either tortures their feelings or
hardens their hearts, and in either case it instructs them how to punish
when power falls into their hands.

Lay then the axe to the root, and teach governments humanity. It is
their sanguinary punishments which corrupt mankind. In England the
punishment in certain cases is by hanging, drawing and quartering;
the heart of the sufferer is cut out and held up to the view of the
populace. In France, under the former Government, the punishments were
not less barbarous. Who does not remember the execution of Damien, torn
to pieces by horses? The effect of those cruel spectacles exhibited to
the populace is to destroy tenderness or excite revenge; and by the
base and false idea of governing men by terror, instead of reason,
they become precedents. It is over the lowest class of mankind that
government by terror is intended to operate, and it is on them that it
operates to the worst effect. They have sense enough to feel they are
the objects aimed at; and they inflict in their turn the examples of
terror they have been instructed to practise.

There is in all European countries a large class of people of that
description, which in England is called the "mob." Of this class were
those who committed the burnings and devastations in London in 1780, and
of this class were those who carried the heads on iron spikes in Paris.
Foulon and Berthier were taken up in the country, and sent to Paris,
to undergo their examination at the Hotel de Ville; for the National
Assembly, immediately on the new ministry coming into office, passed a
decree, which they communicated to the King and Cabinet, that they (the
National Assembly) would hold the ministry, of which Foulon was one,
responsible for the measures they were advising and pursuing; but the
mob, incensed at the appearance of Foulon and Berthier, tore them from
their conductors before they were carried to the Hotel de Ville, and
executed them on the spot. Why then does Mr. Burke charge outrages
of this kind on a whole people? As well may he charge the riots and
outrages of 1780 on all the people of London, or those in Ireland on all
his countrymen.

But everything we see or hear offensive to our feelings and derogatory
to the human character should lead to other reflections than those
of reproach. Even the beings who commit them have some claim to our
consideration. How then is it that such vast classes of mankind as are
distinguished by the appella