Morning journal and courier., 1885-01-19
RESPECT FOR HUMAN LIFE.
Is Familiarity With Crime Leading tc
 a Moral MuddI?e

Is Familiarity with Crime Leading 10 a Moral MuddI2e
 From the London Spectator.]
 Is the respect for human life increasing in Europe? We suppose most men competent
 to give an opinion, and especially men famil- jar with social history, would reply that it
 was, and they would have much to say for ! themselves. Private war has entirely ceased brutal murders-especially murders on the | roads, which were once frightfully common have grown much fewer, and murders by orders of kings and persons in authority have entirely ceased. Napoleon could have a man killed quietly, but the Emperor Will liam could not. The laws in all western countries have become infinitely less cruel, patches of executions for petty offenses would no longer be tolerated, and the pun ishment of death is inflicted with extreme reluctance Not only does king like Hum bert of Italy sanction capital sentence with sort of personal pain, but grave and ex- perienced magistrate like M. Grevy, on most points the firmest of men, scarcely bring himself to sign death warrant, and only last week commuted the capital sentence on soldier who had outraged little girl and then dashed out her brains. A catastrophe involving great loss of life in most countries rouses kind of horror, and this even when the casualty has not resulted from human carelessness, while an increasing attention, sympathetic attention, is paid to the deaths of individuals. The whole tone of the Eu- ropean community has become perceptibly softer, and massacre calls up emotions which in the beginning of the century would have been thought either weak or sentimen tal Finally, in all countries, individual life is safer; and though that proceeds in part from better police organization, it must also be due, in part at all events, to decline in Ii f a1oo playing new aversion to kill These are undeniable facts, and they would seem con elusive but that there are also facts upon the
 other side, which lead either to an opposite impression, st all events to doubt wheth- CT the improved chance of living may not Le
 attributed to causes other than increased be- lief in the sacredness of human life. There is increased softness; but do we owe it to decrease in ferocity or to decrease in forti-
 tude or have both diminutions gone on to- gether? We do nos find, either on the conti-
 nent or in England, that the horror of 8 du- elist increases. The custom of dueling is
 dead here, it is true, beaten down by varie- ty of causes; but it rages increasingly upon the continent, spreading downward, we are
 told to lower and lower strata, while oven
 here few men would object to associate with
 the duelist who had killed his man, while
 many would reject the acquaintance of the
 man who, when called on abroad to kill, had
 steadily refused. We doubt if the dislike of
 war has not declined, if pity has not turned
 rather to the wounded than the killed, and
 are certain that the killing in war of black,
 brown or yellow persons is less thought of
 than it was. Statements are made every
 week in France about occurrences in Ton
 quin which would have crazed the old -hu-
 manitarians but are now received in silence.
 Everywhere we fear, the horror of political
 assassination has declined until respectable
 men read the trial of the anarchists now go-
 ing on in Leipsic with feeling that it is a
 political trial, and almost forget that an em- peror Is a man and a brother, and that kill
 ing him IS as much murder as if he were
 street sweeper. There is plenty of horror of
 the anarchist, but it is because he seeks an
 archy, and not because he sheds human
 blood. We all know how kind of worship of dynamite, as an effective instrument for
 killing the innocent, has spread in limited
 class, and we do not see in it's old fullness
 the hatred of such criminals merely as au-
 thors of slaughter. In Italy all men tell us
 that revengeful murder excites certain sym
 pathy, which again has been shown, with di- |
 rect and proyable injury to the tone of Pari-
 sian character, toward Mime. Clovis-Hugues. l
 Journals in Paris are justifying the killing of |
 Morin, as if @ criminals life were exactly | like 8 tigers. Even in England we have this | week seen men convicted of murder and can l nibalism on evidence so clear that it was un- | disputed, not only reprieved from the gal lows, but allowed by the Home secretary to | satisfy justice by simple detention for six I months, and the majority of the public ap- prove 8 decision which is morally equivalent