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Untitled Article
details his professional career , though the impression is highly honourable to his character ; but , in the fifth and last , it some-, what revives , though in a different form , and adapted to a different taste , in tne survey of the moral qualities and religious feelings which developed themselves in his mind and heart , as he awaited ^ in his peaceful retirement , the summons to his last voyage . He died in his fifty-eighth year , his frame aged by sufferings , and his character matured in worth .
And such was the man whom court-martial justice , in all the promise of his youth—for his youth did plainly promise the excellence of his riper years—sentenced to be hanged ! And why ? Not for raising his hand in rebellion against a captain whose coarse malignity must have been most goad ing :, —not for taking :
the strongest side in an unequal conflict , even after the victory ; but simply for not jumping into a boat which he thought was about to sink , before he was apprized that his remaining on board the ship might be misconstrued . When so apprized , he did attempt it , but was prevented . During the first part of the affair ,
his mind was in the state of confusion consequent on suddenly awaking out of sleep , amid the strangest and most unexpected circumstances . He separated himself as soon as possible from ' the mutineers , and came out spontaneously to the first vessel that appeared oh the coast of Otaheite , where he had remained about two years . The biographer has dealt gently with the court-martial ; he seems to have extended his mercy to them , in virtue of their
having recommended the prisoner to the king ' s mercy . To us the trial seems to be the barbarous administration of barbarous law . The discipline which must be sustained by such means , cannot be necessary when a government does its duty by the community . We demur to letting the case pass as * only one instance amongst many of the imperfection of human laws / It is not an instance of imperfection but of evil design . Martial law is law framed for the reduction of men to machines . Be a good tool , or I will destroy you ;'—that is its spirit . For no
legitimate and honourable purposes , —for no purposes of national defence merely ., can such severity be needful . Its aim is the creation of an engine , with the direction of which no power on earth can be safely trusted . The attempt is presumptive evidence of designs hostile to the freedom and well-being of a community .
It is said that a large portion , both of the army and navy , consists of men so hardened that only by severity can subordination ; be secured . If it be so , the subordination of such men is all the more perilous . They are wild beasts to all but their keeper , who may at any time € cry havoc , and let slip the dogs . ' The combination of severity on the one hand , with privileges and immunities arbitrarily bestowed on the other ; tends to fostqr a spirit most n-
Untitled Article
Tagarts Memqir of Captain iteywood . 80 &
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1832, page 805, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1826/page/13/
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