Of course, society has the right to protect itself, no matter whether the persons who attack its well-being are responsible or not, no matter whether they are sick in mind, or deformed in brain. The right of self-defence exists, not only in the individual, but in society. The great question is, How shall this right of self-defence be exercised? What spirit shall be in the nation, or in society--the spirit of revenge, a desire to degrade and punish and destroy, or a spirit born of the recognition of the fact that criminals are victims? The world has thoroughly tried confiscation, degradation, imprisonment, torture and death, and thus far the world has failed. In this connection I call your attention to the following statistics gathered in our own country: In 1850, we had twenty-three millions of people, and between six and seven thousand prisoners. In 1860--thirty-one millions of people, and nineteen thousand prisoners. In 1870--thirty-eight millions of people, and thirty-two thousand prisoners. In 1880--fifty millions of people, and fifty-eight thousand prisoners. It may be curious to note the relation between insanity, pauperism and crime: In 1850, there were fifteen thousand insane; in 1860, twenty-four thousand; in 1870, thirty-seven thousand; in 1880, ninety-one thousand. In the light of these statistics, we are not succeeding in doing away with crime. There were in 1880, fifty-eight thousand prisoners, and in the same year fifty-seven thousand homeless children, and sixty-six thousand paupers in almshouses. Is it possible that we must go to the same causes for these effects? IV. There is no reformation in degradation. To mutilate a criminal is to say to all the world that he is a criminal, and to render his reformation substantially impossible. Whoever is degraded by society becomes its enemy. The seeds of malice are sown in his heart, and to the day of his death he will hate the hand that sowed the seeds. There is also another side to this question. A punishment that degrades the punished will degrade the man who inflicts the punishment, and will degrade the government that procures the infliction. The whipping-post pollutes, not only the whipped, but the whipper, and not only the whipper, but the community at large. Wherever its shadow falls it degrades.