"The real lawyers," replied Miss Wiggin innocently.
"The judges who write them probably read them," declared Mr. Tutt. "And the defeated litigants; the successful ones merely read the final paragraphs."
"But coming back to crime for a moment," said Miss Wiggin, pouring herself out a second cup of tea; "I had almost forgotten that the criminal law was originally intended only to keep down violence. That explains a lot of things. I confess to being one of those who unconsciously assumed that the law is a sort of official Mrs. Grundy."
"Not at all! Not at all!" corrected Mr. Tutt. "The law makes no pretense of being an arbiter of morals. Even where justice is concerned it expects the mere sentiment of the community to be capable of dealing with trifling offenses. The laws of etiquette and manners, devised for 'the purpose of keeping fools at a distance,' are reasonably adapted to enforcing the dictates of good taste and to dealing with minor offenses against our ideas of propriety."
"I wonder," hazarded Miss Wiggin thoughtfully, "if there isn't some sociological law about crimes, like the law of diminishing returns in physics?"
"The law of what?"
"Why, the law that the greater the force or effort applied to anything," she explained a little vaguely, "the greater the resistance becomes, until the effort doesn't accomplish anything; increased speed in a warship, for instance."
"What's that got to do with crime?"
"Why, the more statutes you pass and more new crimes you create the harder it becomes to enforce obedience to them, until finally you can't enforce them at all."
"That is rather a profound analogy," observed Mr. Tutt. "It might well repay study."