Amongst the most obvious means of rectifying the general morals by positive measures, one is the encouraging a judicious education of the people. Upon this judiciousness almost all its success depends.

But you say, All this will add to the national burdens. We need not be very jealous on this head, whilst we are so little jealous of more money worse spent. Is it known, or is it considered, that the expense of an ordinary campaign would endow a school in every parish in England and Ireland for ever? Yet how coolly (who will contradict me if I say how needlessly?) we devote money to conduct a campaign! -Prevent, by a just and conciliating policy, one single war, and the money thus saved would provide, perpetually, a competent mental and moral education for every individual who needs it in the three kingdoms. Let a man for a moment indulge his imagination-let him rather indulge his reason, in supposing that one of our wars during the last century had been avoided, and that, fifty years ago, such an education had been provided. Of what comparative importance is the war to us now? In the one case, the money has provided the historian with materials to fill his pages with armaments, and victories, and defeats -it has enabled us

To point a moral or adorn a tale;

-in the other, it would have effected, and would be now effecting, and would be destined for ages to effect, a great amount of solid good; a great increase of the virtue, the order, and the happiness of the people.

CHAPTER VI.

OF THE PROPER ENDS OF PUNISHMENT.

The Three Objects of Punishment :-Reformation of the Offender :-Example :-Restitution-Punishment may be increased as well as diminished.

WHY is a man who commits an offence punished for the act? Is it for his own advantage, or for that of others, or for both?-For both, and primarily for his own:* which answer will perhaps the more readily recommend itself, if it can be shown that the good of others, that is, of the public, is best consulted by those systems of punishment which are most effectual in benefiting the offender himself.

When we recur to the precepts and the spirit of Christianity, we find that the one great pervading principle by which it requires us to regulate our conduct towards others, is that of operative, practical good-will -that good-will which, if they be in suffering, will prompt us to alleviate the misery; if they be vicious, will prompt us to reclaim them from vice. That the misconduct of the individual exempts us from the obligation to regard this rule, it would be futile to imagine. It is by him that the exercise of benevolence is peculiarly needed. He is the morally sick, who needs the physician; and such a physician he, who by comparison is morally whole, should be. If we adopt the spirit of the declaration, "I came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance," we shall entertain no doubt that the reformation of offenders is the primary business of the Christian in devising

"The end of all correction is either the amendment of wicked men or to prevent the influence of ill example." This is the rule of Seneca; and by mentioning amendment first, he appears to have regarded it as the primary object.

punishments. There appears no reason why, in the case of public criminals, the spirit of the rule should not be acted upon-"If a brother be overtaken in a fault restore such an one." Amongst the Corinthians there was an individual who had committed a gross offence, such as is now punished by the law of England. Of this criminal Paul speaks in strong terms of reprobation in the first epistle. The effect proved to be good; and the offender having apparently become reformed, the Corinthians were directed in the second epistle, to forgive and to comfort him.

When therefore a person has committed a crime, the great duty of those who in common with himself are candidates for the mercy of God, is to endeavor to meliorate and rectify the dispositions in which his crime originates; to subdue the vehemence of his passions to raise up in his mind a power that may counteract the power of future temptation. We should feel towards these mentally diseased, as we feel towards the physical sufferer-compassion; and the great object should be to cure the disease. No doubt, in endeavoring this object, severe remedies must often be employed. It is just what we should expect; and the remedies will probably be severe in proportion to the inveteracy and malignity of the complaint. But still the end should never be forgotten, and I think a just estimate of our moral obligations, will lead us to regard the attainment of that end as paramount to every other.

There is one great practical advantage in directing the attention especially to this moral cure, which is this, that if it be successful, it prevents the offender from offending again. It is well known that the proportion of those who, having once suffered the stated punishment, again transgress the laws and are again

convicted, is great. But to whatever extent reformation was attained, this unhappy result would be prevented. The second object of punishment, that of example, appears to be recognised as right by Christianity, when it says that the magistrate is a terror to bad men ;

and when it admonishes such to be "afraid " of his

power. There can be no reason for speaking of punishment as a terror, unless it were right to adopt such punishments as would deter. In the private discipline of the church the same idea is kept in view :—“ Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may fear."* The parallel of physical disease may also still hold. The offender is a member of the social body; and the physician who endeavors to remove a local disease, always acts with a reference to the health of the system.

In stating reformation as the first object, we also conclude, that if, in any case, the attainment of reformation and the exhibition of example should be found to be incompatible, the former is to be preferred. I say if; for it is by no means certain that such cases will ever arise. The measures which are necessary to reformation must operate as example; and in general, since the reformation of the more hardened offenders is not to be expected, except by severe measures, the influence of terror in endeavoring reformation will increase with the malignity of the crime. This is just what we need and what the penal legislator is so solicitous to secure. The point for the exercise of wisdom is, to attain the second object in attaining the first. A primary regard to the first object is compatible with many modifications of punishment, in order more effectually to attain the second. If there are two measures,

of which both tend alike to reformation, and one tends most to operate as example, that one should unquestionably be preferred.

There is a third object which, though subordinate to the others, might perhaps still obtain greater notice from the legislator than it is wont to do-restitution or compensation.* Since what are called criminal actions are commonly injuries committed by one man upon another, it appears to be a very obvious dictate of reason that the injury should be repaired;—that he from whom the thief steals a purse should regain its value ; that he who is injured in his person or otherwise, should receive such compensation as he may. When my house is broken into and a hundred pounds' worth of property is carried off, it is but an imperfect satisfaction to me that the robber will be punished. I ought to recover the value of my property. The magistrate, in taking care of the general, should take care of the individual weal. The laws of England do now award compensation in damages for some injuries. This is a recognition of the principle; although it is remarkable, not only that the number of offences which are thus punished is small, but that they are frequently of a sort in which pecuniary loss has not been sustained by the injured party.

I do not imagine that in the present state of penal law, or of the administration of justice, a general regard to compensation is practicable, but this does not prove that it ought not to be regarded. If in an improved state of penal affairs, it should be found practicable to oblige offenders to recompense by their labor those who had suffered by their crime, this advantage would attend, that while it would probably involve considerable punishment, it would approve itself to the offender's mind as the demand of reason and of justice.

* "The law of nature commands that reparation be made." Mor. and Pol. Phil. b. 6, c. 8. And this dictate of nature appears to have been recognized in the Mosaic law, in which compensation to the suffering party is expressly required.