law of nature, viz. instant self-defence, and security from future violence or wrong. The ends are more comprehensive, extending not only to complete security against offence, but to the correction and improvement of the offender himself, and to counteract in others the disposition to offend. Penal laws are to be regulated by this standard; and the lenity or severity with which they are executed, should, if possible, be exactly proportionate to it. In different circumstances, either personal or public considerations may preponderate; and in cases of great moral atrocity, or when the common weal is essentially injured, all regard to the reformation of a criminal is superseded, and his life is justly forfeited to the good of society. In the participation of the benefits of the social. union, he has virtually acceded to its conditions; and the violation of its fundamental articles renders him a rebel and an enemy, to be expelled or destroyed, both for the sake of security, and as an awful warning to others. When capital punishments are viewed in this light, the most humane and scrupulous witness may consider himself as sacrificing private emotions to public justice and social order; and that he is performing an act at once beneficial to his country and to mankind. For political and moral economy can subsist in no community, without the steady execution of wise

and salutary laws; and every atrocious act, perpetrated with impunity, operates as a terror to the innocent, a snare to the unwary, and an incentive to the flagitious. The criminal, also, who evades the sentence of justice, like one infected with the pestilence, contaminates all whom he approaches. He, therefore, who, from false tenderness or misguided conscience, has prevented conviction by withholding the necessary proofs, is an accessary to all the evils which ensue. The maxim, that "it is better ten villains should be discharged than a single person suffer by a wrong adjudication," is one of those partial truths which are generally misapplied, because not accurately understood. It is certainly eligible that the rules and the forms. of law should be so precise and immutable, as not to involve the innocent in any decision obtained by corruption, or dictated by passion and prejudice; though this should sometimes furnish an outlet for the escape of actual offenders. The plea, also, may have some validity in crimes of a nature chiefly political, (with which, however, the Faculty can professionally have no concern,) such as coining and forgery, or in cases wherein the

"The oath administered to the witness is, not only that what he deposes shall be true, but that he shall also depose the whole truth; so that he is not to conceal any part of what he knows, whether interrogated particularly to that point or not." Blackstone's Comment., bk. iii. ch. 23. vol. iii. p. 372.

punishment much exceeds the evil or turpitude of the offence. For Lord Bacon has well observed, that "over-great penalties, besides their acerbity, deaden the execution of the law1;" and, when they are discovered to be unjustly inflicted, its authority is impaired, its sanctity dishonoured, and veneration gives place to disgust and abhorrence.

But the dread of innocent blood being brought upon us by explicit and honest testimony, is one of those superstitions, which the nurse has taught, and which a liberal education ought to purge from the mind: and if, in the performance of our duty, innocence should unfortunately be involved in the punishment of guilt, we shall assuredly stand acquitted before GoD and our own consciences. The convict himself, lamentable as his fate must be regarded, may derive consolation from the reflection, that, though his sentence be unjust," he falls for his country, whilst he suffers under the operation of those rules, by the general effect and tendency of which the welfare of the community is maintained and upholden m."

§ 20. When professional testimony is required in cases of such peculiar malignity as to excite general horror and indignation, a virtuous mind,

1 See Proposal for Amending the Laws of England. (Works, vol. iv. p. 367.)

m Paley's Moral and Political Philosophy, bk. vi. ch. 9.

even though scrupulous and timid, is liable to be influenced by too violent impressions, and to transfer to the accused that dread and aversion, which, before conviction, should be confined to the crime, and as much as possible withheld from the supposed offender. If the charge, for instance, be that of parricide, accomplished by poison, and accompanied with deliberate malice, ingratitude, and cruelty; the investigation should be made with calm and unbiassed precision, and the testimony delivered with no colouring of passion, nor with any deviation from the simplicity of truth. When circumstantial proofs are adduced, they should be arranged in the most lucid order, that they may be contrasted and compared in all their various relations with facility and accuracy; and that their weight may be separately and collectively determined in the balance of justice. For in such evidence there subsists a regular gradation from the slightest presumption to complete moral certainty; and, if the witness possess sufficient information in this branch of philosophical and juridical science, he will always be competent to secure himself, and, on many occasions, the court also, from fallacy and error. The Marquis de Beccaria has laid down the following excellent theorem concerning judicial evidence :-" When the proofs of a crime are dependent on each other, (that is,

when the evidence of each witness, taken separately, proves nothing,) or when all the proofs are dependent upon one, the number of proofs neither increases nor diminishes the probability of the fact; for the force of the whole is no greater than the force of that on which they depend; and, if this fails, they all fall to the ground. When the

proofs are independent of each other, the probability of the fact increases in proportion to the number of proofs; for the falsehood of one does not diminish the veracity of another...... The proofs of a crime may be divided into two classes, perfect and imperfect. I call those perfect, which exclude the possibility of innocence; imperfect, those which do not exclude this possibility. Of the first, one only is sufficient for condemnation; of the second, as many are required as form a perfect proof; that is to say, that, though each of these, separately taken, does not exclude the possibility of innocence, it is nevertheless excluded by their union"."

n Essay on Crimes and Punishments, chap. 14.