Mark Twain's The Facts Concerning The Recent Carnival Of Crime In Connecticut

One important quote from Mark Twain’s “The Facts Concerning the Recent Carnival of Crime in Connecticut” is the narrator’s conscience’s explanation of how it becomes desensitized after it has been jabbed at for too long: "[…] When people plead with you at this late day to quit [smoking], that old callous place seems to enlarge and cover me all over like a shirt of mail. It exerts a mysterious, smothering effect, and presently I, your faithful hater, your devoted Conscience, go sound asleep!" This scene is interesting partially because the narrator’s behavior is reflective of how man’s conscience works in reality.
How does one’s conscience become numb in the first place? The narrator’s conscience is an agent “appointed by authority” that improves