Study Edition · Essay 31
Debtors' Prisons (2)
Source: The Idler, No. 38, Saturday 6 January 1759. Text from The Works of Samuel Johnson (Oxford, 1825), vol. 4, Project Gutenberg #12050. Archaic verb forms modernized; vocabulary kept and glossed.
Johnson returns to debtors' prisons four months later, and this time he argues with numbers. If 20,000 people are locked up for debt, he calculates the cost in lost work, in deaths from gaol fever, and in a whole army's worth of idle men. Then he turns from arithmetic to morality: prisons breed vice, and the shame of imprisonment should fall on the cruel creditor, not on the debtor. The last line is one of his most powerful.
27 sentences: 2 simple, 8 moderate, 17 complex. Hover a number for its paraphrase; click it for the full note.
Key Vocabulary
- gaoljail (old British spelling, pronounced the same)
- oblivionthe state of being forgotten
- abhorto hate deeply; to be horrified by
- declamatoryloudly rhetorical; full of dramatic speech
- vehemencestrong, passionate force
- computista person who calculates; a statistician (old)
- consanguinitybeing related by blood
- reciprocationmutual giving and receiving
- conjecturea guess; an estimate
- contagionthe spreading of disease by contact
- putrefiedrotted
- noisomefoul-smelling; disgusting
- trained bandslocal citizen militia
- exigencyan urgent need or emergency
- abstractionwithdrawal from the world; deep thought
- profligaterecklessly immoral or wasteful
- ignominypublic shame and disgrace
- inveteratelong-established and hard to change
- infamypublic disgrace; a very bad reputation
- obduratestubbornly hard-hearted
The Essay
Since the publication of the letter concerning the condition of those who are confined in gaols by their creditors, an inquiry is said to have been made, by which it appears that more than twenty thousand are at this time prisoners for debt.1
We often look with indifference on the successive parts of that, which, if the whole were seen together, would shake us with emotion.2 A debtor is dragged to prison, pitied for a moment, and then forgotten; another follows him, and is lost alike in the caverns of oblivion; but when the whole mass of calamity rises up at once, when twenty thousand reasonable beings are heard all groaning in unnecessary misery, not by the infirmity of nature, but the mistake or negligence of policy, who can forbear to pity and lament, to wonder and abhor?3
There is here no need of declamatory vehemence: we live in an age of commerce and computation; let us, therefore, coolly inquire what is the sum of evil which the imprisonment of debtors brings upon our country.4
It seems to be the opinion of the later computists, that the inhabitants of England do not exceed six millions, of which twenty thousand is the three-hundredth part.5 What shall we say of the humanity or the wisdom of a nation, that voluntarily sacrifices one in every three hundred to lingering destruction?6
The misfortunes of an individual do not extend their influence to many; yet, if we consider the effects of consanguinity and friendship, and the general reciprocation of wants and benefits, which make one man dear or necessary to another, it may reasonably be supposed, that every man languishing in prison gives trouble of some kind to two others who love or need him.7 By this multiplication of misery we see distress extended to the hundredth part of the whole society.8
If we estimate at a shilling a day what is lost by the inaction, and consumed in the support of each man thus chained down to involuntary idleness, the public loss will rise in one year to three hundred thousand pounds; in ten years to more than a sixth part of our circulating coin.9
I am afraid that those who are best acquainted with the state of our prisons will confess that my conjecture is too near the truth, when I suppose that the corrosion of resentment, the heaviness of sorrow, the corruption of confined air, the want of exercise, and sometimes of food, the contagion of diseases, from which there is no retreat, and the severity of tyrants, against whom there can be no resistance, and all the complicated horrors of a prison, put an end every year to the life of one in four of those that are shut up from the common comforts of human life.10
Thus perish yearly five thousand men overborne with sorrow, consumed by famine, or putrefied by filth; many of them in the most vigorous and useful part of life; for the thoughtless and imprudent are commonly young, and the active and busy are seldom old.11
According to the rule generally received, which supposes that one in thirty dies yearly, the race of man may be said to be renewed at the end of thirty years.12 Who would have believed till now, that of every English generation, a hundred and fifty thousand perish in our gaols? that in every century, a nation eminent for science, studious of commerce, ambitious of empire, should willingly lose, in noisome dungeons, five hundred thousand of its inhabitants; a number greater than has ever been destroyed in the same time by pestilence and the sword?13
A very late occurrence may show us the value of the number which we thus condemn to be useless; in the reestablishment of the trained bands, thirty thousand are considered as a force sufficient against all exigencies.14 While, therefore, we detain twenty thousand in prison, we shut up in darkness and uselessness two-thirds of an army which ourselves judge equal to the defence of our country.15
