My work is done, and I am happy. The task which I have now finished is
of that unpleasant kind which few human beings have ever voluntarily
undertaken. It has led me through wide fields of blight, in which
scarcely a green thing has been left to smile. My path has been amidst
fragments of moral ruin, where serpents of corruption have lurked and
hissed. My canopy has been the beclouded past in which the sun, moon,
or stars are seldom seen. I have heard the voice of man, but it has
been in expressions of angry authority, or of uncompassionated
distress. I have seen "the human face divine," but it was either
transformed into cruelty, and sullen with a spirit of revenge, or
distorted with agony and fixed in despair. I have shivered under the
frost of death, and contemplated a thousand awful epitaphs on the
grave stones of the soul.
Of the volume which I am now bringing to a close, I can say in the
presence of my Creator, that I designed it as a sacrifice to
benevolence; and I have labored to render it an acceptable one. I have
plead the cause of the suffering sinner. I have opened to view his
dungeon; pointed to his fetters--his bleeding back--his neglected
sickness--his unheeded death. I have recorded facts; have argued from
the principles of humanity and religion; have plead, entreated,
exhorted, and prayed with christians to think of the captive, and
cheer his gloomy cell with the light of the gospel. What more can I
do? Nothing; and whatever may be the future sufferings of my brethren
in prison, I am innocent.
In the course of the volume I have advanced the following
opinions.--_In the present state of society, Penitentiaries cannot be
very useful as means of reformation.--Cruel discipline will harden the
sufferer, and nothing but goodness can ever win back a sinner to the
love and practice of virtue.--Prisoners are criminally neglected by
christians.--The loss of character is a calamity, from which the
universal sentiment of mankind admits of no redemption.--The conduct
of christians towards prisoners and repentant sinners, is directly
opposed to the law of God and the principles of their profession._
These and other truths, equally plain and important, are to be found
scattered through the book, and I submit them to the religious
consideration of all concerned.
In speaking of the "_Prison Discipline Society_," I have used pointed
language. Convinced that it is an _un_-benevolent society, laboring,
_conscientiously_, no doubt, to effect the good of community, but in a
way that will certainly multiply the evils it is aiming to cure, I
could not use any other than emphatic terms to express my
disapprobation of its measures. Already has it plunged the subjects of
its discipline into the gulf of a most horrid despotism, and should it
go successfully onward, its measures will spread over and carry
through all our penitentiaries, the unbroken gloom and unregarded
misery of the worst prisons in Europe.
In relation to christians and ministers, I have used language that is
capable of being perverted. I revere the christian who acts on the
pure principles of his profession, and such is an exception from the
remarks, which I wish to have applied to mere professors. I have found
many real christians during my intercourse with society, who have
cheered me in the house of my pilgrimage, and to them my gratitude is
bound by the strongest ties. And in the ministry there are many whom I
respect and love, and had all been such, the remarks which I have
applied to some of that profession would have been quite superfluous
and unmerited.
A remark which I have made in relation to Rev. E. K. A. may, if not
explained, be misunderstood. I meant not to vote with public opinion
against that suffering individual, but simply to state the fact, that
community had decided against him, with a view to illustrate an
inconsistency in the conduct of the persons under consideration. Mr.
A. has had a fair trial, and the jury of the country has cleared him.
With that verdict I am satisfied; and I consider that he is injured,
and the dignity of the laws insulted, by the attitude of the public,
and the conduct of many journals of the day. If the decision of a high
court is not final, where is the security of any man who happens to be
accused? Christianity is wounded by the conduct of Mr. A's opposers,
and they would feel the full force of their actions were they in his
place. Whether Mr. A. is guilty or not, I am silent. God knows.