PHI LOS 0 P H Y . - Classic Works of Apologetics Online

4Qf:S
of Crimes and Pll1zis"me}~Js.
scription. These temptations and facilities can only
be counteracted by adding to the number of capital
punishmeli~s- But a t/~ird cause,. which iIlcreases the
frequency of capital executions in England, is a de-
. feet of tIle laws in not be~rig pro\rided with any oth ..
er punishment than that of death, sufficiently terrib~e
I to keep offenders in awe. Transportation, which is
the sentence;! second in the order of severity, appears
to me to ans\ver the purpose of example ,"ery imperfectly
; not only becau ,e exile is in reality a slight
punishment to those,who have neither property, nor
friends, nor reputation, nor regular means of sub.
sistence at honle ; and becau se their situation becomes
little worse by their crime, than it was before they
committed it: but beC3tlSe the punishment, ,vhat.
ever it be, is unobserved and unkno\vn. A transport~d
con,rict may suffer under his sentence, hut his~
sufferings are l·emoved fronl the view of his countrymen:
his misery is unseen; his condition strikes
110 terror into the mind~: of those, for whose warn·
ing and admonition it was intended. This chasm in
. the scale of punisllment produces also t\VO farther
imperfections in the administration of penal justice:
the first is, tllat the same punishll1ent is extended to
crimes of very different character and malignancy;
the second, that punishments separated by a great interval,
are assigned to crilnes hardly distiIlgllishable
\ in t~eir guilt and ?lischief..
L 1 he end of pum~hment IS two-fold, amC1tdment and
I example. In the first of these, the reformation of crim­
)nals, little has ever been effected, and little I fear is
; practicable. From e\'ery species of punishment that
~has hitherto been devised, fron1 iIllprisonment and
exile, from pail. and infamy, malefactors return mOT(;
h.ardened in their criines alld luore instructed. It­
\ there be any thing that shakes the soul of a confirmled
villain, it is the expectation of approaching death.
The horrors of this situation may cause f't!ch a wrench
in the mental organs, as to give them a holding turn:
and I t11ink it prc)lJ:lil1e, t:I~tclt rnan}' of th()se who are
executed, \vould, if they were delivered at the point
··)f (leath~ rctaitl slJcl1 a rCllle(11l)r~'lCe ()f their sensa