Star.
London, England, 1829-12-14 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

LECTURES DELIVERED IN LONDON. IN 1629.

BY E. BIBER, PH. DR.

CASE OF A DESTITUTE CHILD.
Lt t us fancy ourselves in the condition of a child, born of vicious
and criminal parents, in one of those lanes or alleys, in which the
physical and the moral atmosphere are equally corrupt. What
will be the lot of such a child? The tender and unconscious look
of the suckling is never met by an eye, from which it may drink
the gladdening rays of love; never does the soothing 'aloe= of
parental tenderness calm ite soul in the moment of irritation; the
brutal glare of sensual satiety is the loveliest object it ever beholds;
the irritations of its nature are many, in consequence of the neglect
which it suffers, and which must inevitably be productive both of
bodily disease and of mental Indisposition, whilst every manifesta-
tion of those fretful feelings, which arise from a want of all that Is
wholesome to the body and to the soul, is repressed, or rather pro-
voked at an increased *rate, by rude severity or wild passion. As
soon as he is able to use his limbs, he is cast off by the unnatural
mother, who hates his existence as an interruption to the fuU in•
dulgence of her vicious habits; and a new epoch of his life begins.
during which he passes his time chiefly in the streets, with assn'
elates more advanced in age, and more tbeply initiated in the
Myiteries of sin ; and the filth with which his body is covered, is
but a faint analogy to the moral filth, which is thus gathering up
in his soul, at that period of life when the mind and feelings of
man are first expanding, to receive with. consciousness the im-
pressions of the surrounding world, and. when, from the suscepti-
bility of his whole bring, the nature of those impressions is almost
finally decisive, at lean for this life, of his character and put-
suits. The parental influence during that period is almost en-
tirely confined to daily brutality towards the child, which increase,
in proportion as the child acquires more power to provoke and
to resist it; and it is but a sad compensation for this habitual bar.
barity, that the child is occasloually dragged along by his parent to
the public-house, and allowed to partake of that enervating aad
brutalizing dram, of which a Christian GOvernment encourages the
extensive consumption, bartering away for two millions of revenue
the health of a whole population, and the morality, not to say the
salvation, of millions of souls. In this manner the child may grow
up to the age of seven or eight years, without ever coming into im-
mediate contact with, or falling under the direct notice of, any one
else but the associates of ►is parents and their cffyring ; and if it
should so happen, that a parish or police-officer penetrates into that
world of misery and vice in which the child live., for the purpose
of a seizure, an ejection, or an apprehension; the effect which his
appearance will.produce upon the child's imagination, is not calcu-
lated to impress him with the brter state of that other world,
from which he is an emissary, or to awaked in his mind the idea or
feeling of any thing more lovely, more benevolent, more holy. A
ghastly fear of the delegates of some mysterious power, which is to
all that know it, an object of hatred and terror, is the only trace
that such an event can leave behind in the' child's heart. Bat• ,
the time is fast approaching, when he WM have an opportunity
afforded him, by his own experience, of conceiving .a more
distinct notion of that power. He has now attained sufficient
strength of body, and, as a practical consequence of his mod,
of education, a sufficient facility of disguise, and rename
or lying, to be trusted into the world. The time is come
for him when he must earn his own bread, if he have not already
been turned to account, by being let on hire to beggars, or sent out
on begging errands himself. He is encouraged 'mills first pilfering
expedition by his older associates, whose boldness, and good leek,
excite at once his admiration, his envy, and his emulation...or, peso
baps, introduced in a less buoyant manner to a career, the doff of
which is so mournful—he is stimulated by hunger, nakedness, and
cold. But whatever the stimulants may be, it would require a
prodigy of morality—such as his education can never produce—to
resist, not a mere temptation, but a positive impulse to crime. The
voice of his Conscience is silent on the occasion; for it has never been
called into action, and is, by this time, driven back into the deepest
recesses of his heart, and buried under a man of selfishness, love of
sin, and evil propensities of every kind; Which have been nurtured
op. Thus he commits the first act which enlists him, in the eyes
of the world, among the bad characters. Now let us suppose that
the -happiest chance—at least what our moralists and legislators •
would call so—turns up fir him : he is taught up in the very tact
and dragged before a police-office. Imagine a child brought up in
the manner.l have described—and how many hundreds of children
are trained up in exactly the same situation—entering the date at
'Bow-street', or some other pollee-office of the metropolis; he is
pushed to the bar through a crowd of persOns of the lowest charac-
ter, to whom the daily display of similar immorality is a feast for
their:souls. Here there is no expression of sorrow for the pollu-
thin of so young a mind, of sympathy for the misery which his ap-
pearance bears witness of, nor that look of souistirring indignation,
which.the idea of his transgression might draw forth from the eye
even of the benevolent, if forgetting for a moment the unhappy dr- .
comstatices of the case. All that he meets with there, is tbe fiend-
like merriment of the spectators, and the cold forms of the law,
with'which he is received by the Magistrate, or his subalterns. He
is then examined; witnesses come forward against him, in whose
depositions, it may be, be recognizes as much treachery as truth;
and he is ultimately committed for trial, or—which will be far
less prejudicial so him, because it preserves him from the
contamination of the prison—he Is harangued by the Magis-
trate, and some slight chastisement ordered to be inflicted ,
en him. Now, suppose the magistrate to be the humanest person
that ever sat on the bench—suppose him to be moved by a real
feeling of grief at the idea of such early delinquency—what effect
can his exhortation produce upon the young thief, to whom, pro-
bably, even on account of the unusual language, the whole is as un-
intelligible, as an argument on morality in Chinese might be to any
-of us? AU %that he will gather from the transaction is, that the
power an the bench is the one which commands over all the others •
in the place ; that hi is displeased with what he has done; and
that be bas the power of getting those whipped with whom he is
displeased. But there is nothing in the most impressive exhorta-
tion which can be delivered on ;Itch an occasion, under the forms.
of law, from a magistrate's bench, that is in any way calculated, to
lead the boy to a conviction of the unlawfulness of his act, or that
at all opens to him the prospect of a different career, with sufficient
inducements to quit the one, to which habit has attached him, for
one so new, and so replete with self-denials ; or holds out to him
even the bate physical possibility of subsisting in a different One.
The only practical inference, therefore, which a boy can draw from
this transaction, and the subsequent whipping, is, that it is a bad
thing to be discovered in thieving, and that be must be more care-
ful, in future, in the exercise of his calling. And that this is the
inference, which most of the unfortunate children, placed under
these circumstances, draw from their first experience of the admi-
nistration of public justice, is millciesnly proved by the sequel of
their history, which is Invariably to be met with in the records Id
•riminality. But let ut see the boy again at liberty, after the pub-
. authorities have performed upon hinsoirhat is deemed their dbty.
• change has been produced in his feelings? His evil propas•
not been diminished ; it is well if they have not been
by the addition of a feeling of revenge. Or, has any
been done to enlighten him respecting his condition? All be
learnt is, that he was not solkiently Cunning. Or, ue
anima improved, temptations removed, _or encourage-,
good conduct bell oat? No; he returns exactly to the
posideoein which distress, thevientrund of his parents--en-
• the same means which society uses for the demoostrotion
Is called right, in a police emus, or a court of law.-and the
ezample of his emaciates, will aids urge him on to t►e
commission of trintes., 'opposite; even that his own inclination
I dictate a Seiturary course. The warming he has received has
him more cautious, and be may now go on for years,

