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Are there not similar reasons produces effects precisely the re verse, by introducing the indiscri minate use of the term Christian, without regard either to personal profession, or character?

for the continuance of this practice, which existed for its first adoption? will it not, if applied to adults as a profession of their faith, suggest the like powerful motives To the perpetuity of baptism, to reflection, and to the formation the declaration of the apostle Paul, of good and stable resolutions? that he "was not sent to baptize and is it not likely that assemblies, but to preach the gospel," has whose views of christianity in ge. been urged as an objection; but neral, and of this ordinance in have we not equal reason to infer, particular, are rational and con- from the exhortation of Christ, sistent, would experience the pro- "labour not for the meat which motion of the habits of serious- perisheth, &c." that we should ness, order, unanimity and useful entirely neglect to provide for our discipline, by the application of corporeal wants, and apply our the solemn rite of baptism to seri- minds solely to religious contem ous believers alone, as the general plations? mode of receiving them into their body?

Is there not reason to believe,that the indiscriminate use of the Would not its observance con- term baptism, with respect to the stitute a suitable introduction to very different actions of immersion the other christian ordinance? and and sprinkling, and its indiscrimi is not the regular use of these two nate application, to persons of all ordinances, an important means ages, in sickness as well as in health, of keeping up and promoting the have gone hand in hand with each profession of christianity? do they other, and that both originated not furnish at once a proper in superstitious ideas relative to foundation and stimulant to the the saving influence of the rite, exercise of those branches of disci- independently of its natural effects pline, which relate more immedi- on the minds of the professors? ately to moral conduct? The As immersion is allowed by the circumstance of occasional or even concession of many of the more liof stated attendance at a place of beral ofthose, who have nevertheless worship, is of itself no proper evi- adopted the practice of sprinkling, dence of the profession of christian. to have been the original mode of ity; but if there be no mode of baptism, and the more appropri distinguishing between him who ate signification of the term," does adopt that sacred professsion, and him who does not, what foun. dation can there be for proceeding to farther acts of Christian discipline?

Is there not reason to believe, that as the baptism of adults, in token of their Christian faith and obedience, tends to the promotion of useful discipline, so the practice of infant sprinkling, too cften

VOL. VII.

which is farther confirmed by the uniform practice of the Greek churches; and as this mode is unexceptionable, with respect to persons possessing health and vi

* See quotations to this effect from the works of Tillotson, Burnet and Whitby, in Foot's Practical Discourse on Calmet's Diction. Art. Bapt. Robinson's e: as likewise Bapt. p. 10-12, note Hist. of Bapt. p. 499, &c.

E

"Nolo Episcopari.”

SIR,

Ditchlings
Nov. 15, 1811.

gour, but liable to serious objec. tions, in its application to infants, and to the sickly and infirm; is it not probable from this circum. In that useful little book, the stance that it was instituted with Protestant Dissenter's Catechism, the view to the former only? and by Mr. S. Palmer, at page 34, is not this conclusion much more 2d ed. in a note, I find the folhonourable to christianity, much lowing sentence: "Though it is more agreeable to the character well known that the office (of a of its founder, than the suppositi bishop) is a very desirable one, on, that it was intended to sub- and is generally sought after with ject the unconscious infant to great eagerness, the bishop elect obligations, concerning which he solemnly declares against having could have no knowledge nor used any undue means to obtain choice of his own? and that it it, saying, Nolo Episcopari, i. e. should seem to avail itself of the I am unwilling to be a bishop." bias which might be produced in its favour, from the apprehensions of approaching dissolution, to increase the number of its profess

ors?

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In Jacob's Law Dictionary, 28 ed., under the word Bishop, I have found the following quotation: "Mr Christian, in his notes on 1 Comm. 380, says, that the supDoes not the moral purificati- posed answer of a bishop on his on, which is promoted by christi- consecration, Nolo Episcopari, anity. result chiefly from that in is a vulgar error." As these au timate union between the views of thorities are contradictory to each mortality and of immortality, other, one must be incorrect. If which it produces ? and is not this any of your Correspondents will significantly expressed by being be kind enough to inform me on as it were buried in, and rising which side the error lies, I shall again out of the water? whereas feel myself much obliged; and aspersion, while it conveys a much perhaps it may be useful to others. less emphatic idea of purification itself, bears no analogy whatever to the means by which it is pro duced.

