although he sees penal infliction staring him in the face, his hope deludes him into the belief that he may escape it. Further, if the real cause of human offences be excessive activity of the animal propensities, it follows that mere punishment cannot put a stop to crime; because it overlooks the cause, and leaves it to operate with unabated energy after the infliction has been endured. The history of the world, accordingly, presents us with a succession of crimes and punishments, and at present the series appears to be as far removed from a termination as at any previous period in the annals of the race.

If the world in regard to Man has been arranged on the principle of the supremacy of the moral sentiments and the intellect, we might expect better success were moral retribution, of which I now proceed to treat, resorted to.

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CHAPTER XV.

MORAL RETRIBUTION.

THE motive which prompts the dog to worry and the cock to peck and spur his assailant is, as I have said, mere animal resentment. His propensities are disagreeably affected, and combativeness and destructiveness instinctively start into activity to repel the aggression. The animal resentment of Man is precisely analogous. A thief is odious to acquisitiveness, because he robs it of its treasures; a murderer is offensive to our feelings, because he extinguishes life. And these faculties being offended, combativeness and destructiveness rush to their aid in Man, while under the animal dominion, as instinctively as in the dog, and punish the offender on principles, and in a way, exactly similar.

The case is different with the proper human faculties. Benevolence contemplating theft and murder disapproves of them, because they are hostile to its inherent constitution, and because they occasion calamities to those who are its objects, and misery to the perpetrators themselves. Conscientiousness is pained by such deeds, because its very nature revolts at every infringement of right, and because justice is essential to the welfare of mankind. Veneration is offended at reckless insult and indignity, because its desire is to respect the intelligent creatures of the God whom it adores, believing that they are all the objects of His love.

In short, all the moral sentiments ardently and instinctively desire that crime should be brought to a close, and that its recurrence may be prevented, because it is in direct opposition to their very nature. And this desire, on their part, is not dependent on the power of the criminal to offend or to forbear. Benevolence grieves at death inflicted by a madman, and calls aloud that it should be prevented; conscientiousness disavows theft, although committed by an idiot, and requires that he should be restrained; while veneration recoils at the irreverences even of the frenzied. The fact that the offenders are involuntary agents, incapable of restraining their propensities, does not alter the aversion of the moral faculties to their actions. The reasons of this are obvious. First, these faculties hate evil because it is

contrary to their nature, from whatever source it springs; and secondly, the circumstance that the aggressor is a necessary agent does not diminish the calamity inflicted on the sufferer. It is as painful to be killed by a madman as by a deliberate assassin; and it is as destructive to property to be robbed by a cunning idiot as by an acute and practised thief.

We perceive, therefore, as the first feature of the moral and intellectual law, that the higher sentiments, absolutely and in all circumstances, declare against offences, and demand imperatively that they shall be brought to an end.

There is a great difference, however, between the means which they suggest for accomplishing this object and those prompted by the propensities. The latter, as I have said, blindly inflict vengeance without the slightest regard to the causes which led to the crime, or to the consequences of the punishment. They seize the aggressor, and worry, bite, Scourge, imprison, or strangle him; and there their operations begin and terminate.

The moral and intellectual faculties, on the other hand, embrace even the criminal himself within the range of their sympathies. Benevolence desires to render him virtuous, and thereby happy, as well as to protect his victim. Veneration desires that he should be treated as a man; and conscientiousness cannot acquiesce in any administration towards him that does not tend to remove the motives of his

misconduct and to prevent their recurrence. The first step, then, which the moral and intellectual faculties combine in demanding is a full exposition of the causes of the offence, and of the consequences of the mode of treatment proposed.

The leading fact which arrests our attention in this inquiry is that every crime proceeds from an abuse of some faculty or other; and the question immediately arises, Whence originates the tendency to abuse? We answerFrom three sources: first, from particular faculties being too active; secondly, from great excitement produced by external causes; and thirdly, from ignorance of what are uses and what are abuses of the faculties.

