Abstract

The innocent are immune. We must never, that is, make the object of any violent attack those who bear no responsibility for doing wrong to others; and only with grave reason and in extreme circumstances should we be prepared to cause them any incidental harm as we press home a violent attack against those who are its legitimate objects. This principle of the immunity of the innocent seems almost self-evidently true. This is not to say that the principle is incapable of further development and articulation, unsusceptible of marginal qualification, or underivable from deeper principles. It does however mean that any moral theory which denies this principle altogether will be something that only a fool or a knave could accept.