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and had a severe accident in your childhood which permanently undermined
your constitution; excuses such as these are the ordinary refuge of the
criminal; but they cannot for one moment be listened to by the ear of
justice. I am not here to enter upon curious metaphysical questions as
to the origin of this or that--questions to which there would be no end
were their introduction once tolerated, and which would result in
throwing the only guilt on the tissues of the primordial cell, or on the
elementary gases. There is no question of how you came to be wicked, but
only this--namely, are you wicked or not? This has been decided in the
affirmative, neither can I hesitate for a single moment to say that it
has been decided justly. You are a bad and dangerous person, and stand
branded in the eyes of your fellow-countrymen with one of the most
heinous known offences.

"It is not my business to justify the law: the law may in some cases have
its inevitable hardships, and I may feel regret at times that I have not
the option of passing a less severe sentence than I am compelled to do.
But yours is no such case; on the contrary, had not the capital
punishment for consumption been abolished, I should certainly inflict it
now.

"It is intolerable that an example of such terrible enormity should be
allowed to go at large unpunished. Your presence in the society of
respectable people would lead the less able-bodied to think more lightly
of all forms of illness; neither can it be permitted that you should have
the chance of corrupting unborn beings who might hereafter pester you.
The unborn must not be allowed to come near you: and this not so much for
their protection (for they are our natural enemies), as for our own; for
since they will not be utterly gainsaid, it must be seen to that they
shall be quartered upon those who are least likely to corrupt them.

"But independently of this consideration, and independently of the
physical guilt which attaches itself to a crime so great as yours, there
is yet another reason why we should be unable to show you mercy, even if
we were inclined to do so. I refer to the existence of a class of men
who lie hidden among us, and who are called physicians. Were the
severity of the law or the current feeling of the country to be relaxed
never so slightly, these abandoned persons, who are now compelled to
practise secretly and who can be consulted only at the greatest risk,
would become frequent visitors in every household; their organisation and
their intimate acquaintance with all family secrets would give them a
power, both social and political, which nothing could resist. The head
of the household would become subordinate to the family doctor, who would
interfere between man and wife, between master and servant, until the
doctors should be the only depositaries of power in the nation, and have
all that we hold precious at their mercy. A time of universal

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