The moral and intellectual powers next demand, What is the cause of particular faculties being too active in individuals? In answer, I point to the law of hereditary descent, by which the faculties most energetic in the parents determine those which shall predominate in the child. Intellect then infers that, according to this view, certain individuals are unfortunate at birth in having received

from their parents powers so ill-proportioned that abuse of some of them is almost an inevitable consequence if the individuals are left to the sole guidance of their own propensities under the influence of temptation.

In the next place, undue excitement may arise from the individual being pressed by want of food, stimulated by intoxicating liquors, seduced by evil example, and from a variety of other unfavourable influences.

And thirdly, abuses may arise from sheer want of knowledge concerning the constitution of the mind, and its relations to external objects. The burning of old women as witches was a crime perpetrated under the forms of law; and persecution for opinion is a crime obviously referable, like the other, to this source.

I have no hesitation in saying that if, in the case of every offender, the three sources of crime here enumerated had been investigated, reported on, and published, the belief would have become general and irresistible that the individual had been the victim of his nature and his external condition, and penitentiaries would have been resorted to as the best means of abating crime and of satisfying the moral feelings of the community. The public err through ignorance, and knowledge only is needed to ensure their going into the right path.

Moreover, intellect perceives, and the moral sentiments acknowledge, that these causes exist independently of the will of the offender. The criminal, for example, is not the cause of the unfortunate preponderance of the animal tendencies in his brain; neither is he the creator of the external circumstances which lead his propensities into abuse, or of the ignorance in which he is involved. Nevertheless, the moral and intellectual faculties of the indifferent spectator of his condition do not, on this account, admit that, either for his own sake or for that of society, he should be permitted to proceed in an unrestricted course of crime. They absolutely insist on arresting his progress, and their first question is, How may this best be done? Intellect answers, By removing the causes which produce the offences.

The first cause-the great preponderance of the animal propensities cannot, by any means yet known, be summarily removed. Intellect, therefore, points out an alternative-that of supplying, by moral and physical restraint, the control which, in a brain better constituted, is afforded by the moral and intellectual faculties: in short, of placing the

offender under such a degree of effective control as absolutely to prevent the abuse of his faculties. Benevolence acknowledges this proceeding to be kind, veneration to be respectful, and conscientiousness to be just at once to the offender himself and to society; and intellect perceives that, whenever it is adopted, it will form an important step towards preventing a repetition of the crime.

The second cause-great excitement from without-may be removed by withdrawing the individual from the influence of the unfavourable external circumstances to which he is exposed. The very restraint and control which serve to effect the first object will directly tend to accomplish the second at the same time.

The third cause--namely, ignorance may be removed by conveying instruction to the intellectual, and training to the moral and religious, powers.

If these principles are sound, the measures now recommended, when viewed in all their consequences, should be not only the most just and benevolent, but at the same time the most advantageous that can be adopted. Let us contrast their results with those of the animal method.

Under the animal system, as we have already seen, no measures except the excitement of terror are taken to prevent the commission of crime. But many men become criminals in consequence of a constitutional deficiency in prudence, and of a predominance of the daring elements in their minds. The danger operates as a challenge, and stimulates them to defy the threatened inflictions. Under the moral plan, as soon as a tendency to abuse the faculties should appear in any individual, means of prevention would be resorted to, because the sentiments could not otherwise be satisfied.

Under the animal system no inquiry is made into the future proceedings of the offender, and he is turned loose upon society under the unabated influence of all the causes which led to his infringement of the law; and, as effects never cease while their causes continue to operate, he repeats his offence, and becomes the object of a new animal infliction. Under the moral system the causes would be removed, and the evil effects would cease.

Under the animal system the propensities of the offender and of society are maintained in habitual excitement; for the punishment proceeds from the animal faculties, and is likewise addressed to them. Flogging, for instance, proceeds from destructiveness, and is addressed solely to

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