- ecutions, to those who are not lawyers and read these laws they only appear to be a species of jargon. For the execution of criminal law has always a certain appearance of violence. Being exercised directly on the persons of the supposed offenders, and commonly executed in the face of the public, such executions are apt to excite sentiments of pity for the sufferers, and indignation against those who are employed in such cruelties, being seen as single acts of cruelty, rather than as ill general principles of government. But the operation of the laws in question being such as common feeling brings home to every man's bosom, they operate in a sort of comparative silence and obscurity; and though their cruelty is exceedingly great, it is never seen in a single exertion, and always escapes commiseration, being scarce known, except to those who view them in a general, which is always a cold and phlegmatic light. The first of these laws being made with so general a satisfaction, as the chief governors found that such things were extremely acceptable to the leading people in that country, they were willing enough to gratify them with the ruin of their fellow-citizens; they were not sorry to divert their attention from other inquiries, and to keep them fixed to this, as if this had been the only real object of their national politics; and for many years there was no speech from the throne. which did not with great appearance of seriousness recommend the passing of such laws, and scarce a session went over without in effect passing some of them, until they have by degrees grown to be the most considerable head in the Irish statute-book. At the same time giving a temporary and occasional mitigation to the severity of some of the harshest of those laws, they appeared in some sort the protectors of those whom they were in reality destroying by the establishment of general constitutions against them. At length, however, the policy of this expe dient is worn out; the passions of men are cooled; those laws begin to disclose themselves, and to produce effects very different from those which were promised in making them: for crooked counsels are ever unwise; and nothing can be more absurd and dangerous than to tamper with the natural foundations of society, in hopes of keeping it up by certain contrivances. LETTER.* Mr Y DEAR SIR, - Your letter is, to myself, infinitely obliging with regard to you, I can find no fault with it, except that of a tone of humility and disqualification, which neither your rank, nor the place you are in, nor the profession you belong to, nor your very extraordinary learning and talents, will in propriety demand or perhaps admit. These dispositions will be still less proper, if you should feel them in the extent your modesty leads you to express them. You have certainly given by far too strong a proof of self-diffidence by asking the opinion of a man circumstanced as I am, on the important subject of your letter. You are far more capable of forming just conceptions upon it than I can be. However, since you are pleased to command me to lay before you my thoughts, as materials upon which your better judgment may operate, I shall obey you, and submit them, with great deference, to your melioration or rejection. But first permit me to put myself in the right. I owe you an answer to your former letter. It did not desire one, but it deserved it. If not for an answer, it called for an acknowledgment. It was a new favor; and, indeed, I should be worse than insensible, * William Smith, Esq., to whom this Letter is addressed, was then a member of the Irish Parliament: he is now (1812) one of the Bar ons of the Court of Exchequer in Ireland. |