A crime is any act or omission to act punishable as such by law. It is difficult, if not impossible, to devise any closer definition. Speaking broadly, crimes are certain acts, usually wrongful, which are regarded as sufficiently dangerous or harmful to society to be forbidden under pain of punishment. The general relation of crimes to wrongs as a whole is sometimes illustrated by a circle having two much smaller circles within it. The outer circle represents wrongful acts in the aggregate; the second, wrongful acts held by law to be torts, that is to say, infractions of private rights for which redress may be sought in the civil courts, and the smallest or inner circle, acts held to be so injurious to the public as to be punishable as crimes.