Chapter 92 Part Two - Thirty

Maslova was likely to be sent out with the first batch of prisoners, so Nekhludoff was actively making preparations for his departure.But with so much to do, he felt that no matter how much time he had, it was too late.His situation now is just the opposite of what it used to be.Previously he wanted to think of something to do, and always only for one person, for Dmitry Ivanitch Nekhludoff.But although all the activities of life were for Nekhludoff himself, the affairs themselves were dull.Things were happening now for other people, not for Nekhludoff himself, but they were meaningful, fascinating, and innumerable.

Not only that, but Nekhludoff had always been annoyed and dissatisfied with others doing things for him; now doing things for others made him happy. What Nekhludoff had to do now fell into three categories.In his old-fashioned way he had divided things up in this manner, and accordingly placed the relevant papers in three folders. The first category was for Maslova and her help.This aspect is mainly about running for the court, gaining support, and preparing for the trip to Siberia. The second kind of thing deals with real estate.In Banovo, the land has been handed over to the peasants, and they pay the land rent as the public welfare fund for the peasants.But in order for this to be legally valid, a deed and a will must be drawn up and signed.At Kuzminskoye, things continued as he had planned, that is, he had to collect land rent, set a deadline for payment of the rent, and determine how much of the money he would withdraw for living expenses and how much would be left for the peasants as welfare.He didn't know how much the trip to Siberia would cost, so he didn't dare to give up all the income, but just cut it in half.

The third category is to help the prisoners, and more and more people come to ask him. At first, when he met the prisoners who asked him for help, he always ran for them immediately and tried his best to alleviate their pain; but later, there were too many people who asked for help, and he couldn't help them one by one, so he couldn't help but assume the responsibility of the fourth category. things come.It was this sort of thing that interested him most lately. The fourth category is to answer such a question: what is this strange institution called the criminal court?What is the need to exist?How did it come about?With this institution came the prisons in which he and a group of prisoners met, and various prisons from the Peter and Paul Fortress to Sakhalin Island, and thousands of people, thanks to such an inexplicable The criminal law is suffering there.

Nekhludoff, through his personal relationship with prisoners, through his conversations with lawyers, prison priests, and wardens, and through the experience of prisoners, he classified prisoners, the so-called criminals, into five types of people. The first is the total innocence, the victim of a wrongful conviction by the courts.For example the falsely accused arsonist Minshov, Maslova and others.There were not many such people, the priest estimated that they accounted for about seven percent, but what happened to them was particularly sympathetic. The second type of person is sentenced for doing something in special circumstances such as rage, jealousy, drunkenness, etc.Those who judged them would probably have done the same thing under the same circumstances.Such people, according to Nekhludoff's estimation, probably accounted for more than half of all criminals.

A third class is punished for doing things which they think are commonplace and even good, but whose conduct, according to those who make laws differently from them, is a crime.Those who belong to this category include bootleggers, smugglers, and those who cut grass and collect firewood in the large forests of landowners and public servants.There are also thieving mountain people, non-believers, and church-robbing people who also belong to this category. The fourth kind of people become criminals only because their moral character is higher than that of ordinary people in society.Such people included sectarians, Poles and Circassians who rebelled for independence, as well as various political prisoners sentenced for rebellion against the government-socialists and strikers.Such people are good members of society, and according to Nekhludoff's estimation, they make up a large percentage.

Finally, there is a fifth category of those to whom society has committed far greater crimes than they have committed society.Abandoned by society, they are often oppressed and seduced to the point of dullness, like the boy who stole the old carpet and the hundreds of criminals Nekhludoff saw in and out of the prison.They are constantly under the pressure of life, so that they commit those so-called criminal behaviors.According to Nekhludoff, there are many thieves and murderers of this kind.He has had contact with some of them recently.As for those who are morally corrupt and depraved, Nekhludoff believes that they can also be classified into this category through in-depth understanding.However, the new school of criminology calls them "criminal types", and believes that the existence of such people in society is the main evidence necessary for criminal law and punishment.According to Nekhludoff, society has committed more crimes against these people than they have committed against society. However, society has not committed crimes against them themselves, but has committed crimes against their parents and ancestors before. crime.