The monastic institutions have been often blamed, as tending to retard the increase of mankind.16 And, perhaps, retirement ought rarely to be permitted, except to those whose employment is consistent with abstraction, and who, though solitary, will not be idle; to those whom infirmity makes useless to the commonwealth, or to those who have paid their due proportion to society, and who, having lived for others, may be honourably dismissed to live for themselves.17 But whatever be the evil or the folly of these retreats, those have no right to censure them whose prisons contain greater numbers than the monasteries of other countries.18 It is, surely, less foolish and less criminal to permit inaction than compel it; to comply with doubtful opinions of happiness, than condemn to certain and apparent misery; to indulge the extravagancies of erroneous piety, than to multiply and enforce temptations to wickedness.19
The misery of gaols is not half their evil: they are filled with every corruption which poverty and wickedness can generate between them; with all the shameless and profligate enormities that can be produced by the impudence of ignominy, the rage of want, and the malignity of despair.20 In a prison the awe of the public eye is lost, and the power of the law is spent; there are few fears, there are no blushes.21 The lewd inflame the lewd, the audacious harden the audacious.22 Every one fortifies himself as he can against his own sensibility, endeavours to practise on others the arts which are practised on himself; and gains the kindness of his associates by similitude of manners.23
Thus some sink amidst their misery, and others survive only to propagate villainy.24 It may be hoped, that our lawgivers will at length take away from us this power of starving and depraving one another; but, if there be any reason why this inveterate evil should not be removed in our age, which true policy has enlightened beyond any former time, let those, whose writings form the opinions and the practices of their contemporaries, endeavour to transfer the reproach of such imprisonment from the debtor to the creditor, till universal infamy shall pursue the wretch whose wantonness of power, or revenge of disappointment, condemns another to torture and to ruin; till he shall be hunted through the world as an enemy to man, and find in riches no shelter from contempt.25
Surely, he whose debtor has perished in prison, although he may acquit himself of deliberate murder, must at least have his mind clouded with discontent, when he considers how much another has suffered from him; when he thinks on the wife bewailing her husband, or the children begging the bread which their father would have earned.26 If there are any made so obdurate by avarice or cruelty, as to revolve these consequences without dread or pity, I must leave them to be awakened by some other power, for I write only to human beings.27
Sentence Notes
In plain English: Since the letter about people jailed by their creditors was published, an investigation is reported to have found that more than twenty thousand people are currently in prison for debt.
Reference & context: The letter is Idler No. 22 (essay 30 in this collection). In a later footnote Johnson admitted he had come to doubt the figure of 20,000, which was probably too high.
In plain English: We often ignore the separate pieces of something that would shake us deeply if we saw it all at once.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: A timeless insight into why people overlook slow, spread-out suffering.
In plain English: One debtor is dragged to prison, pitied briefly and forgotten; another follows and is lost in the same dark caves of forgetting. But when the whole mass of suffering appears at once, when we hear twenty thousand rational people groaning in needless misery, caused not by nature's weakness but by bad or careless government, who can help pitying and mourning, being amazed and appalled?
Why this phrase is worth keeping: Two pairs of verbs at the end mirror the movement from sympathy to outrage.
In plain English: There's no need for passionate speeches here. We live in an age of business and calculation, so let's calmly work out the total harm that imprisoning debtors does to our country.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: Johnson deliberately switches from emotion to statistics, speaking the language of his commercial age.
In plain English: Recent statisticians think England's population is no more than six million, so twenty thousand is one in three hundred.
Reference & context: There was no census in Britain until 1801. Population estimates of the 1750s ranged from about 6 to 7 million for England and Wales.
In plain English: What can we say about the kindness or the good sense of a country that chooses to sacrifice one person in every three hundred to a slow death?
In plain English: One person's misfortune doesn't affect many others directly. But if we think about family and friendship, and how people depend on each other in general, it's reasonable to assume that every man suffering in prison causes some kind of trouble for two others who love or depend on him.
In plain English: Multiplying the misery this way, we see that one in every hundred people in the country is affected.
In plain English: If we reckon a shilling a day as the cost of each man's lost work and upkeep while he's forced to sit idle, the national loss comes to £300,000 a year, and in ten years to more than a sixth of all the money in circulation.
Reference & context: A shilling was one-twentieth of a pound, roughly a labourer's daily wage. Johnson's sum is slightly off: 20,000 shillings a day comes to about £365,000 a year, so his estimate is cautious.
In plain English: I fear that people who know our prisons best will admit I'm close to the truth when I guess that bitter resentment, heavy sorrow, foul air, lack of exercise and sometimes of food, diseases that cannot be escaped, cruel jailers who cannot be resisted, and all the other tangled horrors of prison kill one in four of those cut off from ordinary human comforts every year.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: A long, heavy catalogue whose very length makes the reader feel the weight of prison life.
