quotations about crime
It takes a pretty dull policeman to miss the fact that the position of authority is the most prosperous criminal position available.
FRANK HERBERT
God Emperor of Dune
When a man, before innocent, commits crime, he passes, by a sudden transition, into a new world. The significance of all objects around him is changed; the laws of association in his own mind are changed; a viper is born in his breast which stings and goads him. Sounds that he never heard before ring in his ears; a violated conscience turns avenger and scourger;--the foe is within him. Were it merely an external enemy, assaulting the criminal from without, perhaps he might be fled from, resisted, bribed, or would at last remit his inflictions through very weariness of tormenting. But not so with the consciousness of wrong.... It will not sleep, nor tire, nor relent.
HORACE MANN
Thoughts
If a man should wanton walk with crime ... he shall find in death no great deliverance.
AESCHYLUS
The Eumenides
Am I the victim or the crime?
GRATEFUL DEAD
"Victim or the Crime"
We easily forget crimes that are known to none but ourselves.
FRANÇOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
Moral Maxims
Some of the most notorious criminals, when removed from their associates and the scenes of their crimes, have ... made the most respected of citizens, and the most exemplary members of society.
T. AUGUSTUS FORBES LEITH
"On the Detection of Crime and Criminals", Short Essays
Crimes exalted into laws become therefore the more odious; just as the false gods of heathenism, when set up of old on the altar of Jehovah, shocked his true worshippers the more by usurping so conspicuously the honors due to him alone.
WILLIAM E. CHANNING
Thoughts
A crime is like a sound. It does not exist if there is no one there to hear it.
FERDINAND MOUNT
The Spectator, June 27, 1981
Criminals are dumb as stumps. If they were smart they could go be investment bankers. Or judges.
JEFF ABBOTT
Black Jack Point
Crime is terribly revealing. Try and vary your methods as you will, your tastes, your habits, your attitude of mind, and your soul is revealed by your actions.
AGATHA CHRISTIE
The ABC Murders
Everywhere you look -- Britain, the States, western Europe -- people are sealing themselves into crime-free enclaves. That's a mistake -- a certain level of crime is part of the necessary roughage of life. Total security is a disease of deprivation.
J. G. BALLARD
Cocaine Nights
The greatest crimes are committed ... for obtaining or securing the objects of ill-regulated desires, and senseless, because insatiable, passions.
ARISTOTLE
Politics
Crime is a fact of the human species, a fact of that species alone, but it is above all the secret aspect, impenetrable and hidden. Crime hides, and by far the most terrifying things are those which elude us.
GEORGES BATAILLE
The Trial of Gilles de Rais
Pardon one offence and you encourage the commission of many.
PUBLILIUS SYRUS
Maxims
There is no such crime as a crime of thought; there are only crimes of action.
CLARENCE DARROW
Clarence Darrow for the Defense
What do you think, would not one tiny crime be wiped out by thousands of good deeds?
FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY
Crime and Punishment
Actions punishable by jail sentences are not the only crimes.
OSAMU DAZAI
No Longer Human
When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible. When sufferings become unendurable the cries are no longer heard. The cries, too, fall like rain in summer.
BERTOLT BRECHT
"When Evil-Doing Comes Like Falling Rain"
The successful detection of crime and catching the criminal depends very much in losing no time whatever in setting about it, and endeavouring to take up the scent whilst yet warm.
T. AUGUSTUS FORBES LEITH
"On the Detection of Crime and Criminals", Short Essays
Disgrace does not consist in the punishment, but in the crime.
VITTORIO ALFIERI
Antigone