The Life of William Roscoe
Chapter XVI. 1819
William Roscoe to Sir James Mackintosh, [1823]
“Although it is a very long time indeed since I had the
pleasure of your society, and that only for a very short period, yet your track
has been too public and too intimately connected with the advancement of
civilisation to allow me to lose sight of you; to which I cannot refrain from
adding, that there is also an unbroken link in the affectionate respect and
attachment which you and I entertain in common for the memory of a most dear
and lamented friend; which, if this intrusion stood more in want of apology
than I trust you will think it does, would itself be sufficient for that
purpose. I suspect, however, that this long introduction is more gratifying to
my own feelings than necessary to recommend the subject of my letter, which, I
well know, cannot of itself fail to attract as much of your attention as it may
be in your power to bestow upon it. Conceiving, then, that in the approaching
session of parliament you will again take the lead in bringing for-![]()
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wards such measures as seem necessary for the improvement
of our criminal law, I have taken the liberty of submitting to your inspection
a tract which I have just published, under the title of ‘Additional Observations on Penal
Jurisprudence,’ which are in part intended as an answer to an
article in the Edinburgh Review
for February last, but which also relate to the punishment of criminals, and
the treatment of prisoners both in this country and America, and endeavour to
ascertain the true principles by which we should be guided with respect to it.
It appears to me, from the facts and publications which have come to my
knowledge on both sides the Atlantic, that the philanthropic spirit, which, for
some years past, has been employed in improving the condition of the most
wretched portions of our fellow-creatures, has greatly declined, or has been
put down by an opposite body, who have lately risen up in great force, and with
unblushing front have endeavoured to recal the enormities of past ages, and to
resort, for the reformation of their own species, to punishments of the most
brutal and degrading kind. You will perceive I allude to the fashionable
punishments of the tread-wheel in this country, and that of solitary
confinement, already established in some of the American States, and rapidly
extending itself over the rest.
“In this emergency I have not been able to ![]()
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remain silent, although I can by no means flatter myself
with the hope of producing any impression on the public mind, which seems, in
every quarter where I have had an opportunity of judging of it, to be fully
made up to the most vindictive, severe, and unprofitable kinds of punishment
that human invention can devise. If, however, I could hope to suggest an
additional argument on this subject, in opposition to a system which I hold in
inexpressible abhorrence, I should not regret the time and thought I have
employed upon it, and it is with this view I have intruded on a few of my
friends, who, I know, feel an interest in every thing which tends to the
extinction of crime and the mitigation of suffering, with a copy of my tract.
Among these you stand too eminently conspicuous to escape the trouble I give
you, as well by my pamphlet as by this long epistle, which may at least serve
to assure you,” &c.
