DR. DODD.

YESTERDAY was presented to the Secretary of State by Earl PERCY, a Petition in Favour of Dr. Dodd, signed by Twenty-three Thousand Hands. On this Occasion it is natural to confider,

That in all Communities penal Laws have been relaxed
as particular Reafons have emerged :

That a Life eminently beneficent, a single Action eminently good, or even the Power of being useful to the Public, have been sufficient to protect the Life of a De linquent :

That no Arbiter of Life and Death has ever been cen- fured for granting the Life of a Criminal to honeſt and powerful Solicitation :

That the Man for whom a Nation petitions muſt be prefumed to have Merit uncommon in Kind or in Degree; for however the Mode of collecting Subſcriptions, or the Right of Judgment exerciſed by the Subſcribers, may be open to Difpute, it is at laſt plain that ſomething is done for this Man, that was never done for any other; and Government, which muſt proceed upon general Views, may rationally conclude that this Man is ſomething better than other Offenders have been, or has done ſomething more than others have done :

That though the People cannot judge of the Admini- ftration of Juitice ſo well as their Governors, yet their Voice has always been regarded :

That this is a Cafe in which the Petitioners determine againſt their own Intererſ; thoſe for whole Protection the Law was made, intreat its Relaxation, and our Governors cannot be charged with the Conſequences which the People bring upon themselves :

That as this is a Cafe without Example, it will pro- bably be without Conſequences, and many Ages will elapſe before ſuch a Crime is again committed by ſuch a Man :

That though Life be ſpared, Juitice may be ſatisfied with Ruin, Imprifonment, Exile, Infamy and Penury :

That if the People now commit an Error, their Error is on the Part of Mercy; and that perhaps Hiftory cannot ſhow a Time in which the Life of a Criminal, guilty of nothing above Fraud, was refused to the Cry of Nations, to the joint Supplication of Three and Twenty Thousand Petitioners.