different realities and reactions Constitutio Criminalis Theresianapublished in 1769 the instructions from 1715 was repeated.443 Before the Enlightenment, the eternal fate of the executed clearly was a shared concern for secular and ecclesiastical authorities. In 1692 two condemned in Saxony was reprieved from the sack to the sword because of the possible dangers to their souls if they were executed by means of the sack.444 The same year the Saxon theologian Johann Christian Olearius mentioned that in order not to endanger the souls of the condemned the material of the sack had been changed from waxed fabric to linen.445 Thus the drowning was completed faster and the time for terror and despair was shortened. The sack was also generally soon belonging to the past. It was however put to more frequent use in Prussia through an Edict against infanticide August 30th 1720 but was abolished there in 1740.446 A combination of a compassionate Christian approach and a rather ruthless penal ideology partly based on deterrence is to be found in Prussia in the early eighteenth century. The king often used his legal right to increase punishments beyond the limits of the law. The severe penalties would also serve as earthly penance to help the condemned to avoid eternal punishment. Therefore, great care was given to the preparation of the condemned, and planned executions of insufficiently prepared delinquents were postponed by the king. This mixture of different messages, of deterrence and compassion,according to Friedrich Holtze, contributed to the idea spreading that to be executed was the safest road to heaven.447 443 Stuart 2023 p 313 sq. 444 Neues Archiv für Sächsiche Geschichte 1888 p 158. 445 Olearius 1692 p 1769. 446 Preisendörfer 2000 p 162 sq. 447 Holtze 1894 p 40 sq, 81, (quotation p 40 sq:) ”Aber wie eine Strafproceß-Ordnung, so konnte man damals auch ein Strafgesetzbuch entbehren, denn der König machte von seinem Strafschärfungsrechte ausgiebigen Gebrauch, nicht aus Grausamkeit, sondern hier offenbar von einer tief religiösen Auffassung seines Herrscherberufs und die Verantwortung für das Seelenheil seiner Unterthanen bei Gott geleitet. Der Sünder sollte seine schwere Strafe als eine Buße für das auf Erden verübte Verbrechen erdulden, um damit der härteren Strafe im Jenseits zu entgehen. Deshalb die oft rührende Sorgfalt für die religiöse Vorbereitung der Todescandidaten, das mehrmalige Aufschieben der Execution, sobald die den Verbrechen beigeordneten Prediger anzeigten, daß sie wegen mangelnder Buße jener noch nicht für deren Seelenheil stehen könnten. Die harte Strafe sollte nicht nur abschreckend für das Publicum, sondern auch bessernd auf die Verbrecher selbst einwirken 129
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