The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1877-07-21

pect to behold the Eternal Judge, on the great
accounting-day, dealing justice and Judgment
TO his creatures, according TO their deserts IN
this moral life. They say let society by all
means guard itself from any repetition OF the
bloody deed of the murderer, by holding
him in bondage until death but let not society
arrogate to itself tie prerogatiVe if the Eternal
Judge, by taking away life, that mysterious
gift of the Almighty Creator of mankind,
which He seemed to respect Himself in the
case of the first murderer on record in Holy
Writ, whose life He spared, while He placed
the murderer under a ban but nevertheless,
threatened the slayer of that banned murderer
with sevenfold vengeance at the hands OF the
Maker of Men, and their Eternal Judge. For
those who believe in Holy Writ, the case of
Cain is conclusive-God threatening with his
vengeance those who lift their hand against
the life of the murderer. IF capital punish
ment has since prevailed, it is because Holy
Writ has lost its influence over the minds of
the children of mortality.
Writing, az we do, in this interesting diVi-
sion of the christian world, where the sublime
truths of Holy Writ have been so recently
introduced with such happy results amongst
a once heather and benighted race of savages,
we are struck by a fact which must always
give rise to a significant suggestion, when
sentence of capital punishment is about to be
executed upon any miserable human being.
OF the first christians of Hawaii mel,
how many had been murderers. in the times
of their heather benightment? In reading
with thrilling interest the book of the eloquent
historian of the Hawaiian Protestant Missions,
m " IT, r.. = ca1,o-fl- 4afaA onH
the wonderful mercy Of God in calling even
murderers to clothe themselves with the white
garment of His invited guests in His Holy House
is a contant source of admiration for the
pious historiographer. The case of one Hawai-
ian savage, whose crimes were blacker than
those of the most dreadful murderer ever execu-
ted in any civilized country. and who became
a shining light in the earliest Hawaiian church,
ought surely to produce an impression upon
thinking minds in this community, and suggest
the query Is it not best after all to leave the
murderer in the hands Of God, and limit our
course to simply removing him from the
possibility of ever again committing murder,
by lifelong bondage? Looking back, through
the light of Holy Writ, to the first propagation
of the Gospel, does not the apostle Paul him
self avow that he was guilty of prosecuting the
first christians unto death? Does he not own
himself a murderer? Nevertheless, are not all
nations of the christian world indebted to
the inspired teaching of the once blood-thirsty
and numbering Saul.
In conclusion, we feel that we have discharged
a duty towards that class of human beings
and believing christians who conscientiously
shudder at capital punishment, as an invasion
of the prerogative of the Eternal Judge, by
giving expression to n widespread opinion in
the abstract, upon this subject. entirely pre-
SENDING from the circumstances, however afro
cious, which attended the heinous offence for
which a criminal now lies under sentence of
death in Oahu Jail.
For the present, We have not considered the
question of capital punishment in it's relation
to social or political economy but we do
not forget that a writer OF emlnence has asserted
that "the very worst use you can put a man
to is to hang him."