feaman. If the trade would fuffer without his fervice, it is able and ought to be willing to offer him fuch wages as may induce him to afford his fervice voluntarily.* Page 159 "Private mifchief must be borne with pa"tience, for preventing a national calamity."-Where is this maxim in law and good policy to be found? And how can that be a maxim which is not confiftent with common fenfe? If the maxim had been, that private mischiefs, which prevent a national calamity, ought to be generously compenfated by the nation, one might understand it but that fuch private mifchiefs are only to be borne with patience, is abfurd! Ib. "The expedient, &c. And, &c." (Paragraphs 2 and 3.)-Twenty ineffectual or inconvenient fchemes will not juftify one that is unjaft. Ib. "Upon the foot of, &c."--Your reafoning, indeed, like a lie, ftands but upon one foot; truth upon two. Page 160. "Full wages."-Probably the fame they had in the merchant's fervice. Page 1743 "I hardly admit, &c." (Paragraph 5)— When this author fpeaks of impreffing, page 158, he diminishes the horror of the practice as much as poffible, by prefenting to the mind one failor only fuffering hardship (as he tenderly calls it) in fome particular cafes only: and he places against this private mifchief the inconvenience to the trade of the kingdom.-But if, as he fuppofes is often the cafe, the failor who is preffed, and obliged to ferve for the defence of trade, at the rate of twenty-five fhillings a month, could get three pounds fifteen fhillings in the merchant's fervice, you take from him fifty fhillings a month; and if you have a 100,000 in your fervice, you rob this honest induftrious part of fociety, and their poor families of 250,cool. per month, or three millions a year, and at the fame time oblige them to hazard their lives in fighting for the defence of your trade; to the defence of which all ought indeed to contribute (and failors among the reft) in proportion to their profits by it; but this three millions is more than their fhare, if they did not pay with their perfons; but when you force that, methinks you should excufe the other. But it may be fold, to give the king's feamen merchant's wages would cof the nation too much, and call for more tax s The question then will amount to this: whether it be just in a community, that the richer part fhould compel the poorer to fight in defence of them and their properties, for fuch wages as they think fit to allow, and punish them if they refufe? Our author tells us that it is " legal." I have not 'aw e.ough to difpute his authorities, but I cannot perfuad- myif that it is equitable. I will, however, own for the prefent, that it may be lawful when neceffary; but then I contend that it may be used fo as to produce the fame good effects-the public fecurity, without doing fo much intolerable injuftice as attends the impreffing common feamen. In order to be better understood, I would premise too things; Firft that voluntary feamen may be had for the fervice, if they were fufficiently paid. The proof is, that to ferve in the fame fhip, and incur the fame dangers, you have no occasion to imprefs captains, lieutenants, fecond lieutenants, midshipmen, purfers, nor many other officers. Why, but that the profits of their places, or the emolu ments expected, are fufficient inducements? The business then is, to find money, by impreffing, fufficient to make the failors all volunteers, as well as their officers: and this without any fresh burthen upon trade.-The fecond of my premises is, that twenty-five fhillings a month, with his fhare of falt beef, pork, and peafe-pudding, being found fufficient for the fubfiftence of a hard-working feaman, it will certainly be fo for a fedentary fcholar or gentleman. I would then propofe to form a treafury, out of which encouragements to feamen fhould be paid. To fill this treafury, I would imprefs a number of civil officers, who at prefent have great falaries, oblige them to ferve in their refpective offices for twenty-five faillings a month with their fhares of mefs provifions, and throw the rest of their falaries into the feamen's treafury. If fuch a prefs-warrant were given me to execute, the first I would prefs fhould be a Recorder of Bristol, or a Mr. Juftice Fofter, because I might have need of his edifying example, to show how much impreffing ought to be borne with; for he would certainly find, that though to be reduced to twenty-five hillings a month might be a private mifchief, yet that, agree ably to his maxim of law and good policy, it ought to be borne with batience, for preventing a national calamity. Then I would prefs the reft of the Judges; and, opening the red book, I would prefs every civil officer of government from 50l. a year falary, up to 50,000l. which would throw an immenfe fum into our treasury: and these gentlemen could not complain, fince they would receive twenty-five fhillings a month, and their rations; and this without being obliged to fight. Laftly, I think I would impress * * * *. ON THE CRIMINAL LAWS, AND THE PRACTICE OF PRIVATEERING. LETTER TO BENJAMIN VAUGHAN, ESQ. MY DEAR FRIEND, March 14th, 1785. AMONG MONG the pamphlets you lately fent me, was one, entitled, Thoughts on Executive Justice. In return for that, I fend you one on the fame fubject, Obfervations concernant l'Exécution de Article II. de la Déclaration fur le Vol. They are both addressed to the Judges, and written, as you will fee, in a very different fpirit. The Englifh