Note 6 — Chapter VI · THE SPIRITUALISTS.1

However, on the strength of the statements of an old police officer, Joly thinks he can draw the conclusion that poverty enters only to a small extent into the etiology of crime. Nevertheless the established fact that a rise in the price of grain is associated with an increase of criminality, contradicts this. But according to Joly the contradiction is only apparent. “Famines are exceptional; theft is constant and while famines are always decreasing, theft is always increasing. Suppose that in ordinary years people did not steal or stole very little; the difficult moments would find them more patient, more resolute to have recourse to legal and permissible means; we should not see them so prompt to extricate themselves from their difficulties by simply taking the property of others. But what resistance can we count on from those who have long had the habit of stealing from fancy, cupidity, or a desire to gormandize? What resistance can be hoped for, especially when the habit has begun in youth? Now, we have seen that a third of the thefts are committed by minor children.”6