Among these people it was Nekhludoff who was particularly attracted to the habitual thief Ohotin.Ohotin was the illegitimate son of a prostitute. He grew up in nightclubs. He lived to be thirty and never saw a person with more morals than a policeman.He has hung out among thieves since he was a boy, but he is endowed with a funny talent and is endearing.He asks Nekhludoff for help, and at the same time laughs at himself, at the judge, at the prison, at all laws—not only the criminal law, but the divine law as well.The other was the handsome Fedorov, who led a gang of bandits to rob an old official and beat him to death.Fedorov came from a peasant family whose father's house had been illegally taken over by others. He himself later became a soldier and suffered a lot in the army because he fell in love with the mistress of an officer.This person is naturally lively and enthusiastic, looking for fun everywhere.In his mind, no one in the world would restrain his desires and give up pleasure.He also never knew that there are other purposes in life besides pleasure.Nekhludoff saw very clearly that both were gifted, but that their lack of education had led to deformed growth, just as plants grow wild and become deformed if left unattended.He had also seen a vagabond and a woman whose insensitivity and apparent cruelty were awe-inspiring, but he could not at all see that they were what the Italian school of criminology called the "criminal type."He just felt that he hated them personally, as much as he hated the men in frock coats and epaulettes and women covered in lace outside the prison.

Why, then, are the various people mentioned above in prison, while others like them are at liberty and can be tried?This was the fourth category of matters that concerned Nekhludoff. At first Nekhludoff wanted to find the answer to this question in books, and he bought everything that had to do with it.He bought the works of Lombroso, Garofalo, Ferry, Lister, Modesley, and Tarde, and read them with all his heart, but the more he read, the more disappointed he became.Some people study learning not to do anything academically, such as writing, debating, teaching, etc., but to find answers to some simple life problems, but the results are often disappointing.This is what happened to Nekhludoff now: the sciences gave him answers to a thousand profound questions about criminal law, but they did not answer his questions.The question he asks is simple.He asked: Why can some people imprison others, abuse, flog, exile, and kill others, when they themselves are no different from the people they abused, flogged, and killed?Why can they behave like this?He was answered by various arguments: Do people have the freedom to express their will?Can craniometry be used to determine whether a person is a "criminal type"?What role does genetics play in crime?Are there any people who are born immoral?What exactly is morality?What is madness?What is degradation?What is Temperament?What influence do climate, food, ignorance, imitation, hypnosis, lust have on crime?What is society?What are the responsibilities of society?Etc., etc.

-------- ①For Lombroso and Tarde, please refer to the footnotes to Chapter 21 of the first part of this book.Garofalo (born 1852) and Feli were both Italian criminologists and disciples of Lombroso.List (1789-1846) was a German economist.Modesley (1835-1918) was a British psychologist. These remarks reminded Nekhludoff of how a boy coming home from school had once answered his questions.Nekhludoff asked him if he had learned to spell.The boy replied, "Got it." "Okay, then spell the word 'paw'." "What 'paw'? Is it a dog's paw?" the boy answered him slyly.It is this rhetorical answer that Nekhludoff finds in those scholarly works for his main question.

There are many smart, deep, interesting insights in those books, but they just don't answer his main question: Why should some people punish others?Not only does the question not answer, but all arguments boil down to one point, that is, to justify punishment as necessary and justified.Nekhludoff read a lot of books, but intermittently, so that he could not find the answer due to lack of research, hoping to find the answer in the future.For this reason, he was not yet sure of the answer that had been circling in his mind more and more frequently of late. -------- ① Refers to the answer given at the end of Chapter 27 above: "All these people were arrested, imprisoned, or exiled absolutely not because they committed any injustice or committed a crime, but simply because they hindered the bureaucracy and the rich. Men have what they have looted from the people."