Odger's English Common Law

CRIMINAL INTENTION. 113
may think that the act which he intends to do is only a tort,
or is even a lawful act ; nevertheless, if it be a crime, he has
formed a criminal intention. Ignorance of our law is no
excuse, even for a foreigner who is only temporarily within
our shores. An intent to do any act which is, in fact,
criminal is sufficient.
But what is an intention, and how does it differ from a
motive ?
A man's intention is his determination to do or not to do
a particular act ; his motive is his reason for forming that
determination. He intends to do that which he means and
tries to do ; his motive is what makes him intend to do that
act—it is the spur which stimulates him to action. On the
question of " guilty " or " not guilty " our law as a rule
disregards the prisoner's motives, though they may affect
the amount of the punishment.
The criminal law regards the prisoner's acts ; from these
it infers his intention. But it is not so easy to divine his
motive ; to discover that, it is generally necessary to inquire
into all the surrounding circumstances, including what he said
or did on other occasions. The absence of any apparent
motive may be some ground for urging that the prisoner is
insane, or that there has been a mistake as to identity and
that the prisoner is not the person who committed the crime
in question. But if a man, who is of full age, sane, sober,
and free either to act or abstain from acting, is proved to
have done an act which is criminal, he is liable, whether his
motive was good or bad, or whether he had none. He has
done an act which is forbidden by our law, and it will be no
defence for him to urge that he had a laudable motive, or
even that he conscientiously believed on religious grounds
that it was his duty to do the act.
It is the intention and not the motive which gives in law
the character and quality to an act. If a man intends to do
one thing, but in fact does another, he will be judged by
what he did and not by what he intended to do. He may
thus be liable for results which he never desired or even con-
templated. " The intention to do the act exists for all
B.O.L. 8