The inquiry into existing legislation on insane criminals, undertaken by the ``Soci<e'>t<e'> G<e'>n<e'>rale des prisons de Paris,'' showed that in France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Croatia, Belgium, Portugal, and Sweden, the authors of crimes or offences who are acquitted on the ground of insanity are withdrawn from all control by the judicial authority, and entrusted to the more or less regular and effectual control of the administrative authority. In England, <p 232>Holland, Denmark, Spain, and Russia, on the contrary, the judicial authority is empowered and even compelled to order the seclusion of these individuals in an ordinary or a criminal lunatic asylum. Of the objections raised against this form of social defence against insane criminals, I pass over that of the cost, which is considerable; for even from the financial point of view I believe that the actual system, which gives no guarantee of security against madmen with criminal tendencies, is more costly to the administration, if only by reason of the damage which they cause. I also pass over the other objection, based on the violent scenes which are said to be inseparable from the association of such prisoners; for experience has shown that forebodings are ill founded in regard to criminal asylums where the inmates are classified according to their tendencies, under the direction of a staff with special knowledge, who are able to prevent such outbreaks. In ordinary asylums, on the other hand, a few insane criminals are sufficient to render the maintenance of order very difficult, and their inevitable and frequent outbreaks have dire effects on the other patients. The most serious and repeated difficulties in regard to lunatic asylums spring from the very principles of the defensive function of society. It is said in the first place that the author of a dangerous action is either a madman or else a criminal. If he is a madman, he has nothing to do with penal justice--so Fabret, Mendel, and others have said; his action is not a crime, for he had no <p 233>control over himself, and he ought to go to an ordinary asylum, special measures being taken for him, as for every other dangerous madman. Or else he is a criminal, and then he has nothing to do with a lunatic asylum, and he ought to go to prison.