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Chapter 12 - Crime and Punishment |
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one of the judges of the city stood forth and said, "Speak
to us of Crime and Punishment." |
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| And he answered, saying: It is when your spirit
goes wandering upon the wind, That you, alone and
unguarded, commit a wrong unto others and therefore
unto yourself. And for that wrong committed must
you knock and wait a while unheeded at the gate of
the blessed. |
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| Like the ocean is your god-self; It remains for
ever undefiled. And like the ether it lifts but the
winged. Even like the sun is your god-self; It knows
not the ways of the mole nor seeks it the holes of
the serpent. But your god-self dwells not alone in
your being. Much in you is still man, and much in
you is not yet man, But a shapeless pigmy that walks
asleep in the mist searching for its own awakening.
And of the man in you would I now speak. |
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| For it is he and not your god-self nor the pigmy
in the mist that knows crime and the punishment of
crime. |
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| Oftentimes have I heard you speak of one who commits
a wrong as though he were not one of you, but a stranger
unto you and an intruder upon your world. But I say
that even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise
beyond the highest which is in each one of you, So
the wicked and the weak cannot fall lower than the
lowest which is in you also. And as a single leaf
turns not yellow but with the silent knowledge of
the whole tree, So the wrong-doer cannot do wrong
without the hidden will of you all. Like a procession
you walk together towards your god-self. You are
the way and the wayfarers. And when one of you falls
down he falls for those behind him, a caution against
the stumbling stone. |
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| Aye, and he falls for those ahead of him, who,
though faster and surer of foot, yet removed not
the stumbling stone. |
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| And this also, though the word lie heavy upon
your hearts: The murdered is not unaccountable for
his own murder, And the robbed is not blameless in
being robbed. The righteous is not innocent of the
deeds of the wicked, And the white-handed is not
clean in the doings of the felon. Yea, the guilty
is oftentimes the victim of the injured. And still
more often the condemned is the burden bearer for
the guiltless and unblamed. You cannot separate the
just from the unjust and the good from the wicked;
For they stand together before the face of the sun
even as the black thread and the white are woven
together. |
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| And when the black thread breaks, the weaver shall
look into the whole cloth, and he shall examine the
loom also. |
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| If any of you would bring to judgment the unfaithful
wife, Let him also weigh the heart of her husband
in scales, and measure his soul with measurements.
And let him who would lash the offender look unto
the spirit of the offended. And if any of you would
punish in the name of righteousness and lay the axe
unto the evil tree, let him see to its roots; And
verily he will find the roots of the good and the
bad, the fruitful and the fruitless, all entwined
together in the silent heart of the earth. |
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| And you judges who would be just. What judgment
pronounce you upon him who though honest in the flesh
yet is a thief in spirit? What penalty lay you upon
him who slays in the flesh yet is himself slain in
the spirit? |
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| And how prosecute you him who in action is a deceiver
and an oppressor, Yet who also is aggrieved and outraged? |
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| And how shall you punish those whose remorse is
already greater than their misdeeds? Is not remorse
the justice which is administered by that very law
which you would fain serve? Yet you cannot lay remorse
upon the innocent nor lift it from the heart of the
guilty. Unbidden shall it call in the night, that
men may wake and gaze upon themselves. And you who
would understand justice, how shall you unless you
look upon all deeds in the fullness of light? Only
then shall you know that the erect and the fallen
are but one man standing in twilight between the
night of his pigmy-self and the day of his god self,
And that the corner-stone of the temple is not higher
than the lowest stone in its foundation. |
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