PRISONS
431
PRISONS
imprisonment being considered not so much a penalty
as a means of supervising culprits. The care of the
gaols, up to the middle of the third century, was in-
cluded among the duties of the triumviri capitales.
In the provinces a more regular administration en-
tirely under inilitary control was then being in-
stituted. At first the accused do not seem to have
been separated from the convicted, nor were the
sexes kept apart; though there are instances of
solitary imprisonment (Humbert in Daremburg and
Saglio, "Diet, des antiquit^s grecques et romaines",
8. V. Career).
II. Influence of Christianity. — It was natural that when Christians were being hunted down and cast into gaol for their faith, the Church should rec- ommend the faithful to visit the prisoners. The deacons and deaconesses were especially charged with the care of the incarcerated Christians, bringing them the comforts of religion, food, clothing, and es- pecially money, which was needed to procure certain mitigations, even liberty. The deaconesses more particularly were appointed to this office, for in visiting the Christians they ran less risk of awakening the suspicion of the pagans. At an early period the bishops began to purchase the liberty of the prisoners. For this they made collections, and if the receipts were not sufficient, they sold the church property. Not only their own flock but the Christians in dis- tant lands were the objects of their charitable zeal. Debtors, towards whom Rome w:>,s so heartless, were not forgotten. Justinian granted private debtors the right of asylum in the house of God, but only if the creditors abused their rights; this favour was not, however, extended to public or state debtors. The Church, the help of sinners, could not but extend her assistance and protection to criminals; for crime is primarily a sin. In the earliest times, as soon as more peaceful days had dawned, she endeavoured to free them from prison, to punish and correct them in another way. For this she employed three means.
(1) The paschal indulgence. By virtue of an edict of Valentinian I in 367 all prisons were opened at Easter and the prisoners set free. This edict was called the indulgenlia pascalis. The privilege was not extended to those arrested for sacrilege, poisoning, treason, adultery, rapine, or murder. Valentinian the younger, Theodosius, and Theodoric issued similar edicts, but they excluded in addition recidivists.
(2) The right of asylum. Under Constantine the Church had the right of asylum, which was granted also by his successors. Charlemagne ordained in a capitular}' that no one taking refuge in a church should be taken from it by force, but should be un- molested till the court had pronounceti its decision. This privilege in the course of time was abused and consequently was abolished. The right of asylum was not extended to adulterers, ravishers of young girls, or public debtors; it was confined to tho.se who were unjustly pursued. (3) The right of interces- sion. The bishops had the right to ask the civil judge to pardon condemned prisoners, especially those sentenced to death; frequently, however, they petitioned to have prisoners discharged. In the course of time, through the influence of the Church, the lot of prisoners was greatly improved. The Council of Niciea (32.5) ordered the procuralores pau- perum to visit the gaols and offer their services. The Synod of Orleans (.549) obliged the archdeacon to see all the prisoners on Sundays. The active in- tervention of the Church began in the days of Con- stantine the Great and continued for a long period. The bishops and priests were invited and authorized to supervise the conduct of the judges, to visit prisoners on a certain week-day, Wednesdays or Fridays, and find out the reason of their imprison- ment, to speak with them about their position and wants, to inform the proper authorities of any de-
fects they noticed and to have changes made. Dup-
ing the Middle Ages this right and duty was enforced
only here and there. St. Charles Borromeo was a
gre^t reformer and reorganized the whole prison
system in his diocese, even to the smallest details,
on an essentially humanitarian and Christian basis.
The clergj'man deputed by the bishop to look after
the prisoners had to inquire constantly "qujE illorum
cura adhibeatur, cum in primis ad animae salutem,
turn etiam ad corporis sustentationem", i. e. what
care was taken of them, first in regard to their
spiritual needs and then as to their physical welfare.
Influence of the Papacy. — The influence of the Papacy also was very great, and the prison system at Rome became a model. Popes Eugenius IV (1435), Paul y (1611), and Innocent X (1655) passed regulations improving the conditions of prisoners, until finally Clement XI (1703), by con- structing St. Michael's prison, introduced the most essential change needed to ameliorate the penal system: the construction of a house of correction for youthful offenders, as is recorded in the inscription on the fagade: "Perditis adolescentibus corrigendis instituendisque ut qui inertes oberant instruct! reipublica; serviant" (for the correction and educa- tion of abandoned youths; that they who, without training, were detrimental to the State, may, with training, be of service to it). The methods employed to reclaim culprits were separation, silence, work, and prayer. Each prisoner had his cell at night, but all worked in common during the day. A religious confraternity supervised them and undertook their education. Each one was taught a trade, and was encouraged by a system of rewards. The punish- ments consisted in bread and water diet, work in their cells, black holes, and flogging. In the large workshop of the gaol was inscribed the motto: "Parum est coercere improbos pa?na nisi probos efficias disciplina" (It avails little to punish the wicked unless you reform them by discipline). In 1735 Clement XII erected a prison for women on the model of St. Michael's. If Clement is considered the creator of the modern penitentiary system, it must be pointed out that at Amsterdam the principle of separation at night and work in common during the day had been introduced in 1603 (Von Hippel, "Beitriige zur Geschichte der Freiheitstrafe" in "Zeitschr. fiir die Gesch. Straf.", 1897, p. 437, and Roux, "Re\'ue penitcntiaire", 1S98, p. 124 sqq.), and that the work of the Dutch inspired many imitators in Germany and Italy, where learned jurisconsults proclaimed that the reformation of the culprit was the object of punishment (Riviere, "Revue peni- tcntiaire", 1895, p. 11.52). A priest, Filippo Franci, after experimenting at Venice and Naples on the effect of separating prisoners according to sex, age, and social rank, succeeded in making his house of refuge at Florence (casa pia di refugio), by the ap- plication of individual separation, a model establish- ment for the correctional education of children.
Influence of the Religious Orders. — In the iSIiddle Ages the Church founded religious orders which bound themselves by vow to the redemption of cap- tives; the Trinitarians, or Mathurins, established in 1198 by St. John of Matha and Felix de Valois, and the Nolascans, founded in 1223. In Spain, France, and especially Italy, there were, moreover, associations or confraternities labouring to improve the condition of prisoners: the Confrafernitd, della Misericordia and the Compagnia di Santa Maria della croce al Tempio delta de Neri at Florence, the Pia Casa di Misericordia at Pisa, the Co.sa della pieta at Venice, etc. Besides the prisons depending on the State, there were prisons under the control of the religious authorities. Each convent had one or at times two prisons in which religious were in- carcerated. The term of imprisonment was tem-
