Massacres only
increase the ferocity of men, and teach them to regard their own lives
and those of others as of little value; whereas the great policy of
government is, to teach the people to think both of great importance in
the eyes of God and the state, and never to be sacrificed or even
hazarded to gratify their passions, or for anything but the duties
prescribed by the rules of morality, and under the direction of public
law and public authority. To punish them with lesser penalties would be
to debilitate the commonwealth, and make the nation miserable, which it
is the business of government to render happy and flourishing.
As to crimes, too, I would draw a strong line of limitation. For no one
offence, _politically an offence of rebellion_, by council, contrivance,
persuasion, or compulsion, for none properly a _military offence of
rebellion_, or anything done by open hostility in the field, should any
man at all be called in question; because such seems to be the proper
and natural death of civil dissensions. The offences of war are
obliterated by peace.
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