In commenting on some of the effects of the Enlightenment, the Dutch Reformed theologian Herman Bavinck praised the humanitarianism but also faults it.
His praise: "...the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century introduced a milder assessment of sin and crime, abolished instruments of torture, moderated punishments, and aroused a sense of humaneness everywhere...". This "...idea of humaneness and the sense of human sympathy have had a powerful awakening and have put an end to the crulety that used to prevail, especially in the filed of criminal justice. ...before (the Enlightenment) the mentally ill were treated as criminals,..." (Reformed Dogmatics, IV, 704-8)
I think many people, regardless of their religious affiliation or convictions, would welcome the recognition that human behavior, whether deviant or virtuous, is far more complex than what we suspected pre-Enlightenment. A man may steal bread, and in doing so may be guilty of a crime, but he does not always do it from envy or greed: he may simply be starving. Thus, recognizing how easily we can be tempted to do wrong (i.e. steal) for good reasons (i.e. provide for hungry children) but also recognizing that in doing so he is guilty of a moral (as well as civil) law, the Poet pleads with God to intervene in such a way that he neither starves nor steals: "Remove far from me falsehood and lying; give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, lest I be full and deny you and say, “Who is the Lord?” Or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God." (Prov. 30:8-9) We may not throw out laws that prosecute such crimes, but we can sympathize with those who commit them and even work to alleviate the kind of suffering from which they may issue.
In Bavinck's words, there is another extreme toward which the Enlightened mind swings from its pre-Enlightened callousness: "...this humanitarian viewpoint also brings its own imbalances and dangers: whereas before (the Enlightenment) the mentally ill were treated as criminals, now criminals are regarded as mentally ill." Whereas before we had no catagories for the mentally ill rather than "criminal" (i.e. there were not thought to be psychological, sociological, or developmental explanations such deviant behavior), now, to think that there are any moral defects in a person that factor into such deviant behavior is a crime.
This is not to say that all mental illness is a fruit of moral defects per se; C.S. Lewis has a helpful chapter in Mere Christianity on Psychoanalysis in which he distinguishes between the "broken" mind that can't work right and the mind that operates fine but is put to wrong use. The former is in need of being "fixed" while the latter is in need of repentance. However, this is to say that we have lost our ability to see life in any moral terms and have adopted a more therapeutic stance; there's nothing morally wrong in crime, man just isn't healthy. Bavinck writes, "Before that time [of Enlightenment] every abnormality was viewed in terms of sin and guilt [this was not a good thing]; now all ideas of guilt, crime, responsibility, culpability, and the like are robbed of their reality [ and this is no better]. The sense of right and justice, of the violation of law and of guilt, are seriously weakened to the extent that the norm of all these things is not found in God but shifted to the opinions of human beings and society. In the process all certainty and safety is gradually lost. For when the interest of society becomes the deciding factor, not only is every boundary between good and evil wiped out, but also justice runs the danger of being sacrificed to power." (RD, IV, 708)
Man's conduct and behavior are complex: at times we are immoral and at other times we are subject to the limits of our own humanity, but often we are both simultaneously. This is what makes life so complex and difficult. The answer is not to throw notions of "sin" and "guilt", nor is it to ignore social, genetic, economic, or developmental factors at work in us. The answer, at least in part, is to look to the one who can explain us to ourselves. Everything else is just a powerplay: "And the same human sentiment that first pleaded for the humane treatment of a criminal does not shrink, a moment later, from demanding death by tortue of the innocent. Hosannas make way for a cross." (RD, IV, 708)
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