It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul. William Ernest Henley
Let the punishments of criminals be useful. A hanged man is good for nothing; a man condemned to public works still serves the country, and is a living lesson. Voltaire
Your thought describes laws, courts, judges, punishments. Mine explains that when man makes a law, he either violates it or obeys it. If there is a basic law, we are all one before it. He who disdains the mean is himself mean. He who vaunts his scorn of the sinful vaunts his disdain of all humanity. Kahlil Gibran
Too frequent rewards indicate that the general is at the end of his resources; too frequent punishments that he is in acute distress. Sun Tzu
Even honors are punishments. Corsican Proverb
Strange sins, strange punishments. Latin Proverb