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How to discriminate between these two classes.

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How the criminal class should be. regarded.

our reproach, and whose disposal presents the problem which has so long haffled and perplexed us. The other class-the professional criminals-who form, it is calculated, nine-tenths of the entire number -belong to a different category, are acted upon in a great measure by other influences, and must be dealt with in a different manner. They are brought up to crime; they follow it as an avocation; they practise it regularly for a livelihood'; it furnishes their daily bread; it is to them a profession with its regular steps, in which petty larceny is the lowest grade, and burglary the culminating honour. These offenders constitute that CRIMINAL POPULATION-which can only exist in communities whose condensation is great, and whose civilization is complex-whose existence forms our present difficulty and danger-whose treatment and disposal form our present task. To this class, therefore, the following remarks will distinctively, if not exclusively apply.

And here we are met by the first practical question we have to decide:-viz., how are we to discern and determine to which of the two classes any given culprit belongs? This can be done by one of two methods, or by a combination of the two. It is obvious that the nature of the crime can be no test. A casual offender may be detected in his first offence, and that offence may be a very heinous one. A professional and regular criminal may, after a long course of successful depredations, be detected at last only in pilfering a handkerchief or snatching a purse. But we may either decide each case on such evidence as can be produced in Court, or we may adopt some rough rule which shall err on the safe side, and which, though often inadequate, shall never be unjust. We may either, after conviction, accept evidence of the antecedents of the criminal, his haunts, his associates, his habits of life, &c., which shall satisfy the judge and jury that he belongs to the criminal class, and which usually would not be difficult to procure, nor be liable to reasonable suspicion. Or we may, without any possible risk of harshness to the culprit, but with an absolute certainty of allowing numbers of regular offenders to escape, decide that a previous conviction shall in all cases be taken as proof that the subject of it belongs to the criminal population. The circumstance of coming a second time before the bar of justice affords an irrefutable pre sumption, either that the man has such inability to resist temptation or such proclivity to crime that he either is, or is certain to become, an habitual offender; or that his first imprisonment has produced its usual consequences, and either fostered his proficiency in crime or deprived him of all avenue to an honest livelihood; or that he is an established member of the fraternity that lives by depredation. It would seem desirable to adopt both tests; to accept any reliable evidence in proof of the offenders belonging to the criminal class, and at the same time to regard a previous conviction as

superseding the necessity of any other proof.

It will wonderfully simplify our course of action to adopt a clear and persistent idea of the light in which regular criminals should be regarded by the State. In the first place, then, they are xor objects of vengeance. The State is not competent to take vengeance. Vengeance-that is, retributive infliction-is the weakness of the savage; the privilege of the Deity. The State is not competent to apportion punishment to individual guilt; simply because it can never be competent to judge either the degree of guilt incurred, or the severity of the punishment inflicted. As to moral criminality, with the inadequate means at our disposal for discerning motives, guaging temptation, and estimating antecedents, it is obvious that the most patient jury can never collect half the materials for arriving at a confident decision, nor can the wisest judge hope to do more than form a plausible conjecture. Moreover, the same penalty which to one culprit would be too lenient for a theft, may, to a differently organized offender, be too severe almost for a murder. Vengeance, which repays, can, by its very term, belong only to that higher Intelligence which can estimate aright the debt to be repaid, and the value of the coin assigned for repayment.

In the next place, criminals are not to be regarded by the State as objects of compassion,—as patients to be cured, as unfortunates to be pitied and rescued,—as "weak brethren," to be petted, and guided, and

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taken by the hand. They may be all this: probably many of them are; and it may be quite right that they should be thus viewed and treated by individual members of the society they have outraged and pilfered. But the State has a very different relation towards them. It is neither a chaplain nor a schoolmaster,—except incidentally, and with a view to an ulterior and more selfish object. Its function is neither to regenerate offenders nor to forgive offences.

pacitated.

Society-or the State, which is its organ-has only one concern with the criminal class, only one light in which to view them. They are its focs and spoilers. They live in a state of chronic hostility to all that is pure, valuable, and peaceable within it. They assail its members and Simply as enemies prey upon its possessions. They are the enemies of society, and society to be guarded has nothing to do but to protect itself against them. that retributive punishment, allotted after some rude conjectural fashion

It is possible enough against, and inca of its own, or schemes of reformation and education carried out according to the best system we can devise, may be found the most effectual means of affording society the protection it seeks. But this is by the way. The principle to be laid down as the basis and justification of all our proceedings is, that society has in this matter one object only to pursue, and in pursuit of it may discard all extraneous considerations. It has to protect itself against crime and it may do this in any mode which, in its wisdom, it shall deem efficacious; which, in its justice, it shall deem right; which, in its strength, it shall find feasible; which its feelings of mercy and humanity shall allow. It has to defend itself against its criminal inter- necine foes; and it must do this in the wisest, and completest, and most permanent manner,

enemies.

Now, what plan has been usually pursued for the attainment of this What society has object? In our endeavour rudely to proportion the punishment to the been in the habit of offence, we have sentenced far the largest proportion of our offenders doing with these to short terms of imprisonment. Out of 100,000 convicted, 50,000 are confined for less than one month, and 20,000 of those for less than fourteen days. Yet it is notorious that short imprisonments always send out the culprit worse than they found him-certain to resort to crime—almost certain to return to gaol. It is known that those once engaged in a criminal career can scarcely, by any possibility, under the present system, avoid relapsing immediately on liberation, even if their life in prison had created a desire to do so. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred all openings to a virtuous course are closed to them, and their vicious associates are always waiting for them. Their first (detected) crime makes subsequent crime inevitable; their first punishment may be said to be life-long. though intermittent. The fact that they come from gaol shuts the door of the family, the workshop, and of the factory against them; the same fact, on the contrary, is a diploma for the career of theft; a life of larceny alone welcomes them and beckons to them: as things now are, their only choice usually lies between starvation and relapse.

It is known, further, that very few indeed of the criminal population become criminals from want; nearly all are trained to theft from child- hood. Comparatively few, moreover, become thieves in later life; almost all have been "juvenile delinquents" before becoming hardened malefactors. Finally, we know that nearly every adult criminal-usually when in prison, always when out of it-is busy in training other and younger sinners. Among the convict classes, "the schoolmaster" is always " abroad.”

It clearly follows from these facts, that we have habitually so acted as to defeat what is, or ought to be, our sole object. Having once got hold of our "enemy," we have secured his being our enemy for life. So far from permanently protecting ourselves against his enmity, we have ensured our continuous exposure to it. We find him warring against us and preying upon us; and we forthwith proceed to confirm him in his hostility, and to improve his skill; we leave him no alternative but a continuance of his depredations; and we then turn him forth to wreak the one and to renew the other.

What society

This has been our suicidal course-followed in the absence of a distinct object and an intelligible principle. What, however, ought we to do, should have done now that our object is defined to be the permanent protection of the with these enemies.

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