ircle.

In the absence of any solid starting point on which an argument can be
based; in the absence of any reliable figures; in the absence of any way
to interpret the figures; in the absence of any way to ascertain the
indirect results of judicial killings, even if the direct ones could be
shown; in the impossibility through life, experience or philosophy of
fixing relative values, the question must remain where it has always
been, a conflict between the emotional and unemotional; the
"sentimental" and the stolid; the imaginative and the unimaginative; the
sympathetic and the unsympathetic. Personally, being inclined to a
purely mechanistic view of life and to the belief that all conduct is
the result of certain stimuli upon a human machine, I can only say that
the stimuli of seeing and reading of capital punishment, applied to my
machine, is revolting and horrible. Perhaps as the world improves, the
sympathetic and imaginative nature will survive the stolid and selfish.
At least one can well believe that this is the line of progress if there
shall be progress, a matter still open to question and doubt.

XXIV

STIGMATA OF THE CRIMINAL

Lombroso and others have emphasized the theory that the criminal is a
distinct physical type. This doctrine has been so positively asserted
and with such a show of statistics and authority, that it has many
advocates. More recent investigations seem to show conclusively that
there is little or no foundation for the idea that the criminal is a
separate type. Men accustomed to criminal courts and prisons cannot
avoid being impressed with the marks of inferiority that are apparent in
prisoners. Most prisoners are wretched and poorly nourished, wear poor
clothes and are uncared-for and unkempt. Their stunted appearance is
doubtless due largely to poor food, the irregularity of nourishment, and
the sordidness of their lives in general. One also imagines that a
prisoner looks the part, and in his clothes and surroundings he
generally does. It is hard for a prisoner to look well-groomed; he has
neither the opportunity nor the ambition to give much attention to his
personal appearance. The looks of the prisoners are of little value.
Nothing but actual measurements could give real information, and these
do not sustain the theory of their being different from other men.

It is not possible to see how the criminal can be of a distinct physical
type. Criminality exists only in referenc