author is for hanging all thieves. The Frenchman is for proportioning punishments to offences. If we really believe. as we profefs to believe, that the law of Mofes was the law of God, the dictate of divine wisdom, infinitely fuperior to hunian; on what principles do we ordain death as the punishment of an offence, which, according to that law, was only to be punished by a restitution of four-fold? To put a man to death for an offence which does not deferve death, is it not a murder? And, as the French writer fays, Doit-on punir un délit contre la focieté par un crime centre la nature? Superfluous property is the creature of fociety. Simple and mild laws were fufficient to guard the property that was merely neceffary. The favages' bow, his hatchet, and his coat of fkins, were fufficiently fecured, without law, by the fear of perfonal refentment and retaliation. When, by virtue of the first laws, part of the fociety accumulated wealth and grew powerful, they enacted others more fevere, and would protect their property at the expence of humanity. This was abufing their power, and commencing a tyranny. If a favage, before he entered into fociety, had been told-" Your neighbour by this means, may become owner of an hundred deer; but if your brother, or your fon, or yourself, having no deer of your own, and being hungary, fhould kill one, an infamous death must be the confequence" he would probably have preferred his liberty, and his common right of killing any deer, to all the advantages of fociety that might be proposed to him. That it is better a hundred guilty perfons fhould efcape, than that one innocent person should suffer, is a maxim that has been long and generally approved; never, that I know of, controverted. Even the fanguinary author of the thoughts agrees to it, adding well, that the very thought of injured innocence, and much more that of Suffering innocence, muft awaken all our tenderest and most compaffionate feelings, and at the same time raise our highest indignation against the inftruments of it. But," he adds, "there is no danger of either, from a ftri& adherance to the laws." -Really!Is it then impoffible to make an unjust law? and if the law itfelf be unjuft, may it not be the very "inftrument" which ought to raise the author's, and every body's highest indignation ?" I fee, in the last newspapers from London, that a woman is capitally convicted at the Old Bailey, for privately stealing out of a fhop fome gauze, value fourteen fhillings and three-pence: Is their any proportion between the injury done by a theft value fourteen fhillings and three-pence, and the punishment of a human creature, by death, on a gibit? Might not that woman, by her labour, have made the reparation ordained by God, in paying fourfold? Is not all punishment inflicted beyond the merit of the offence, fo much punishment of innocence ? In this light, how vaft is the annually quantity, of not only injured but fuffering innocence, in almost all the civilized ftates of Europe! But it feems to have been thought that this kind of innocence may be punished by way of preventing crimes. I have read, indeed, of a cruel Turk in Barbary, who, when Man, ever he bought a new Chriflian flave, ordered him immedi ately to be hung up by the legs, and to receive a hundred blows of a cudgel on the foles of his feet, that the fevere fenfe of the punishment, and fear of incurring it thereafter, might prevent the faults that fhould merit it. Our author himself would hardly approve entirely of this Turk's conduct in the government of flaves; and yet he appears to recommend fomething like it for the government of English fubjects, when he applauds the reply of Judge Burnet to the convict horfe-ftealer; who being asked what he had to fay why judgement of death fhould not pafs against him, and anfwering, that it was hard to hang a man for only ftealing a horfe, was told by the judge, thou art not to be hanged only for ftealing a horse, but that horfes may not be ftolen." The man's anfwer, if candidly examined, will, I imagine, appear reasonable, as being founded on the eternal principle of juftice and equity, that punishments fhould be proportioned to offences, and the judge's reply brutal and unreafonable, though the writer "wishes all judges to carry it with them whenever they go to the circuit, and to bear it in their minds, as contaming a wife reason for all the penal ftatutes which they are called upon to put in execution. It at once il uftrates (fays he) the true grounds and reafons of all capital punishments whatsoever, namely, that every man's property, as well as his life, may be held facred and inviolate." Is there then no difference in value between property and life? If I think it right that the crime of murder should be punished with death, not only as an equal punishment of the crime, but to prevent other murders, does it follow that I must approve of the fame punishment for a little invafion on my property by theft? If I am not myfelf fo barbarous, fo bloody-minded, and revengeful, as to kill a fellow-crea ture for stealing from me fourteen-fhillings and three-pence, how can I approve of a law that does it? Montefquieu, who was himself a Judge, endeavours to impress other maxims. He must have known what humane judges feel on fuch occafions, and what the effects of thofe feelings; and, fo far from thinking that fevere and exceffive punishments prevent crimes, he afferts, as quoted by our French writer, that |