It may justly be demanded of the essayist that he shall give some small
thought to the question of corporal punishment by means of the “cat,”
and “ground-ash.” We have given the subject the most elaborate
attention; we have written page after page upon it. Day and night we
have toiled and perspired over that distressing problem. Through
Summer’s sun and Winter’s snow, with all unfaltering purpose, we have
strung miles of ink upon acres of paper, weaving wisdom into eloquence
with the tireless industry of a silkworm fashioning his cocoon. We have
refused food, scorned sleep, and endured thirst to see our work grow
beneath our cunning hand. The more we wrote the wiser we became; the
opinions of one day were rejected the next; the blind surmising of
yesterday ripened into the full knowledge of to-day, and this matured
into the superhuman omniscience of this evening. We have finally got so
infernally clever that we have abandoned the original design of our
great work, and determined to make it a compendium of everything that
is accurately known up to date, and the bearing of this upon flogging
in general.
To other, and inferior, writers it is most fortunate that our design
has taken so wide a scope. These can go on with their perennial wrangle
over the petty question of penal and educational flagellation, while we
grapple with the higher problem, and unfold the broader philosophy of
an universal walloping.