and the stigma of infamy, were convicts exhibited day after day, to their companions, occupied in mean and servile employments in Penitentiary Houses, or on the highways, canals, mines or public works.-It is in this way only that there is the least chance of making retribution to the parties whom they have injured; or of reimbursing the State, for the unavoidable expence which their evil pursuits have occasioned.

Towards accomplishing the desirable object of perfection in a criminal code, every wise Legislature will have it in contemplation rather to prevent than, to punish crimes; that in the chastisement given, the delinquent may be restored to Society as an useful member.

This purpose may possibly be best effected by the adoption of the following general rules.

1. That the Statute-Laws should accurately explain the enor mity of the offence forbidden; and that its provisions should be clear and explicit, resulting from a perfect knowledge of the subject; so that justice may not be defeated in the execution.

2. That the punishments should be proportioned and adapted, as nearly as possible, to the different degrees of offences; with a proper attention also to the various shades of enormity which may attach to certain crimes.

3. That persons prosecuting, or compelled so to do, should not only be indemnified from expence; but also that reparation should be made, for losses sustained by the injured party, in all cases where it can be obtained from the labour, or property of the delinquent.

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4. That

4. That satisfaction should be made to the State for the injury done to the Community; by disturbing the peace and violating the purity of Society.

Political laws, which are repugnant to the Law of nature and reason, ought not to be adopted. The objects above-mentioned seem to include all that can be necessary for the attention of Law-givers.

If on examination of the frame and tendency of our criminal laws, both with respect to the principles of Reason and State Policy, the Author might be allowed to indulge a hope, that what he brings under the Public Eye on this important subject, would be of use in promoting the good of Mankind, he should consider his labours as very amply rewarded.

The severity of the criminal Laws is not only an object of horror, but the disproportion of the punishments, as will be shewn in the course of this Work, breathes too much the spirit of DRACO,* who boasted that he punished all crimes with death; because small crimes deserved it, and he could find no higher punishment for the greatest.

Though the ruling principle of our Government is unquestionably Liberty, it is much to be feared that the rigour which the Laws indiscriminately inflict on slight as well as more atrocious offences, can be ill reconciled to the true distinctions of Morality, and strict notions of Justice, which form the peculiar ex

* He lived 624 years before the Christian æra.

cellence of those States which are to be charac terised as free.

By punishing smaller offences with extraordinary severity, is there not a risque of inuring men to baseness; and of plunging them into the sink of infamy and despair, from whence they seldom fail to rise capital criminals; often to the destruction of their fellow-creatures, and always to their own inevitable perdition?

To suffer the lower orders of the people to be ill educated-to be totally inattentive to those wise regulations of State Policy which might serve to guard and improve their morals; and then to punish them for crimes which have originated in bad habits, has the appearance of a cruelty not less severe than any which is exercised under the most despotic Govern

ments.

There are two circumstances which ought also to be minutely considered in apportioning the measure of punishment the immorality of the action, and its evil tendency.

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 ǎ 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 Legislature as merely personal, and not in the class of public wrongs, the disproportionate 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 twelve-pence, 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 families, 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.

The Crime of Adultery was punished with great severity both by the Grecian and the Roman Laws. In England this offence is not to be found in the Criminal Code. It may indeed be punished with fine and penance by the Spiritual Law; or indirectly

in the Courts of Common Law, by an action for damages, at the suit of the party injured. The former may now (perhaps fortunately) be considered as a dead letter; while the other remedy, being merely of a pecuniary nature, has little effect in restraining this species of delinquency.

Like unskilful artists, we seem to have begun at the wrong end: since it is clear that the distinction, which has been made in the punishments between public and private crimes, is subversive of the very foundation it would establish.

Private Offences being the source of public crimes, the best method of guarding Society against the latter is, to make proper provisions for checking the former.-A man of pure morals always makes the best Subject of every State; and few have suffered punishment as public delinquents, who have not loug remained unpunished as private offenders. The only means, therefore, of securing the peace of Society, and of preventing more atrocious crimes, is, to enforce by lesser punishments, the observance of religious and moral duties: Without this, Laws are but weak Guardians either of the State, or the persons or property of the Subject.

The People are to the Legislature what a child is to a parent:-As the first care of the latter is to teach the love of virtue, and a dread of punishment; so ought it to be the duty of the former, to frame Laws with an immediate view to the general improvement of morals.

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