Reference & context: “Gaol fever” (typhus) killed many prisoners. Jailers were paid by prisoners rather than the state and were often brutal; a parliamentary committee in 1729 had exposed torture in the Fleet and Marshalsea prisons.
In plain English: So five thousand men die every year, crushed by grief, wasted by hunger or rotting in filth; many of them in the strongest, most useful years of life, because careless people are usually young, and active, busy people are seldom old.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: The inverted word order (“Thus perish … five thousand men”) gives the sentence the weight of an epitaph.
In plain English: By the usual rule, which assumes that one person in thirty dies each year, the whole population is replaced every thirty years.
In plain English: Who would have believed until now that in each English generation 150,000 people die in our jails? That every century a nation famous for science, devoted to trade and hungry for empire should freely lose half a million of its people in stinking dungeons, more than plague and war have ever killed in the same time?
Reference & context: Johnson's figures rest on his own estimates, which he later doubted, but the rhetorical point stands: a preventable, man-made disaster on the scale of war or plague.
In plain English: A very recent event shows how significant this number is: when the militia was re-established, 30,000 men were thought enough to deal with any emergency.
Reference & context: The Militia Act of 1757, passed during the Seven Years' War against France, revived a home-defence force of about 32,000 men.
In plain English: So by holding twenty thousand in prison, we lock away in darkness and idleness two-thirds of an army we ourselves consider big enough to defend the nation.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: A vivid comparison that makes an abstract number concrete.
In plain English: Monasteries have often been criticised for slowing population growth.
Reference & context: Protestant writers often criticised Catholic monasteries and convents for keeping thousands of people unmarried and economically idle.
In plain English: Maybe withdrawal from the world should rarely be allowed except to people whose work suits solitude and who won't be idle when alone; to people whom illness makes unable to contribute; or to those who have done their share for society and, having lived for others, can honourably be released to live for themselves.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: A humane and memorable definition of a deserved retirement.
In plain English: But however bad or foolish monasteries may be, a nation whose prisons hold more people than other countries' monasteries has no right to criticise them.
In plain English: Surely it's less foolish and less wrong to allow idleness than to force it; to go along with debatable ideas of happiness than to condemn people to obvious, certain misery; to put up with the excesses of misguided religion than to multiply temptations to evil.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: Three balanced comparisons, each showing that debtors' prisons are worse than the monasteries Protestants complain about.
In plain English: The suffering in jails is only half the harm they do. They are full of every kind of corruption that poverty and wickedness can produce together, all the shameless and immoral outrages bred by the boldness of disgrace, the fury of need and the spite of despair.
In plain English: In prison, fear of public opinion disappears and the law has done its worst; there is little to fear and nothing to be ashamed of.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: Six short words summing up how prison destroys shame.
In plain English: The immoral egg each other on, and the bold make each other bolder.
Reference & context: This idea, that prisons are “schools of crime,” became central to later prison reformers such as John Howard (1777) and Elizabeth Fry.
In plain English: Everyone tries to harden himself against his own feelings, tries out on others the tricks used on him, and wins his companions' friendship by behaving like them.
In plain English: So some are destroyed by their misery, and others survive only to spread wickedness.
In plain English: Let's hope our lawmakers will finally take away our power to starve and corrupt each other. But if for some reason this deep-rooted evil can't be removed in our age, which good government has made more enlightened than any before, then let the writers who shape public opinion and behaviour try to move the shame of such imprisonment from the debtor to the creditor, until the wretch who condemns another to torture and ruin out of love of power or revenge for a bad debt is disgraced everywhere, hunted through the world as an enemy of mankind, and finds that his money can't protect him from contempt.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: Johnson calls on writers to use public shame as a weapon where the law has failed.
In plain English: Surely a man whose debtor has died in prison, even if he clears himself of deliberate murder, must feel his mind troubled when he thinks how much another person has suffered because of him; when he thinks of the wife weeping for her husband, or the children begging for bread their father would have earned.
In plain English: If any people are so hardened by greed or cruelty that they can consider these results without fear or pity, I must leave them to be woken up by some other power, because I write only for human beings.
Why this phrase is worth keeping: One of the most devastating last lines in English prose: the merciless creditor is written out of the human race.
Reference & context: “Some other power” hints at God's judgement.
Fun Fact
Change came slowly. The reformer John Howard's The State of the Prisons (1777), written after he toured prisons across Europe, finally made the public face these conditions, and Howard counted far fewer debtors than Johnson's 20,000. But the system lasted another century. Dickens set much of Little Dorrit (1857) in the Marshalsea, where his own father had been imprisoned.