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/ 
“30 
viewer, in conclusion,) be a great 
deal of solitude; coarse food; a dress 
of shame; hard, incessant, irksome, 
eternal labour; a planned and regu- 
Jated, and unrelenting, exclusion of 
happiness and comfort.” It appears 
to be the object of the writer merely 
fo impress the mind of the convict 
with a terror of future imprisonment; 
and this is an old and a simple expe- 
dient, and, Heaven knows, has been, 
and always will be, very easily accom- 
plished. But what is the effect? By 
rendering his labour irksome, are you 
likely to inspire him with a love of 
industry? By turning him adrift in 
the world, pennyless and unhappy, 
are you likely to reclaim him to better 
feelings, or to rescue him from future 
temptation? On his discharge, grant- 
img that he hates the prison more, are 
his necessities, whica urged him to 
crime, less, or his habits and feelings 
altered or improved? Nothing of all 
this: but he is dismissed with the sim- 
ple injunction, ‘“‘ You have fallen into 
this trap once: you know the miseries 
you have suffered ; take care how you 
get into it again.” This is an undis- 
guised system of mere terror, and 
places the human being on the same 
fevel as the brute animal. It is the 
noble endeavour of the present day to 
act upon a higher and more efficacious 
Principle ; to operate on our moral and 
intellectual, rather than on our corpo- 
real nature; to replace bad habits by 
good; to reclaim the sinner, and to 
raise him, if possible, for a short sea- 
son, above tempiation, by enabling 
him during his confinement to acquire 
same small means of exercising his in- 
dustry profitably after his enlarge- 
ment. Here we have not force, but 
reason; and reasonable means directed 
to bencficial ends. The impression of 
terror wears away, or is overcome by 
weightier motives of necessity; but 
teach a man his duty, inure him to 
labour, make his labour pleasant and 
profitable, turn him out with a little 
capital in hand, and an improved cha- 
racter; and who can hesitate in de- 
ciding whether that man is most likely 
to return to his dungeon, who blesses 
it as the scene of his amendment, or 
he who curses it as the witness of his 
anguish and despair. It gives us 
great concern to see this review, 
which ought to do better things, set- 
ting itself against the reformed system, 
and contributing to cheek those plans, 
which we have no deubt will, when 
The Philosophy of Contemporary Criticism, No, XXIII. [Aug. 1, 
matured, be as useful as they are ho- 
nourable to society; and we cannot 
avoid observing, that a Christian di- 
vine docs not appear to us to be act- 
ing exactly in character, by contri- 
buting to darken the house of bon- 
dage, and to strike the iron deeper 
into the heart of the unhappy prisoner. 
A very powerful and impressive ex- 
position of the State of the Nation, as 
respects its financial concerns, forms 
the fourth article; and, notwithstanding 
all our familiarity with the burdens 
and grievances of the country, such are 
the ability and perspicuity with which 
the statements are here made, and 
such the force of argument and indig- 
nation with which the extravagance of 
the government is laid before us, that 
we feel it with all the force of a new 
and recent fact. From the sixth of a 
series of tables relating to the expen- 
diture and revenue of the kingdom, 
which are all highly interesting and in- 
structive, it appears, that, calculating 
the change in the value of the cur- 
rency, the country, in the words of the 
reviewer, “has been paying, during the 
last year, a larger amount of taxes, by 
half a miliion, than it did during the 
most wasteful and oppressive period of 
the late war; and a larger amount, by 
nearly three millions, than it did dur- 
ing the period next to that in point of 
expenditure.” Granting, what we be- 
lieve to be true, that the return to cash 
payments was a wise, perhaps an 
imeyitable measure, what is the infer- 
ence? That no public man should be 
allowed to retain more of his salary 
than will barely recompence him for his 
real labour; that no such thing as a 
sinecure should exist for a moment 
longer; and, that our civil, naval, and 
especially our military establishments, 
should be reduced to the very lowest 
possible scale. To this conclusion, or 
to worse, we must come at last. 
Through all the course of its various 
reasonings, this paper deserves the 
most_pointed attention ; and, we car- 
nestly recommend its perusal and cir- 
culation, as an-efficacious means of 
opening the eyes of the country to its 
true condition. 
We next meet with the most spirited 
and agreeable piece of criticism of 
which this number can boast, bearing 
‘within itself the demonstration of its 
paternity. It is a review of Lord 
Byron’s tragedies, and makes, we 
think, a very fair and correct estimate 
of his powers, as displayed in this de- 
partment. 
