line. It will scarcely, at the
present day, be denied that the only motives on which, in such a
government, criminal law can be administered, are the public safety, and
the reformation of the criminal himself. Vengeance has not been
delegated to man under the Christian dispensation. It is too evident,
nevertheless, that the principle of retaliatory punishment, irrespective
of any considerations of public safety, or the benefit of the offender,
pervades our criminal jurisprudence, both in theory and practice, and
just so far as this is the case, is the last great object defeated, for
his feelings are deadened, and his heart hardened by it. The most
depraved wretch has that within him which testifies that his fellow worm
has no right to inflict pain upon him solely as a _punishment_, and his
heart rebels against what he feels to be oppression. On the more
enlightened, the effect is equally unfavorable, for he contrasts the
practice of his persecutors with their profession, and is perhaps
conducted thereby to infidelity and despair. One of the prisoners at
Sing Sing, while contrasting the former with the present management,
said, "We used to hear the gospel preached to us on the Sabbath, but see
its doctrines trampled upon in all the conduct pursued towards us the
whole week besides." How different the result where the law of love
reigns! At Sing Sing there are numerous recent instances where
conviction on the minds of the prisoners that the authorities of the
prison have no other object than their temporal and spiritual benefit,
has softened their hearts, and thereby disposed them to the reception of
that consoling faith in a crucified Saviour, which is the only
foundation of true amendment of life. How important is it that all the
offices in a prison should be filled by persons of true piety; and where
can such be more usefully employed?

In a former part of this work, I have expressed a somewhat unfavorable
opinion on "the separate system," adopted in the Philadelphia
Penitentiary. One of my objections to this system is this, that to
deprive man so entirely of human society, is to do violence to the
strongest instinct of his nature, and thereby to inflict suffering far
more severe than corporeal pain or privation. If the severity of this
system does not obviously tend to carry out the legitimate objects of
prison discipline, it cannot be defended. The small number of
recommittals is no proof of the efficacy of this syst