Essays on the punishment of death / [Charles Spear].

  • Charles Spear
Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essays on the punishment of death / [Charles Spear]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    as man dies, so he remains forever, tortured with anguish and polluted with guilt, or blooming in un¬ fading joy and exalted goodness.’ We have, in all our labor, so far, looked to this sub¬ ject in reference to temporal things, but now we must turn away from all the fleeting vanities of time, to that world, £ where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.’ On such a subject we ought to speak with humility, if not with terror. Let us then look at the facts in the case. We have seen, especially in our article on the effect of public execu¬ tions, that, generally, those who become guilty of cap¬ ital offences, become more- hardened and indifferent as the day approaches. Mr. Wakefield, who spent seve¬ ral years in prison, says, £ In about one case out of four,* no religious impression is produced; but the prisoner goes through all the ceremonies of his situa¬ tion with an air of indifference, being occupied to the very last moment with the hope of a reprieve.’ He further states, £ that on almost every execution day, on which several are hanged, the chaplain is subjected to the most outrageous insults from one or more of the doomed men. He will readily confirm this statement. And it may be farther proper to say, for the informa¬ tion of religious persons, among those who make our laws, that every year several of their fellow-creatures are cut off in front of Newgate, in the very act of scoff¬ ing at God and Christ, and the Holy Sacrament.’ We could fill volumes, showing the deadening, paralyzing influence of this mode of punishment upon those un- # The author of Old Bailey Experience, makes the proportion much less. He says that, ‘in nineteen cases out of twenty, there is no true repentance; most of them die apparently careless about their formei course of life, or of the world to come.’ 9*
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