earning his livelihood by the same meene,without being ever caught
inflogrand. At last, however, he will be caught up again, and
again brought under the influence of social institutions. Let us
suppose again the happiest state of things which can be imagined
for him, under existing circumstances. Let us suppose, that a
feeling of the misery and degradation, which attaches to his mode
of living, has occasionally got hold upon his heart; that, by some
providential occurrence he has been brought Into contact with in-
fluences, by which his attention has been directed to the possibility
of a better condition, both as regards his moral nature, and bis cir-
cumstances ; let us suppose that confinement, previously to his
final commitment by the magistrate,/ —halyards, to his trial, has
abated the buoyancy of his spirits ; that he has become inclined
for reflexion, and accessible to the kind exertions of some of those
benevolent Christians who visit the prisons, to snake the saving
health known, where it is most wanted; suppose all this to have
worked together, to bring his soul to a sort of crisis, in which he is
ready to throw off the bondage of iniquity, and to begin anew life.
Suppose all this to be the case, does the law wait for the develop-
ment of this crisis, by which a soul may be saved ? No I it cond.
nues in its cold, heartless, formal, and rigorous course ; he is brought
up for re-examination, or committed, or brought up for trial,
not as his state of mind may render advisable, but as the course st
the law dictates. Or does the law, and the power that executes the
law, take his state of mind into account, when deciding upen his •
fate? No I Suppose he confess his guilt, melting in tears of re-
pentance—suppose he express his willingness, his determination to
amend his life—suppose the Magistrate to be moved, and to hesi-
tate about the course which be is to adopt ; one of the tools of that
heartless syetem will step forward—" Don't trust his. promises,
your Worship, be is a notorious thief ; young as be la, we know
him to be an old practitioner." This testimony, coming frime such
I quarter, is sufficient to destroy the last chance that remained for
the youth, to turn from his evil ways. He is fully committed;
and if his repentance should last till the time of his trial, it will be
of no avail. His sorrow for the past, his anxious look out for the
future, are not regarded by those who—blasphemously, as they do
it in the name of sU that is sacred—presunie to decide what he
deserves, and what is to become of him. The circumstantial eel.'
dence of the fact is all, that these judges of unrighteous judgment
attend to ; and, as if there was no such thing as atonement and
mercy, as if they needed it not themselves, nor could imagine that
any one else needed it, they pronounce the " sentence of the law"
upon the unhappy youth. Such is the spirit of our institutions, that
even men, who in private affairs show themselves to be pious, just,
and followers after that which is good, nevertheless unhesitatingly
join in those, I repeat it, blasphemous, unrighteous, anti-Christian
performances. It will be said, mercy may still be extended to him,
for there is a difference between pronouncing and executing a sen-
tence. Be it so ; ibis may alter the case for the social conscience,
whom it furnishes with a sophistical excuse ; but it does not alter
It, at least not for the better, with regard to the individual, with
whose feelings society the" plays, as the cat does with the mouse.
The sentence is not pronounced with a view that it should have no
effect; and unfortunately, the effect does sot fail to be produced.
The repenting sinner has found his fellow-creatures turning a deaf
ear upon his repentance, upon his better determinations, and his
promises : an unforgiving Mirk has been gown, and the effect of
this can be so other than to harden bint. His better feelings are
inevitably chilled, and he returns to his prison with feelings voey
different from those with which he came to take his trial. The
cenaiquence is, that he now prefers the society of his wicked cons•
panions to the convention with those, in whom he bed medidelmeo
when he felt a favourable change operated in his dispedden, bet
whom he now shuns the more, the mote they bad succeeded in ex•
ercising influence over him. The exertions of Cluistian
Moo are interrupted; the edge of love and truth is blunted; Mt
whet a mitigation of punishment is announced to him. be will be.
more induced to murmur against what remains of his' sentonnte •
end to consider the alleviation of it as a happy escape, that has
turned up for him by chance, than, in resigned submission to his
