Had you imagined the most
perfect judicial system; had you found the most upright and enlightened
judges, there will always remain some room for error or prejudice. Why
interdict to yourselves the means of reparation? Why condemn yourself to
powerlessness to help opprest innocence? What good can come of the
sterile regrets, these illusory reparations you grant to a vain shade,
to insensible ashes? They are the sad testimonials of the barbarous
temerity of your penal laws. To rob the man of the possibility of
expiating his crime by his repentance or by acts of virtue; to close to
him without mercy every return toward a proper life, and his own esteem;
to hasten his descent, as it were, into the grave still covered with the
recent blotch, of his crime, is in my eyes the most horrible refinement
of cruelty. MAXIMILIEN MARIE ISIDORE ROBESPIERRE.
From "Against Capital Punishment."
* * * * *
And love, young men, love and venerate the ideal. The ideal is the word
of God.
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