Should not submission to this ordinance at a suitable season, and in suitable circumstances, be regarded as a valuable privilege, whereby every individual who is capable of it, is in turn enabled to make an open and solemn avowal of his faith and good reso. lutions, and not as a painful duty, to be undertaken with reluctance, a yoke which can with difficul. ty be endured?"* P. * See some valuable remarks relative to the subject of the above queries, in

A. B..

A Collection of Facts relating to
Criminal Law.

"What a lamentable case it is that
so many Christian men and women
should be strangled on that cursed tree of
field a man might see together all the
the gallows; insomuch as if in a large
Christians that but in one year come to
that untimely and ignominious death,
if there were any spark of grace or cha-
bleed for pity and compassion."
rity in him, it would make his heart to

Lord Coke.
Institute.

Epilogue to his Third

the Preface to Robinson's Hist. of Baptism, and in p. 47-49 and various other parts of that important work.

"The state of every king consists more assuredly in the love of the subject towards their prince, than in the dread of laws made with rigorous pains; and laws made for the preservation of the commonwealth without great penalties are more often obeyed and kept, than laws made with extreme punishments." 1 Mar. st. I. c. I. "It is a melancholy truth, that among the variety of actions which men are daily liable to commit, no less than an hundred and sixty have been declared by act of Parliament to be felonies with out benefit of clergy; or, in other words, to be worthy of instant death.

lected that we err with such men (not to allude to a bright constellation of living philanthropists,) as Sir Thomas More, Erasmus, Beccaria, Montesquieu; Johnson, Franklin, Blackstone, Paley, Pitt and Fox.

We ought, perhaps, to acknow. ledge that we were incited to enter upon this discussion by the perusal of Mr. Montagu's volumes, On the Punishment of Death;" we shall be satisfied if we be reckdreadful a list, instead of diminishing, oned amongst his feeblest coadincreases the number of offenders. The jutors, in his labours of charity and injured, through compassion, will often

So

66

forbear to prosecute: juries, through mercy. compassion, will sometimes forget their

Our plan is to lay down Prooaths, and either acquit the guilty or positions relating to criminal law, mitigate the nature of the offence: and and to adduce under each such judges, through compassion, will respite

one half of the convicts, and recommend authorized facts as prove, illustrate them to the royal mercy. Among so er enforce it. When any additi. many chances of escaping, the needy and onal facts occur to us, we shall hardened offender overlooks the multi- return to propositions which may tude that suffer; he boldly engages in have been already gone over; for some desperate attempt, to relieve his wants or supply his vices; and, if unex- this purpose the propositions will pectedly the hand of justice overtakes be numbered. We need not add him, he deems himself peculiarly unfor- that we rely upon our correspon tunate, in falling at last a sacrifice to dents for assistance in the prose those laws, which long impunity has taught him to contemn.' cution of our object.

Proposition I.

The frequency and number of Capital Punishments in England, degrade the English character in the eyes of Foreigners.

Blackstone, B. iv. ch. 1. There is no one subject on which wise and good men are so generally agreed as on the propriety of reducing the criminal law of a state to the standard of justice; "When Mirabeau was in Engand almost every writer on the land, he asked a friend of mine subject has pronounced the crimi. with whom he was dining, if it nal law of England to be singular. were true that twenty young men ly imperfect, and to stand in great had been hanged that morning, need of melioration. We shall at Newgate? Upon being answertherefore make no apology for ed, that if the daily papers asserted bringing this topic into discussion: it, there was no reason to doubt if indeed the facts we have to ex- the assertion; he replied, with hibit do not carry the reader's great warmth and surprize, 'The convictions along with us, apolo- English are the most merciless gies would be useless: though we people I ever heard or read of in shall not perhaps be much blamed my life.' even by those, if any there be, that think we err, when it is recol.

"It appears that Mirabeau was in England in 1785. In February

Wakefield's Life, v. i. p. 311. "It is said by those who know Europe generally, that there are more thefts committed and punished annually in England, than in all the other nations put together. If this be so, there must be a cause or causes for such depravity in our common people. May not one be, the deficiency of justice and morality in our national govern ment, manifested in our oppressive conduct to subjects and unjust wars on our neighbours ?"

Proposition II.

