The knowledge of the true relations between a sovereign and his subjects and of those between those of different nations; the revival of commerce by the light of philosophical truths, diffused by printing; and the silent international contest of industry, the most humane and the most worthy of rational men - these are the fruits we owe to the enlightenment of this century. But how few have examined and combated the cruelty of punishments and the irregularities of criminal procedures, a part of legislation so elementary and yet so neglected in almost the whole of Europe; and how few have sought, by a return to first principles, to dissipate the mistakes accumulated by many centuries, or to mitigate, with at least that force which belongs only to ascertained truths, the excessive caprice of ill-directed power, which has presented up to this time but one long example of lawful and cold-blooded atrocity! And yet the groans of the weak, sacrificed to the cruelty of the ignorant or to the indolence of the rich; the barbarous tortures, multiplied with a severity as useless as it is prodigal, for crimes either not proved or quite chimerical; the disgusting horrors of a prison, enhanced by that which is the cruelest executioner of the miserable— namely, uncertainty; - these ought to startle those rulers whose function it is to guide the opinion of men's minds. The immortal Montesquieu has treated cursorily of this matter; and truth, which is indivisible, has forced me to follow the luminous footsteps of this great man; but thinking men, for whom I write, will be able to distinguish my steps from his. Happy shall I esteem myself if, like him, I shall succeed in obtaining the secret gratitude of the unknown and peaceable followers of reason, and if I shall inspire them with that pleasing thrill of emotion with which sensitive minds respond to the advocate of the interests of humanity. To examine and distinguish all the different sorts of crimes. and the manner of punishing them would now be our natural task, were it not that their nature, which varies with the different circumstances of times and places, would compel us to enter upon too vast and wearisome a mass of detail. But it will suffice to indicate the most general principles and the most pernicious and common errors, in order to undeceive no less those who, from a mistaken love of liberty, would introduce anarchy, than those who would be glad to reduce their fellow-men to the uniform regularity of a convent. What will be the penalty suitable for such and such crimes? Is death a penalty really useful and necessary for the security and good order of society? Are torture and torments just, and do they attain the end which the law aims at? What is the best way of preventing crimes ? Are the same penalties equally useful in all times? These problems deserve to be solved with such geometrical precision as shall suffice to prevail over the clouds of sophistication, over seductive eloquence, or timid doubt. Had I no other merit than that of having been the first to make clearer to Italy that which other nations have dared to write and are beginning to practice, I should deem myself fortunate; but if, in maintaining the rights of men and of invincible truth, I should contribute to rescue from the spasms and agonies of death any unfortunate victim of tyranny or ignorance, both so equally fatal, the blessings and tears of a single innocent man in the transports of his joy would console me for the contempt of mankind. Complete. From "Crimes and Punishments.» C AGAINST CAPITAL PUNISHMENT APITAL punishment is injurious by the example of barbarity it presents. If human passions, or the necessities of war, have taught men to shed one another's blood, the laws, which are intended to moderate human conduct, ought not to extend the savage example, which in the case of a legal execution is all the more baneful in that it is carried out with studied formalities. To me it seems an absurdity that laws, which are the expression of the public will, which abhor and which punish homicide, should themselves commit one; and that, to deter citizens from private assassination, they should themselves order public manslaughter. What are the true and most useful laws? Are they not those covenants and conditions which all would wish observed and proposed, when the incessant voice of private interest is hushed or is united with the interest of the public? What are every man's feelings about capital punishment? Let us read them in the gestures of indignation and scorn with which everyone looks upon the executioner, who is, after all, an innocent administrator of the public will, a good citizen contributory to the public welfare, an instrument as necessary for the internal security of a state as brave soldiers are for its external. What, then, is the source of this contradiction; and why is this feeling, in spite of reason, ineradicable in mankind? Because men in their most secret hearts, that part of them which more than any other still preserves the original form of their first nature, have ever believed that their lives lie at no one's disposal, save in that of necessity alone, which, with its iron sceptre, rules the universe. What should men think when they see wise magistrates and grave priests of justice with calm indifference causing a criminal to be dragged by their slow precedure to death; or when they see a judge, while a miserable wretch in the convulsions of his last agonies is awaiting the fatal blow, pass away coldly and unfeelingly, perhaps even with a secret satisfaction in his authority, to enjoy the comforts and pleasures of life? "Ah," they will say, "these laws are but the pretexts of force, and the studied, cruel formalities of justice are but a conventional language, used for the purpose of immolating us with greater safety, like victims. destined in sacrifice to the insatiable idol of tyranny. That assassination which they preach to us as so terrible a misdeed we see nevertheless employed by them without either scruple or passion. Let us profit by the example. A violent death seemed to us a terrible thing in the descriptions of it that were made to us, but we see it is a matter of a moment. How much less terrible will it be for a man who, not expecting it, is spared all that there is of pain in it." Such are the fatal arguments employed, if not clearly, at least vaguely, by men disposed to crimes, among whom, as we have seen, the abuse of religion is more potent than religion itself. If I am confronted with the example of almost all ages and almost all nations who have inflicted the punishment of death upon some crimes, I will reply that the example avails nothing before truth, against which there is no prescription of time; and that the history of mankind conveys to us the idea of an immense sea of errors, among which a few truths, confusedly and at long intervals, float on the surface. Human sacrifices were once common to almost all nations, yet who for that reason will dare defend them? That some few states, and for a short time only, should have abstained from inflicting death, rather favors my argument than otherwise, because such a fact is in keeping with the lot of all great truths, whose duration is but as the lightning flash in comparison with the long and dark night that envelops mankind. That happy time has not yet arrived when truth, as error has hitherto done, shall belong to the majority of men; and from this universal law of the reign of error those truths alone have hitherto been exempt, which supreme wisdom has seen fit to distinguish from others, by making them the subject of a spe cial revelation. The voice of a philosopher is feeble against the noise and cries of so many followers of blind custom, but the few wise men scattered over the face of the earth will respond to me from their inmost hearts. From "Crimes and Punishments.» i HENRY WARD BEECHER (1813-1887) ENRY WARD BEECHER'S "Star Papers" show the same control of musical English which made his sermons and orations famous. They are evidently inspired by a determination to succeed in doing something wholly unlike preaching, and their saccess in this respect is marked. They are pleasant conversations with the reader on subjects in which all healthy people ought to be interested. -books, flowers, the woods,- even "angleworms, white grubs, and bugs that carry pick and shovel on the head." He gossips over these in the most genial and companionable way, and if sometimes he shows the result of ex cathedra habits of teaching, no pupil who is worthy to be well taught will blame him for it. He was born at Litchfield, Connecticut, June 24th, 1813, and died March 8th, 1887, at Brooklyn. As a pulpit orator he ranks with Phillips Brooks whom he surpasses in power of pleasing expression, though surpassed by him in insight. As an essayist, he shows the influence of Addison and Irving, with occasional suggestions of the homely humor of Izaak Walton. THE DREAM-CULTURE HERE is something in the owning of a piece of ground which affects me as did the old ruins of England. I am free to confess that the value of a farm is not chiefly in its crops of cereal grain, its orchards of fruit, and in its herds; but in those larger and more easily reaped harvests of associations, fancies, and dreamy broodings which it begets. From boyhood I have associated classical civic virtues and old heroic integrity with the soil. No one who has peopled his young brain with the fancies of Grecian mythology, but comes to feel a certain magical sanctity for the earth. The very smell of fresh-turned earth brings up as many dreams and visions of the country as sandalwood does of Oriental scenes. At any rate, I feel, in walking under these trees and about these slopes, something of that enchantment of the vague and mysterious glimpses of the past, |