A true story about a famous General.

Fighting armies of past centuries were often followed by the families of the soldiers in order to keep their family member/soldier feed and to bury the body if the soldier was killed.
On one of Napoleons campaigns a young soldier fell asleep on guard duty. An offense punishable by death.
The soldier was convicted of his crime and brought before Napoleon to be sentenced. Napoleon sentenced the young man to death.
Suddenly the mans mother came forward to beg for her sons life. Have mercy she said. Napoleon stated that the offense could not be tolerated. But the woman begged for mercy for her son saying “mercy mercy, please have mercy on my son.”
Napoleon again stated the seriousness of the offense and again said that the sentence would be death.
But the woman fell on her knees and said mercy mercy I beg you to have mercy on my only son.
Mercy! said Napoleon. He fell asleep.
! He does not deserve mercy!
The woman then said, if he deserved it, then it would not be mercy.
Napoleon thought about what the woman had said and then gave the boy back to his mother.

Happy Easter