PUNISHMENTS, CORPORAL. In Germany, punishment is inflicted with a whip, ród, or stick, publicly, on the criminal; the degree of punishment, within one hundred lashes or strokes at one time, depends on the sound prudence of the judge. See CHAIN. FUNISHMENTS, IMPARTIAL. What punishments shall be ordained for the nobles, whose privileges make so great a part of the laws of nations? I do not mean to enquire whether the hereditary distinction between nobles and commoners be useful in any government or necessary in a monarchy; or whether it be true that they form an intermediate power, of use in moderating the excesses of both extremes; or whether they be not rather slaves to their own body and to others, confining within a very small circle the natural effects and hopes of industry, like those little fruitful spots scattered here and there in the sandy deserts of Arabia; or whether it be true that a subordination of rank and condition is inevitable or useful in society; and, if so, whether this subordination should not rather subsist between individuals than particular bodies, whether it should not rather circulate through the whole body politic than be confined to one part, and, rather than be perpetual, should it not be incessantly produced and destroyed -be these as they may, I assert that the punish. ment of a nobleman should in no wise differ from that of the lowest member of society. Every lawful distinction, either in honours or riches, supposes previous equality, founded on the laws, on which all the members of society are con sidered sidered as being equally dependent. We should suppose that men, in renouncing their natural despotism, said, “The wisest and most industrious among us should obtain the greatest honours, and his dignity shall descend to his posterity. The fortunate and happy may hope far greater honours, but let him not therefore be less afraid than others of violating those conditions on which he is exalted." It is true, indeed, that no such decrees were ever made in a general diet of mankind, but they exist in the invariable relations of things; nor do they destroy the advantages which are supposed to be produced by the class of nobles, but prevent the inconveniences; and they make the laws respectable, by destroying the hopes of impunity. It may be objected, that the same punishment inflicted on a nobleman and a plebeian becomes really different, from the difference of their educa. tion, and from the infamy it reflects on an illustri ous family. But punishments are to be estimated not by the sensibility of the crimina!, but by the injury done to society; which injury is augmented by the high rank of the offender. The precise equality of a punishment can never be more than external, as it is in proportion to the degree of sensibility, which differs in every individual. The infamy of an innocent family may be easily oblite rated by tokens of favour from the sovereign, and forms have always more influence than reason on the gazing multitude. Beccaria. PUNISHMENTS, MEASURE OF. There are two circumstances which ought also to be minutely considered in apportioning the measure of punishment; the immorality of the action, and it's evil tendency. Nothing Nothing contributes in a greater degree to deprave the minds of the people than the little regard› which laws pay to morality; by inflicting more severe punishments on offenders who commit, what may be termed, political crimes, and crimes against property, than on those who violate religion and virtue. When we are taught, for instance, by the measure of punishment, that it is considered by the law as a greater crime to coin a sixpence than to kill our father or mother, nature and reason revolt against the proposition. In offences which are considered by the legisla ture as merely personal, and not in the class of public wrongs, the disproportion of punishment is extremely shocking. If, for example, a personal assault is committed of the most cruel, aggravated, and violent, nature, the offender is seldom punished in any other manner than by fine and imprisonment; but if a delinquent steals from his neighbour secretly more than the value of twelvepence, the law dooms him to death; and he can suffer no greater punishment, except the ignominy exercised on his dead body, if he robs and murders a whole family. Some private wrongs of a flagrant nature are even passed over with impunity. The seduction of a married woman, the destruction of the peace and happiness of fami lies, resulting from alienating a wife's affections, and defiling her person, is not an offence punishable by the criminal law; while it is death to rob the person who has suffered this extensive injury of a trifle exceeding a shilling. Colquhoun. PUNISHMENTS, MILDNESS OF. Crimes are more effectually prevented by the cer tainty than the severity of punishment. Hence, in a magistrate, the necessity of vigilance, and in a judge, of implacability; which, that it may be come an useful virtue, should be joined to a mild legislation. The certainty of a small punishment will make a stronger impression than the fear of one more severe, if attended with the hopes of escaping; for it is the nature of mankind to be terri fied at the approach of the smallest inevitable evil; whilst hope, the best gift of heaven, hath the power of dispelling the apprehension of a greater, espe cially if supported by examples of impunity too frequently afforded. Beccaria. PUNISHMENTS, ORIGIN OF. Laws are the conditions under which men, naturally independent, united themselves in society. Weary of living in a continual state of war, and of enjoying a liberty which became of little value, from the uncertainty of it's duration, they sacrificed one part of it, to enjoy the rest in peace and security. The sum of all these portions of the liberty of each individual constituted the sovereignty of a nation, and was deposited in the hands of the sovereign, as the lawful administrator. But it was not sufficient only to establish this deposit; it was also necessary to defend it from the usurpation of each individual, who will always endeavour to take away from the mass, not only his own portion, but to encroach on that of others. Some motives, therefore, that strike the senses were necessary to prevent the despotism of each individual from plunging society into it's former chaos. Such motives are the punishments established against the infractors of the laws. Motives of this kind are necessary; because experience experience shews that the multitude adopt no established principle of conduct; and because society is prevented from approaching to that dissolution to which, as well as all other parts of the physical and moral world, it naturally tends, only by motives that are the iminediate objects of sense, and which, being continually presented to the mind, are sufficient to counterbalance the effects of the passions of the individual which oppose the general good. Nei ther the power of eloquence nor the sublimest truths are sufficient to restrain, for any length of time, those passions which are excited by the lively impressions of present objects. Ibid. PUNISHMENTS, PECUNIARY. There was a time when all punishments were pecuniary. The crimes of the subjects were the inheritance of the prince. An injury done to society was a favour to the crown; and the sovereign and magistrates, those guardians of the public security, were interested in the violation of the laws. Crimes were tried at that time in a court of exche. quer, and the cause became a civil suit between the person accused and the crown. The magistrate then had other powers than were necessary for the public welfare, and the criminal suffered other punishments than the necessity of example required. The judge was rather a collector for the crown, an agent for the treasury, than a protector and minister of the laws. But, according to this system, for a man to confess himself guilty was to acknowledge himself a debtor to the crown; which was, and is at present, the effects continuing after the causes have ceased, the intent of all criminal causes. Thus, the criminal who refuses to confess his crime, though convicted |