The Sun.
London, England, 1832-06-04 00:00:00

DUTCH AND GERMAN PAPERS.

ST. PETERSBURGH, MAY 14.—Yesterday, tht
13th of May, the Emperor gave a solemn audience
in the Winter Palace to the Deputies who wen
commissioned to lay at his Majesty's feet the ho-
mage of the profound gratitude of the Poles, fot
the general amnesty, and for the favours which his
Imperial Majesty has been pleased to grant to the
kingdom of Poland:

, --7
T The whole Imperial Court, the Members of the
Council of the Empire, the Senators, the Generals
and Officers of the Guard, as well as the persons of
the first four classes presented at Court, assembled
in St. George's Hall, where the deputation arrived
at noon, and was introduced by Count Strogonoff
to their Majesties, who stood before the throne.
Prince Valentine Radzivil, the senior member of the
deputation, then read the following address in the
Polish language :--
" Sire,—Erents beyond the reach of human foresight
had caused the kingdom of Poland to pass from a state of
profound tranquillity and of prosperity, such as it had
never before known, to one of trouble and anarchy. A
handful of factious men, exciting the mass of the people,
had :rustrated the intervention of prudent men, and of the
most devoted subjects of your Majesty, to restore order
and peace : the voice of your Majesty was disregarded. It
was in these deplorable circumstances that your Majesty,
using the only possible means to make men who had gone
astray return to their duty, reduced the factious to silence
by the force of arms, and chained the monster of discord.
Your Maj sty did more : you resolved that moderation
should succeed victory, and that pardon and oblivion of
the past should be the pledge of your paternal intentions
and a new monument of your inexhaustible goodness.
The Deputies of the kingdom of Poland now assembled in
the capital of your empire hasten to lay at the foot of your
Majesty's throne, for so many benefits, the homage of
their fidelity—the submission of their gratitude,—and even
venture to hope that, pitying the miseries hich the war
has brought in its train, your Majesty will deign to stretch
out a protecting hand to the victims of these deplorable
excesses."

The 3liniver of the Interior, by his Majesty's
orders, then addressed the Deputies in the Russian
language to the following effect :
" Gentlemen,—His Majesty the Emperor receives with
pleasure the expression of the sentiments of his subj-cts
of the kingdom of Poland, which you lay at the foot of
his throne. His paternal heart was afflicted when fulfill-
ing an imperative duty. After having exhausted all means
of persuasion, his Majesty found himself obliged to recur
to arms, to restore order which had been destroyed by
guilty factions. Success has crowned the cause of justice;
the people of the kingdom of Poland have been snatched
from the abyss of revolution and anarchy, and his Ma-
jesty the Emperor hopes that, by the aid of the Almighty,
his care and his solicitude will soon efface even the traces of
the evils which have latterly afflicted the country. His
Majesty depends on a zealous cooperation on.your part, as
well as on that of all his faithful and well-disposed sub-
jects in the kingdom of Poland. Under the protection of
the laws which have been given you,—laws which are
adapted to the situation of the country, and to the cir-
cumstances of the times,—you will make unanimous
efforts to attain the object indicated by his Majesty, viz.,
to consolidate public order by propagating the salutary
ideas which serve as its securities by rejecting perfidious
suggestions,—in a word, by preserving the weak-minded
from the fatal influence of men habituated to sacrifice the
general good to private interest, and who are now im-
pelled by despair as much as by a sense of their own sh ime.
His Majesty the Emperor is confident that their efforts
will be vain. Melancholy experience has often taught
the people of the kingdom of Poland, that their happi-
ness and tranquillity can find no solid foundation but in
unshaken fidelity to the monarch, in the institutions due
to his wisdom, and in a sincere and indissoluble union
with the Russian nation, which has issued from the same
parent stock as themselves. The future will restore to them
the blessings which the disorders of intestine war have
destroyed, and his Majesty will thus see the accomplish•.
ment of one of his most ardent wishes."

The first ship from Cronstadt this year sailed on
the Bth of May, with a cargo of Russian goods for
Liverpool.— Journal de St. Petersbu►g/i, May 15.

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.

A meeting of the members and friends of the Society for
the Diffusion of Information on the Punishment of Death
was held on Saturday, in Exeter Hall. The greater por-
tion of the assembly consisted of ladies. Among the gen-
tlemen on the platform were Mr. Ewart, M.P. Mr.
Hume, M.P. Mr. Sadler, M.P. Mr. D. O'Connell, M.P.
Mr. Strickland, M.P. Mr. T. B. Lennard, M.P. Mr.
Wyse, M.P. &c. &c.
On the motion of Mr. WILLIAM ALLEN, Lord NUGENT
was called to the chair. .

