The Journal of Prison Discipline and Philanthropy (New Series, No. 3, January 1864)Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons
History
The Journal of Prison Discipline and Philanthropy (New Series, No. 3, January 1864)
Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons
Charities -- Periodicals; Prisons -- Periodicals
Every effort made by the Society, in its attempt to alleviate the
miseries of public prisons, is intended to be in a moral direction; and
whether the person in whose behalf the agent or representative of the
Society labors, is to be the tenant of a cell for years, or to be
immediately released, it is to the moral perceptions that addresses are
made, and it is the moral condition that is the object of public and
private labor; it is for the moral improvement that the physical
condition is regarded, and what may appear to the careless or
indifferent observer as merely an exercise of philanthropic feeling, or
of a humane sentiment, has for its great end such a disposition of the
offender, or the accused, as will secure to him the means and condition
of moral improvement, making the cell endurable to the felon by a
growing appreciation of the justice that placed him there, and a sense
of the benefit of reflection upon the past, and the comprehension of the
advantage of resolves for good, which, by kind monition and gentle
persuasion he is induced to adopt. The moral image defaced by vice, or
buried beneath the accumulation of crime, begins to assume its earlier
charms, begins to move under its superincumbent mass, and, with a
recognition of its proprieties and value, vice and crime not only lose
attraction, but become hideous and repulsive; the spirit of hostility to
the world is gradually weakened, and a lively sensibility to all the
duties of social life takes the place of that wretched resolve to
misapply power by felonious appropriation, and indulge passion in the
violation of the laws of decency and morals.
Or, if the prisoner is to leave his cell, the efforts are to fix in his
heart the great principle of moral excellence, and to strengthen the
resolutions which he formed while in prison. To follow, indeed, the
liberated man to his home, if he have any, or failing that, to provide
him with temporary shelter and employment, and to watch over his
conduct, and guide and guard him amid the temptations upon which he has
entered with delicate susceptibilities and wounded self-respect.
Resolves formed in the solitude of cells, are like roots that vegetate
in darkness, they are certain not to be very fruitful in their secluded
condition, and are exceedingly liable to perish unproductive when
exposed to the light.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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