SYSTEM OF PRISON DISCIPLINE. 



157 



mignt as soon attempt to stem a mountain tor- er have their spirits taken tneir flight into the 

 rent by a breath of wind, or to interrupt the world unknown, thaji subscriptions are set on 

 dashings of a mighty cataract by the waving of foot, statues and mausoleums are erected, flat- 



our hand, as to expect to counteract, by any 

 considerations that can be adduced, the current 

 of popular feeiing in favour of novels, and tales 

 of knights, and of tournaments ; of warlike chief 

 tains, and military encounters. Such a state of 

 feeling, I presume, never can exist in a world 

 where moral evil has never shed its malign in 

 fluence. 



Again, if we consider the sentiments and the 

 conduct of many of our Literary and Scientific 

 characters, we shall find that even philosophy has 

 had very little influence, in counteracting the 

 stream of malignity, and promoting the exercise 

 of benevolence. Do not many of our literary cha- 

 idclers in their disputes frequently display as keen 

 resentments, and as malevolent dispositions, as 

 the professed warrior, and the man of the world ? 

 and have they not some times resorted even to 

 horsewhips and to pistols to decide their con 

 tests ? In proof of this, need I refer to the 

 gentlemen now or formerly connected with the 

 &quot; Edinburgh Magazine,&quot; &quot; Blackwood s Maga 

 zine, &quot; the &quot; London Magazine,&quot; the &quot; Quarterly 

 Review,&quot; and other periodical works and to the 

 mean jealousies and contentions which have 

 been displayed, and the scurrilous paragraphs 

 which have been written by various descriptions 

 of competitors for literary fame ? Such a display 

 of temper and conduct in men of professed erudi 

 tion, is not only inconsistent with moral princi 

 ple, and the dignity of true science, but has a 

 tendency to hold up philosophy and substantial 

 knowledge to the scorn and contempt both of the 

 Christian and of the political world. 



Again, is it an evioence that benevolence 

 forms a prominent character of modern civilized 

 society, when philanthropists, who have devoted 

 their substance and their mental activities to the 

 promotion of the best interests of mankind ; and 

 when men of science, who have enlarged the 

 sphere of our knowledge, and improved the useful 

 arts, are suffered to pine away in penury and neg 

 lect, and to descend into the grave, without even 

 a &quot; frail memorial&quot; to mark the spot where their 

 mortal remains are deposited; while, on the 

 warrior, who has driven the ploughshare of de 

 struction through the world, and wounded the 

 peace of a thousand families, enormous pensions 

 are bestowed, and trophies erected to perpetuate 

 his momory to future generations? And how 

 conies it to pass, if benevolence and justice 

 be distinguishing features of our age and nation, 

 that authors, whose writings afford instruction 

 and entertainment to a numerous public, are fre 

 quently suffered to pine away in anxiety and dis 

 tress, and to remain in hopeless indigence, while 

 publishers and booksellers are fattening on the 

 fruit of their labours? Yet, while we leave them 

 to temain in abject penury, during life, nosoon- 



tering inscriptions are engraved on their tombs, 

 and anniversary dinners are appointed to cele 

 brate their memories. Such displays of liberali 

 ty might have been of essential benefit to the 

 individuals, while they sojourned within the limits 

 of this sublunary sphere; but they are altogether 

 futile and superfluous in relation to the separate 

 spirits, which are now placed forever beyond the 

 reach of such vain pageantry and posthumous 

 honours. 



If we now attend, for a little, to thePenal Code* 

 of civilized nations, we shall find them, not 

 only glaringly deficient in a spirit of benevolence, 

 but deeply imbued with a spirit of cruelty and 

 revenge. The great object of all civil punish 

 ments ought to be, not only the prevention of 

 crimes, but also the reformation of the criminal, 

 in order that a conviction of the evil of his con 

 duct may be impressed upon his mind, and that 

 he may be restored to society as a renovated cha 

 racter. When punishments are inflicted with a 

 degree of severity beyond what is necessary to 

 accomplish these ends, the code which sanctions 

 them, becomes an engine of cruelty and of injus 

 tice. Bui, the reformation, and the ultimate 

 happiness of the criminal, never seem to have 

 been once taken into consideration, in the con 

 struction of (he criminal codes of any nation in 

 Europe. The infliction of pain, and even of to? 

 ture, and of every thing that is degrading and 

 horrible, to a degree far beyond what is necessary 

 for the security of the public, and which has no 

 other tendency than to harden the culprit, seems 

 to have been the great object of the framers of 

 our penal statutes. If a man has committed an 

 offence against society, he is either confined to a 

 jail, thrown into a dungeon, loaded with irons, 

 whipped through the streets, banished to a dis 

 tant land, hung upon a gallows, or broken on the 

 wheel. No system of moral regimen, calculated 

 to counteract his criminal habits, to impart in 

 struction to his mind, and to induce habits of in 

 dustry and temperance, (except in a few insulated 

 cases) has yet been arranged by our legislators, 

 so as to render punishment a blessing to the cri 

 minal, and to the community which he has injured. 



The following circumstances, in relation to 

 punishments, manifest a principle both of folly 

 and of malignity in the arrangements of our cri 

 minal jurisprudence. In the first place, the 

 present system of our prison discipline, instead 

 of operating to prevent the increase of crime^ 

 has a dire :t and inevitabls tendency to produce 

 vice and wretchedness, and to render our jails 

 the nurseries of every depraved propensity, and 

 of every species of moral turpitude. From th 

 indiscriminate association of the young and the 

 old, and of persons charged with every degree 01 

 criminality, the youthful and inexperienced cul- 



