Some crimes relate to person , others to property .
The first ought to be punished corporally. Liberty is at an end whenever the laws permit that, in certain cases, a man may cease to be a person , and become a thing . Then will the powerful employ their address to select from the various combinations of civil society all that is in their own favour. This is that magic art which transforms subjects into beasts of burden, and which, in the hands of the strong, is the chain that binds the weak and incautious. Thus it is that in some governments, where there is all the appearance of Liberty, tyranny lies concealed, and insinuates itself into some neglected corner of the constitution, where it gathers strength insensibly.