fete, to persevere in his good determination, and to torn the time
of trial and probation, which is impend upon him, to account tor
the improvement of his life. But whilst society, by this unfeeling
,cmediect, positively obstructs in him the rise of those feelings, which
could bias him to a reformation of his character, it surrounds hint
with every Influence that is calculated to foster in him the growth
of sin. Prisons, houses of correction, and other similar inalte•
dons, are so many collections of moral monstrosities; and the
'contamination and infection among such anumber of bad characters
broUght into such close contact, must necessarily be more extensive
and more dangerous than that which takes place amongst them
when at large; for the restraint by which they are prevented from
the outward performance of their evil thoughts, so far from being a.
cite& upon evil communicatlin, operates rather as a stimulus to It.
So that the youth who enters the place, with a heart disposed foe
evil, and, to. a certain degree, familiar with the practice of it,
leaves it, at the expiration of the time of his confinement, ten dates
mote corrupted, and eager to palate practice the additional know.
ledge which he hu gained. His situation is, at the same time, es
devoid of all honest resources as ever ; it is not only hopeless. but
•desperate.
His inevitable fate is a renewed course of immorality; in which
be will be ititerrUpted again and again by the arm of human justice;
and to what end ?—to save him from destruction? No,, but is
avenge More and more cruelly upon him the consequences of that
state of destitution.and degradation, of which. culpable as be may
be, by far the greater guilt rests on society itself. Thus he is driven
9n in the career of delinquency from step to step, till he is at length
ripe for that last act of barbarity, which the community perpetrates
upon its abandoned members, to whom it has never stretched out
a hand of love. Is this the education which a Christian society
owes to its destitute children? Is this the discharge of that sacred
trust, which renders the community responsible for the temporal
and eternal welfare of every one of its members? Whence does
society derive the right of taking bloody vengeance upon those
unfortunate beings, whole-chief crime Is, to have too well answered,
by their conduct, the means adopted, either with the silent conseer
or by direct interposition of siciety, for the formation of their cha-
racter If it isa bloody deed for an individual to take away the
lie of his fellow creature, is. the deed less bloody because society
pallet:atm:it; because it is not an act of rashness, but of premedita-
tion—en act systematically resolved upon, systematically executed,
systematically repeated ? Or is it less bloody because society has,
by its neglect on one hand, and by its oppression on the other, pre-
viously murdered the souls of those whom it thus prematurely
hurries into eternity, to stand before the judgment seat of Goo?
Does sot society apprehend, that whilst its victims will have to
mount for their own transgression', the very history of their sins
will be a loud accusation against those who bad the power,lim not
the wM, to become instrumental in their rescue, and who seed the
authority, given them from on High, not to uve, but to ruin souls?
Do they consider, that the subtle forms of the law will leave no
subterfuge in the eye of Hne, whose holiness win lay bare the
iniquity of human justice—that " murder" will be written le
laming characters upon every such deed, which it now sealed with
the seal of lawful authority ? Does society think it a enliciest
compensation for the neglect of that education to will& oliri
individual has a claim, that the victims of Its sulfa
are. by the convulsive fears of death, harassed Into ..efism).l
penance, the sincerity of which it must be impossible for ostodiro
novice In religious knowledge, under such Circumstances, to meet;
tab ? Qr is Ir deemed a eatiefutoty atonement for the Obit
minal violation of .GOD'S law, and for the blasphemous abuse made
of his name, for the purposes of iniquity, that a Chaplain's ap-
pointed to read the burial service= those mournful occident? i

criminality
He authork
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thing been
can have
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of what is
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rendered

A fatal accident
.happened on Friday =Ming to a
:As
ape Muir stri,..ebotlt:Ma 7w. ow. th. .. Af, Ar. f,5••••
11•. • bouillee. er Asethietuti 114/0,. , p
moth* doe mods leeed woUrniousiafif -. . Lft TM
over, and killed epee the spot. Tbe T rweeofees al4 wmo
i dreadful spectacle!