It is forgotten, in Germany and in some other countries, sometimes even in France, that to bring immorality within reach of the arm of the law is not necessarily by any means to make the actual penalty, in the largest sense of the term, more severe. So long as he retains the good opinion of his fellows, imprisonment is no injury to a man; it has happened to some of our most distinguished and respected public men. The bad opinion of his fellows, even when the law is powerless to touch him, is often an irretrievable injury to a man. We do not fortify the social reaction, in most matters, when we attempt to give it a legal sanction; we do not even need to fortify it, for it is sometimes harsher and more severe than the law, overlooking or not knowing all the extenuating circumstances. In France, as in England, the force of social opinion, independently of the law, is exceedingly and perhaps excessively strong.
In England, however, we see an attitude towards immorality which differs alike from the French attitude and the German attitude, though it has points of contact with both. The distinctive feature of the Englishman's attitude is his spirit of extreme individualism (which distinguishes him from the German) combined with the religious nature of his moral fervour (which distinguishes him from the Frenchman), both being veiled by a shy prudery (which distinguishes him alike from the Frenchman and the German). The Englishman's reverence for the individual's rights goes beyond the Frenchman's, for in France there is a tendency to subordinate the individual to the family, and in England the interests of the individual predominate. But while in France the laws have been re-moulded to the national temperament, this has not been the case to anything like the same extent in England, where in modern times no great revolution has occurred to shake off laws which still by their antiquity, rather than by their reasonableness, retain the reverence of the people. Thus it comes about that, on the legal side the English attitude towards immorality in many respects resembles the German attitude. Yet undoubtedly the most fundamental element in the English attitude is the instinct for personal freedom, and even the religious