the strategies behind the reactions and the counterstrategies longing for the scaffold 802 Swanson 1990 p 47 sqq. 803 Fielding 1882 p 264 sqq. 222 hat to do about these crimes? And what to do to not be hindered in the intention to commit such a crime? Some aspects of these Wconflicting aims will be discussed here. Persisting political problems often elicit the strategic thinking aiming to solve them. For a related problem we can see how ideas were outlined by the English writer and judge Henry Fielding in 1751. He identified the problem, referring to the situation at Tyburn in mid-eighteenth century, as stemming from the attitude of the condemned and the reception it received by the crowds. The condemned were triumphant and the meek felt compassion while the hardened applauded. Aceremony of shame and terror had been transformed to an event of triumph, courage, and sympathy. Thereby executions were not deterring and the risk was therefore greater that the poor and labouring ended up in the gallows; something Fielding, sympathetic to them, wanted to hinder.802 The situation in London, with its frequent executions, also made the problem greater there than elsewhere. Fielding’s program to solve the problem had several parts. One was swift executions, while the crimes still were so vividly present in the mind of the public that the condemned would be abhorred. In principle, he preferred non-public executions as he meant, learning from the theatre, that to imagine the dreadful gives greater terror than to watch the dreadful scene. There would then be no support in the crowds to find for courageous delinquents. A third alternative solution consisted of a very solemn execution – presenting death in all its gravity. In the mind of Fielding terror was the goal as only terror would deter.803 Fielding was thus The strategies behind the reactions
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