Then I asked, "Why did you do it?"
He moved uneasily in the dock without answering, looked about him, and seemed puzzled.
I repeated the question.
Evidently he was trying to remember back why he had done it, and found it difficult. He had not considered the point before, and introspection was new to him. "Why did I do it?" he was saying to himself.
"Well?" I asked.
He looked me frankly in the face. "I don't know," he said. "I suppose I could not help it. I did not think about it at all; something just made me take it."
He was convicted, of course, and I forgot the case.
But I did not forget what he had said. It remained in my mind and recurred to me from time to time, I did not know why. For I had always been taught that crime was due to an evil disposition which a person could change, only he would not, and I had as yet seen no reason to question this view. Therefore the accused's defence appealed to no idea that was consciously in my mind. I did not reflect upon it. I can only suppose that, unconsciously to myself, these words reached some instinct within me which told me that they were true. And at last from the very importunity of their return I did begin to think about them, and, consequently on them, of the causation of crime in general. A curiosity awoke which has never abated, has indeed but grown, as in some small ways I was able to satisfy it.
What causes crime? Is it a purely individual matter? If so, why does it follow certain lines of increase or decrease, or maintain an average? That looks more like general results following on general causes than the result of individual qualities. Why is it not curable? It should have been cured centuries ago. Why does punishment usually make the offender worse instead of better? If his crime were within the individual's control, its punishment certainly would deter. It does not. Any deterrent effect it may have is rarely on him who is punished, but on the outside world, and that is but little. So much I saw very clearly in practice, and every book I read on the subject confirmed this. The infamous penal laws of England a hundred years ago did not stop crime; flogging did not stop garotting, it ceased for other causes. I began to think and to observe.
Some three years later my attention was still more strongly drawn to this subject.