A Milanese jurist, economist and criminologist:
False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real
advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would
take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown
in it; that has no remedy for evils, except destruction. The laws that
forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm
only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.
Can it be supposed that those who have the courage to violate the most
sacred laws of humanity, the most important of the code, will respect
the less important and arbitrary ones, which can be violated with ease
and impunity, and which, if strictly obeyed, would put an end to
personal liberty - and subject innocent persons to all the vexations
that the guilty alone ought to suffer? Such laws make things worse for
the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to
encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be
attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. They ought to be
designated as laws not preventative but fearful of crimes, produced by
the tumultuous impression of a few isolated facts, and not by
thoughtful consideration of the inconveniences and advantages of a
universal decree.
On Crimes and Punishments, 1764