To strike out
with the fist is the same act, whether done in a desert or in a
crowd.
The same considerations which have been urged to show that an act
alone, by itself, does not and ought not to impose either civil
or criminal liability, apply, at least frequently, to a series of
acts, or to conduct, although the series shows a further
co-ordination and a further intent. For instance, it is the same
series of acts to utter a sentence falsely stating that a certain
barrel contains No. 1 Mackerel, whether the sentence is uttered
in the secrecy of the closet, or to another man in the course of
a bargain. There is, to be sure, in either case, the further
intent, beyond the co-ordination of muscles for a single sound,
to allege that a certain barrel has certain contents,--an intent
necessarily shown by the ordering of the words. But both the
series of acts and the intent are per se indifferent. They are
innocent when spoken in solitude, and [132] are only a ground of
liability when certain concomitant circumstances are shown.
The intent which is meant when spoken of as an element of legal
liability is an intent directed toward the harm complained of, or
at least toward harm. It is not necessary in every case to carry
the analysis back to the simple muscular contractions out of
which a course of conduct is made up.
Pages:
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177