The former is, without gainsaying, less guilty than
the other; and they can only be proportionately punished by death
being inflicted equally upon them both; yet to the one it is a mild
punishment when his nobler temperament is taken into account,
whereas it is a hard punishment to the other in view of his baser
temperament. But, on the other hand, were they all equally condemned
to penal servitude for life, the honourable man would be too
severely punished, while the other, on account of his baseness of
nature, would be too mildly punished. In the judgement to be
pronounced over a number of criminals united in such a conspiracy, the
best equalizer of punishment and crime in the form of public justice
is death. And besides all this, it has never been heard of that a
criminal condemned to death on account of a murder has complained that
the sentence inflicted on him more than was right and just; and any
one would treat him with scorn if he expressed himself to this
effect against it. Otherwise it would be necessary to admit that,
although wrong and injustice are not done to the criminal by the
law, yet the legislative power is not entitled to administer this mode
of punishment; and if it did so, it would be in contradiction with
itself.
However many they may be who have committed a murder, or have even
commanded it, or acted as art and part in it, they ought all to suffer
death; for so justice wills it, in accordance with the idea of the
juridical power, as founded on the universal laws of reason.
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