The Parricide andJustice. that it would appear that the parricide was un known in the early days of civilized society, and we will show further on that the He brew law, like the Grecian and Roman laws, did not take this crime into consideration, esteeming that it was an impossibility. At Athens, the first mention of a law for the punishment of a parricide only appears at the time of Solon. At Rome, this crime was unknown for a long time, if we may believe the most, authentic historians. Plutarch and Seneca say that for nearly ten centuries this crime was exceedingly infrequent, if in real ity it ever occurred, and Titus Livius goes as far as to affirm that the first parricide was committed by Publicius- Alalleolus, who killed his mother in the Roman year of 653. But beginning with the century of Augustus, parricides became so frequent, that in less than a century after the execution of Malleclus, Seneca wrote: "Pcssinw loco fictas fuit, ('cstqitain sapins cullcos quam cruces vidi mus." The example of this most odious crime came from one of high birth, for Xero en deavored to rid himself of his mother by every possible means. Three times he tried to poison her and failed; he endeavored to drown her, and she saved her life by swim ming. At last, he had her stabbed. The study of the legislation of the various civilized people, at different epochs of their history, show that, if all the societies have invariably punished criminal acts by variable penalties, there is not a single crime, excepting regicide, during the troubled epochs of the formation of States, which has been more severely repressed than that of parri cide. It is so true that this crime has been con sidered the most odious, that the primitive people appear never to have known it, as I have already pointed out, so much so that they had not conceived the possibility of such on act.- The Jewish laws do not men tion it, but one can judge what might have
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been the chastizement of a parricide when one takes into consideration the punishment inflicted upon sons who were wanting in re spect for their parents. A son who was guilty of serious disobedience to his parents was stoned (Deut. xxi. 18); he who injured his parents or attacked them in any way was punished by death (Exod. xxi., 17.; Le vit. xx., 9; Deut, xxvii., 16). It was the same in Egypt, where the supreme crime, after that of outraging the. gods, was to leave one's parents without a tomb. The Athenian laws are also dumb on the subject of parricide. Solon, that great legislator and philosopher whom history ranks highest among those who have made the social education of the Grecian race, formulates no law for this crime, which was reputed an impossibility, at a time, nevertheless, when a father had the right to sell his children. At a later date, however, this monstrous crime began to be perpetrated, and accord ing to Plato, the punishment was as follows: If anyone is unfortunate enough as to dare to voluntarily and with premeditation snatch the soul from the body of his father or of his mother, of his brothers or his chil dren, such is the law that the mortal legisla tor will apply against his; he shall be con demned to death by the judges; the magis trates wiil have him executed by the public executioners, and his body will be thrown out of the city in a naked condition in a space designated for this purpose. All the magis trates, in the name of the entire State, shall carry a stone in the hand, and then throw it at the head of the cadaver, and will thus purify the entire State. He will then be car ried beyond the limits of the territory, and there will be left without a tomb, according to the order of the law. This last disposi tion of the body was the most rigorous, be cause among the Greeks, as with several other nations, the supreme chastizement was to leave a body without a tomb, and it was to avoid this ignominious shadow cov