Severe laws restrain humane men from prosecuting offenders. "Some years ago, an act was pas sed in Ireland, by which it was made

An

of that year, Twenty convicts were executed, at once, before New. gate; in April, Nineteen; and in the November foilowing, Eighteen suffered death at the same place, besides others executed during a capital felony to cut down a tree the several months of that year, by day or by night. A gentleman amounting in the whole to nearly who dedicated much of his proOne Hundred, many of them young perty, and most of his time, to persons, who fell a sacrifice to the agricultural improvements; who severity of the penal statutes, in had planted much, and was much London alone-not one of them attached to his plantations, was under a charge of murder." the first to rejoice at this additionalsecurity to his property, and having, before the act passed, suffered much from these depredations, he again and again declared that in the event of detecting any offender, the law should be put in force. An occasion soon occurred. offender was detected in the very act of destroying his plantations; and was committed for trial at the ensuing assizes. I well knew what my friend endured upon that occa sion. I had the happiness of his friendship and the honour of his confidence: he was a man of the highest worth and of undaunted public spirit; he never relaxed in 66 England, contenting herself his resolution to enforce the law; he with the superior wisdom, hu. prepared to proceed and did pro manity and justice of her laws in ceed to the assize town; but there all repects but one, and too fond of his fortitude at last failed: he the ancient order of things,' has declared that after the most agoalone remained stationary. The nizing deliberation, he could not nation, indeed, is fully sensible of reconcile to his notions of justice the evil which attends a multitude the propriety of being the cause of of sanguinary laws, and the go- an untimely death of a fellow vernment itself begins to be alarm- creature for having cut down a ed with the magnitude of the mis- tree. My worthy friend afterchief. Judge Blackstone was wards stated to me, that, great as active in prosecuting a reform; he considered the injury to society and Lord Ashburton, it is said, in suffering the criminal to escape was prevented by his death from with impunity, yet he could not bringing forward in Parliament a be instrumental in procuring his plan for that purpose." condemnation, even though the Bradford's Enquiry into the crown might remit the puPunishment of Death, p. 31. nishment. Such was the mode in

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Dr. Franklin's Letter to B. Vaughan, Esq. March 14, 1785. Works. 8vo. ii. 445.

which a man, far above the weaknesses likely in most cases to interfere, decided."

painful struggles between the sense of private and of public duties; and three times dreading the severiSir J. Newport's Speech on Sir ty of our law, I have yielded to my S. Romilly's Bill, May 2, 1810. humanity conspiring with my rea "It happened to me, my lords, son, when they forbad me without about four or five years since, to real necessity, to shed the blood leave my house in town for the even of the unrighteous. One of purpose of going into the country. the offenders, after leaving my An old and faithful servant was family ventured upon other crimes left in care of it till my return. in other places-a second by my In about four or five days, I came suggestion entered into the army. to town again, and found, to my I have not been able to trace the surprize, that my servant had fled conduct or the fate of the thirdduring my absence, carrying off But under a deep conviction of mywith her a considerable quantity responsibility to the tribunal of of plate and other property. Now, heaven, I shall ever look back with my lords, there were many causes approbation to my own forbear. which operated with me to abstain ance." from prosecuting this unfortunate woman. She was aged, and the tris Varvicensis, ii. 402, 403. course of nature had already "About five years since, the

Characters of Fox, by Philopa

marked her by many infirmities county of York was deeply inte for a speedy but natural dissoluti- rested in the trial of the father of -on-she had been the dupe of a a large family, who when living designing villain, who instigated in the greatest respectability, was her to the theft-she was friendless accused of highway robbery. The and she was poor. My lords, trial was in York Castle; the propublic duty pointed out the course secutor was a youth of about 20 I ought to take. I knew I ought years of age, the son of a banker, immediately to go before a magis. and the prisoner a stout athletic trate, who would have committed her for trial-I must have appeared in a court of justice, as the prosecutor against her, and have embittered my own life by the consciousness of having shortened her's. My lords, humanity triumphed over justice and public duty. I was constrained to turn loose upon the public an individual cer. tainly deserving of punishment, because the law of the land gave me no opportunity of visiting her with a castigation short of death." Earl of Suffolk's Speech in the House of Lords, May 30, 1810. "Three times, let me confess, I have myself suffered the most

man, of 50. The prosecutor had transacted his business as usual at the market-town; he had received several sums of money in the presence of the prisoner, had dined, and about 5 o'clock had set out on his return home: it was a fine evening in summer, and he rode gently on in a solitary lane, he was overtaken by the prisoner, who seized him and demanded his pocket-book; in the first agony of surprize and fear, the prosecutor gave him a violent blow with his whip; but the prisoner, who was a very powerful man, dragged him from his horse, knelt down upon him and took from him his money

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