OF A PARTICULAR KIND OF CRIME.
The reader of this treatise will perceive that I have omitted all
reference to a certain class of crime, which has deluged Europe with
human blood; a crime which raised those fatal piles, where living human
bodies served as food for the flames, and where the blind multitude
sought a pleasant spectacle and a sweet harmony from the low dull groans,
emitted by wretched sufferers from volumes of black smoke, the smoke
of human limbs, whilst their bones and still palpitating entrails were
scorched and consumed by the flames. But reasonable men will see that
the place, the age, and the subject suffer me not to inquire into the
nature of such a crime. It would be too long and remote from my subject
to show, how a perfect uniformity of thought ought, contrary to the
practice of many countries, to be a necessity in a State; how opinions,
which only differ by the most subtle and imperceptible degrees, and are
altogether beyond the reach of human intelligence, can yet convulse
society, when one of them is not legally authorised in preference to the
others; and how the nature of opinions is such, that, whilst some become
clearer by virtue of their conflict and opposition, (those that are true
floating and surviving, but those that are false sinking to oblivion,)
others again, with no inherent self-support, require to be clothed with
authority and power. Too long would it be to prove, that howsoever
hateful may seem the government of force over human minds, with no other
triumphs to boast of but dissimulation and debasement, and howsoever
contrary it may seem to the spirit of gentleness and fraternity,
commanded alike by reason and the authority we most venerate, it is yet
necessary and indispensable. All this should be taken as clearly proved
and conformable to the true interests of humanity, if there be anyone
who, with recognised authority, acts accordingly. I speak only of crimes
that spring from the nature of humanity and the social compact; not of
sins, of which even the temporal punishments should be regulated by other
principles than those of a narrow philosophy.