i88o.] 
Natural Science and Morality . 
459 
statistics) is in the ratio of one to a hundred, the punish- 
ment equivalent to the stealing of as much as a thief 
could earn by honest work in a day, would be a hundred 
days’ labour. This would be the minimum mathematical 
value of the penalty under the above conditions, and if 
society did not counteract the advantage gained in the theft 
by at least this amount of punishment, it would be abso- 
lutely offering a reward for stealing. But it is necessary 
that a flourishing society should do more (or it must fix the 
penalty somewhat in excess of its true minimum value) in 
order to make the unfair method of attaining definite ends 
positively disadvantageous, so that it may not be adopted 
except by members of inferior reasoning power. . No doubt 
special considerations may influence the administration of 
the code in special cases, but the recognition of a broad or 
general principle underlying the penalties is not on this 
account of less value or importance. 
It may, perhaps, assist in appreciating that the above 
principle is a just one (in regard to the minimum value of 
the penalty) to observe that if detection were certain (in the 
case of a sum stolen, for instance), then the mere depriva- 
tion of the sum afterwards would be sufficient as a penalty 
to check thieving (as it would destroy all profit). It must 
follow logically from this, therefore (on the same principle), 
that when detection is not certain, a fine equal to the chance 
of escape multiplied by the value of the sum abstracted, 
would also be a sufficient penalty, because all means of gain 
would thus be entirely extinguished (and a margin of loss 
remain in the trouble of abstraaing the sum). This is 
evidently merely an instance of varying the punishment by 
infliaing fines instead of the equivalent labour. 
The above analysis may perhaps serve to make it suffi- 
ciently clear that the feelings of responsibility, praise, and 
blame (originally formed probably as “instinas” through 
natural seleaion), have a distina rational foundation, and 
are in harmony with the doarine of stria causal sequence 
in nature. The penal code may be regarded as merely a 
more emphatic method of awarding blame, or of teaching 
people that selfishness is the opposite of self-interest. It may 
be added that those who are interested in the related question 
of stria causation in physical events, may be referred to a 
recent letter by one of the authors in “Nature,” May 13th, p. 
29, “ On a Point Relating to Brain Dynamics.” It should 
be remarked, however) .that we have since learnt through 
Mr. George Romanes (“Nature, May 27th, p. 75), that the 
mode of reconciliation of the rival views on Free Will v. 
