Cesare Beccaria
(1738-1794)

“la massima felicità divisa nel maggior numero”
Cesare Beccaria
Essay On Crime and Punishments (1764)

"Never have thy been dictated by a dispassionate student of human nature who might, by bringing the actions of a multitude of men into focus, consider them from this single point of view: the greatest happiness shared by the greatest number." [page 8]

and "It is better to prevent crimes than to punish them. This is the ultimate end of every good legislation, which, to use the general terms for assessing the good and evils of life, is the art of leading men to the greatest possible happiness or to the least possible unhappiness." [page 92]

[from Henry Paolucci's translation of Cesare Beccaria's Essay On Crime and Punishments (Bobbs-Merrill: Indianapolis, 1963)]

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