Thus in everyday life we all require of every labourer the work of which he is more particularly capable. No one would dream, for instance, of having his watch mended by a cobbler. The administration of criminal justice, on the contrary, is demanded of any one we chance to come across, be he grocer or man of independent means, painter or pensioner, who may never in his life have witnessed a criminal trial! The irregularity of our statutes corresponds to the incapacity of individual jurymen; for it is evident that we cannot impose the rigorous process of a special mode of procedure on the first- comer. And the law heightens the absurdity by plainly declaring that juries must give their decision without regard to the consequences of their verdict! ``Jurymen fail in their highest duty when they have regard to the penal law, and consider the consequences which their verdict may have upon the accused'' (Article 342 of the French code of criminal procedure). That is to say, criminal justice should be based on the neglect of the elementary rule of justice, according to which every man ought always to consider the possible consequences of his actions. And the criminal law demands from juries this proof of <p 188>their blindness (which is fortunately impossible) that they should judge blindfold, with no regard for the prisoner, or for the consequences which their verdict may have upon him. It was impossible that the advocates of the jury should fail to see the absurdity of these principles; and they have been compelled to slur them over, at any rate in ordinary practice. In respect of the composition of juries, restrictions have been introduced, by means of lists of eligible persons, selection by lot, the optional exclusion of a certain number of jurymen by the public prosecutor and the defence, &c. All these expedients, however, some of which are imposed by necessity, can only insure a general and presumptive capacity, for they have the merely negative effect of contributing to exclude the most manifest moral or intellectual incapacity. But the only capacity which is necessary in a judge, which is a special and positive capacity, is not guaranteed by these restrictions, which, after all, are a negation of the very principle of the jury. And even if the jury were always composed of persons of adequate capacity, it would still be condemned by two inevitable arguments of human psychology.