England in the 1700's had a sophisticated legal system that enabled a small, dominant class to rule by using ritual to inspire fear and deference and by threatening awful public punishment for the most severe infractions. It was a transition between pre-modern, or repressive, and modern, or autonomous systems of law. The essay investigates the link between spectacular punishment and popular culture; the spectacle and secondary punishment; and the pillory -- spectacular punishment, community justice, popular values, and deaths in the pillory. The formal structure of the pillory channeled passionate feelings while subjecting those feelings to some social constraint. The legal system of 18th-century England demonstrated an advanced appreciation of the manipulation of hateful public feelings as a weapon of political power. Notes