The Noble CHAIRMAN congratulated the friends of the
Society on the steady progress of their cause. Since the
days of Draco experience bad demonstrated that undue se•
verity of punishment was always accompanied by propor-
tionate uncertainty and inefficiency. Prosecutors held
back, and juries, witnesses, and judges swerved from
their strict line of duty, rather than subject an offender to
an extensive measure of punishment. This general reluc-
tance to inflict the too rigorous penalties of the law afforded
chances of
,escape on which criminals speculated when
meditating the commission of illegal acts. Within the
last three days, he was happy to say, that the cause of
humanity had made a great advance ; but the triumph
was darkened by a melancholy event of which his heart
was painfully conscious, for on the day when Mr. Ewart'a
resolutions passed the committee of the House of Commons,
on that very day the lips of his dear and respected friend Sir
James Macintosh, whose strong reasoning and persuasive
eloquence had ever pleaded for the rights of mankind,
were sealed in death. He who had caught the mantle
of the virtuous Rornilly—who had upheld the banner of
philosophic philanthropy—would, had he been spared to
witness it, have exulted in the triumph of that hour.—
(Applause.) The difficulty of instituting a proper system
of secondary punishments which hal been put forward
by the opponents of the Society ought not to arrest their
indeavours to abate the pruriency of severe legisla►ion
which hail too long disgraced this country. It was edu-
cation that must take the place of severe penal enactments,
and schools that must supersede gibbets.—(Applause.)
Mr. ALLEN read the report, which described the mea-
sures adopted by the society for the accomplishment of
their humane object, and stated that the disbursements had
exceeded the receipts by 2621.
Mr. BASIL MONTAGU moved that the report should be
received and adopted. The Learned Gentleman adverted
to circumstances which had occurred thirty years before,
on an occasion when he had been the means of convey-
ing a respite to two convicts at Huntingdon. From that
period be bad determined to persevere in his efforts to put
an end to those legalized atrocities that tended to harden
the popultr mind.
Mr. STRICKLAND, M. P., seconded the motion, which
was carried unanimously.
Mr. T. B. LENNARD, M. P. moved the next resolu-
tion—" That the efficacy of criminal laws depends less
upon the severity of punishment than the certainty of in-
fliction, and that laws which cannot be carried into exe-
cution without shocking the feelings of society, and ex-
citing sympathy for the offender, are contrary to reason,
inconsistent with morality, and opposed to the interests of
justice."

Mr. J. flumr, M.P., seconded the resolution, which
was agrred to.

The following resolutions were then severally put and
agreed to :

" That the criminal laws of England are of a character
so vindictive and barbarous, as to be utterly incapable of
uniform execution ; and that, consequently, under the
present system, the lives of men depend less upon the pre-
cise and express provisions of law, than upon the temper,
feeling, or caprice of a Judge or Secretary of State ; whence
it arises that all the assizes and courts throughout England
afford examples of inequality of punishment, and practical
proofs of the arbitrary discretion exercised in the selection
of victims for the altars of sanguinary justice."
" That the excessive severity of the law operates to the
total impunity of offenders, by;deterring humane persons
from prosecuting, and by holding out a temptation to
jurors to viola'e their oath rather than be accessory to
judicial murder ; while almost all the capital punishments
now in the statute-book are innovations upon the tem-
perate and wholesome principles of the ancient common
law of the land, which had ever bee❑ admired for its hu-
manity and wisdom by the greatest legal authorities, and
is coeval with the noblest and best principles of the Eng
lith constitution."
" That, France baying recently introduced ameliorations
into her criminal code, which was previously far less san-
guinary than our own, and the United States of America
having abolished ❑early the whole of the exterminating
statutes received from this country, it behoves the British
Parliament not to neglect those enlightened examples, but
to do that which the true interests of justice as well as of
humanity require, by introducing such a thorough and
efficient reform of the criminal law as will render it more
auxiliary to public morals than to private vengeance, and,
by a judicious system of prison discipline, afford that pro-

tection to propeey of which all persons may avail them-
-elves without purchasing it by the sacrifice of human li .e."
It was agreed that a petition in conformity with these
resolutions should be adopted, and presented to both Houses
of the L-gislature,—and that his Royal Highness the Duke
of Sussex should he requested to present it to the House of
Lords, and Mr. Hume to the house of Commons.
Thanks were then voted to several distinguished advo-
cates of the cause of humane legislation in foreign coun-
tries, to the public press, anti to the Chairman : after which
the meeting broke up.