we might adopt the word reciduous to express renewed acts of crime after punishment.

[50] The figures for May 1878 are: Men, 8,983; of these only 2,064 had had no previous conviction of any kind, 4,672 had had sentences short of penal servitude, and 2,247 penal servitude sentences. Of the 1,226 women, 124 had never been convicted before, 635 had had sentences short of penal servitude, 567 penal servitude sentences.—(P.S. Report, iii. 1170. See also ii. 206, 296, 364.)

[51] Penal Servitude Acts Commission, 1879, vol. iii. 1195-6.

[52] Judicial Statistics, 1878, xvi. 45.

[53] The same seems to be also true of France. ‘Quoi de plus important que ce fait, qu’en moyenne annuelle 30,000 crimes ou dÉlits restent impunis parce que les auteurs en sont inconnus, et 10,000 environ parce que les charges portÉes contre les accusÉs ou prÉvenus ont ÉtÉ jugÉes insuffisantes.’—Legoyt, La France et l’Étranger, i. 406.

[54] Hill, Crime, 28.

[55] Memorials of Millbank, ii. 274-5.

[56] The author of Five Years’ Penal Servitude. With this testimony agrees thoroughly that of the Chaplain of Parkhurst Prison (P.S. Rep. iii. 707-8), that of the Governor of Portland Prison (ii. 164-5), and that of the Governor of Spike Island (iii. 814-5).

[57] Penal Servitude Report, i. 43.

[58] If we include offences proceeded against summarily with the indictable offences reported, about 2 per cent. of the population may be counted as dishonest.

[59] Strafgesetzbuch, c. vi. 33.

[60] Wheeler, Imperial Assemblage at Delhi, 1877, 124, 127.

[61] CongrÈs pÉnitentiaire international. Tableau xii.

[62] There is a precedent for such a law in the legislation of Leopold, Grand Duke of Tuscany: ‘Les malheureux injustement emprisonnÉs et reconnus innocents devaient Être indemnisÉs au moyen d’un fonds formÉ par les amendes, mÉsure Équitable et profondÉment humaine.’—Loiseleur, Hist. des Peines, 336.

[63] Staunton’s Penal Code of China, 29.