s the jury is in part composed of educated
men.

In their decisions, as in their ordinary modes of thought, the jurors
drawn from the educated classes are little, if at all, affected by
theological conceptions, but they are sometimes influenced in a not less
unfortunate way by conceptions of a different order. It may happen,
for instance, that a juror who had passed through one of the higher
educational establishments has his own peculiar theory about the value
of evidence, or he is profoundly impressed with the idea that it is
better that a thousand guilty men should escape than that one
innocent man should be punished, or he is imbued with sentimental
pseudo-philanthropy, or he is convinced that punishments are useless
because they neither cure the delinquent nor deter others from crime; in
a word, he may have in some way or other lost his mental balance in
that moral chaos through which Russia is at present passing. In England,
France, or Germany such an individual would have little influence on
his fellow-jurymen, for in these countries there are very few people who
allow new paradoxical ideas to overturn their traditional notions and
obscure their common-sense; but in Russia, where even the elementary
moral conceptions are singularly unstable and pliable, a man of this
type may succeed in leading a jury. More than once I have heard men
boast of having induced their fellow-jurymen to acquit every prisoner
brought before them, not because they believed the prisoners to be
innocent or the evidence to be insufficient, but because all punishments
are useless and barbarous.

One word in conclusion regarding the independence and political
significance of the new courts. When the question of judicial reform
was first publicly raised many people hoped that the new courts would
receive complete autonomy and real independence, and would thus form a
foundation for political liberty. These hopes, like so many illusions of
that strange time, have not been realised. A large measure of autonomy
and independence was indeed granted in theory. The law laid down the
principle that no judge could be removed unless convicted of a definite
crime, and that the courts should present candidates for all the vacant
places on the Bench; but these and similar rights have little practical
significance. If the Minister cannot depose a judge, he can deprive him
of all possibility of receiving promotion, and he can easily force him
in an indirect