Character and Conduct – 14 December – Punishment

PUNISHMENTS, then, must in the first place be proportionate to the offence, lest, by an undiscriminating severity or an undiscriminating leniency, distinctions of moral desert be blurred or effaced.

Secondly, they must be analogous to the offence.   The greedy must be starved, the insolent humbled, the idle compelled to work.   Otherwise the imposition will not effectually go home to the offender.

Thirdly, punishments ought to be exemplary.   Since they needs must come, it is not enough that they should simply open the eyes of the culprit, by giving him his deserts.   They must be utilised as object-lessons for the behoof of that large class, the culprits in potentiality.

Fourthly, they ought to be economical. ‘It is good that they should suffer,’ we sometimes say;  and so it is, so long as suffering, in itself always an evil, do not exceed the quantum that is lamentably needful, needful, that is, to vindicate authority, to stigmatise the offence, and to impress the offender.

Fifthly, punishments ought to be reformatory.   Not only must they never, by vindictiveness in him who gives, and degradation in him who receives, impair the instincts and resolves for a better life;  they must be devised in the belief, or at least in the hope, that these instincts and resolves exist, though they may be inhibited by the evil proclivities which punishment is meant to crush.   The killing of what is bad must always look to the liberation of what is good.

Finally, punishments ought to insist upon, and to define indemnity, so that the wrong-doer, in things small or great, may be forced to repair, so far as this is possible, the irreparable mischief which offence implies.

The Making of Character, Professor MacCUNN

oooOOOooo

These quotes are from ‘Character and Conduct’ A selection of helpful thoughts from various authors arranged for daily reading.

Collected by Constance M Whishaw and first published in 1905 as a follow up to her volume of Daily Readings for members of the Being and Doing Guild who asked for an additional volume

In her preface Whishaw writes:

‘This collection of noble thoughts expressed by men and women of past and present ages who have endeavoured to leave the world a little better than they found it.’

It is my hope in publishing them here is that readers may be inspired to imitate the example of the authors.