prevents as
little the commission of fresh crimes in society, as the removal of
weeds on a field would prevent their returning if the roots and seeds
are not likewise destroyed. Absolutely to prevent the forming of harmful
organisms in Nature is a feat man never will be able to achieve but _to
so improve his own social system, a system produced by himself, that it
may afford favorable conditions of life for all, and furnish to each
equal freedom to unfold, to the end that they no longer need suffer
hunger, or be driven to satisfy their desire for property, or their
ambition at the expense of others--that is possible_. Let the cause of
the crimes be studied, and let that be removed; then will the crimes
themselves be wiped out.[163]

Those who would remove crimes by removing the causes thereof, cannot, as
a matter of course, sympathize with a plan of brutal suppression. They
cannot prevent society from protecting itself after its own fashion
against the criminals, whom it cannot allow a free hand; but we demand
all the more urgently the radical reformation of society, i. e., the
removal of the causes of crime.

The connection between social conditions, on the one hand, and evildoing
and crimes, on the other, has been frequently established by
statisticians and sociologists. One of the misdemeanors nearest at
hand--one that, all Christian charitable tenets to the contrary
notwithstanding, modern society regards as a misdemeanor--is begging,
especially during hard times. On that subject, the statistics of the
Kingdom of Saxony inform us that, in the measure in which the last
industrial crisis increased--a crisis that began in Germany in 1890, and
whose end is not yet in sight--the number of persons also increased who
were punished for begging. In 1889, there were 8,566 persons punished
for this crime in the Kingdom of Saxony; in 1890, there were 8,815; in
1891, there were 10,075; and in 1892 the figures rose to 13,120--quite
an increase. Mass-impoverishment on one side, swelling affluence on the
other--such is the sign-manual of our age. In Austria, in 1873, there
was one pauper to every 724 persons; in 1882, to every 622 persons.
Crimes and misdemeanors show similar tendency. In Austria-Hungary, in
1874, there were 308,605 persons sentenced in the criminal courts; in
1892, their number was 600,000. In the German Empire, in 1882, there
were 329,968 persons sentenced for crimes and misdemeanors under the
laws of the land