Mr. Turner on Crimes and Pnn'tjhments. 323 



gler to perfift in, a pradtice io highly detri- 

 mental to fociety ? 



If, on the contrary, the punlfhment be too 

 fevere, as is the cafe, at leaft, whenever it is 

 more than adequate to the prevention of the 

 crime, the following pernicious confcquences 

 muft neceffarily enfue. 



I. As human punifliments cannot rife beyond 

 a certain height, if the feverer ones begin to 

 be inflifted too low in the fcale of offences, 

 the highefb punifliments will be brought into 

 life long before we reach the higheft offence j 

 the necelfary confequence of which muft be, 

 that crimes of different degrees of enormity will 

 be puniflied equally. From hence it will as 

 neceffarily follow, that fuch crimes will be 

 looked upon as indifferent with refpeft to each 

 other. Habitual offenders are accuftomed to 

 cftimate crimes by their confcquences, and not 

 by their moral turpitude: whenever, therefore, 

 the civil magiftrate makes no difference between 

 the punijhment, they will be apt to make as- little 

 difference between the commijfwny of one, two, 

 or more of them ; according as it may fuit their 

 prefent convenience, or occafion lefs danger of 

 detedlion. * Thus, if both robbery and murder 



• Can there be a better reafon given, why footpads more 

 frequently accompany their depredations with cruelty than 

 highwaymen on horfeback, than that, as they are more 

 eafily purfued, it is their bufinefs to render the fuiFerers 

 incapable of purfuit ? 



y 2 are 



