Here, then, we have a primary and potent cause of the slight efficacy of legal punishments, in the picturing of the many chances of escape. First there is the chance of not being detected, which is the most powerful spring of all contemplated crime: then the chance, in case of detection, that the evidence will not be strong enough, that the judges will be merciful, or will be deceived, that judgment may be averted amidst the intricacies of the trial, that clemency may either reverse or mitigate the sentence. These are so many psychological causes which, conflicting with the natural fear of unpleasant consequences, weaken the repellent force of legal punishment, whilst they are unknown to natural punishment. There is also another psychological condition which, undermining even the force of natural punishment, almost entirely destroys the power of social punishment; and that is improvidence. We see, in fact, that even the most certain natural consequences are defied, and lose most of their power to guard an improvident man from anti-natural and dangerous actions. Now in regard to legal punishment, even apart from passionate impulse, it is known that criminals, occasional and other, are specially improvident, in common <p 106>with savages and children. This weakness is conspicuous enough in the lower and less instructed classes, but amongst criminals it is a genuine characteristic of psychological infirmity. Now, whilst a very slight force is sufficient to produce very great and constant effects, when it acts in harmony with natural tendency and environment, every process, on the other hand, which is opposed to the natural tendencies of man, or which does not follow them closely, encounters a resistance which triumphs in the last resort.