industry and virtue; their passions were not assailed by the tempting offers of present gratifications, which for a time be numbed their reasoning faculties; they were not bereft of the slender barrier that guarded their virtue, nor that once removed were they driven, in despair, to criminal pursuits, to procure the very necessaries that sustain existence-No, their moral turpitude was such, that in prefer, ence to following some lawful occupation, they descended to the vicious act of corrupting the principles of the rising generation, and blasting the fairest prospects of parental affection. But I flatter myself that I have said sufficient to prove their greater guilt, though not all that might be adduced against such pestilen, tial miscreants.

I have at length come to the last and most important argument of Mr. Hale

against the Penitentiary" that the prin ciples upon which it is established cannot be defended, either by precept or éxaniple, from the word of God;" and he ob ́serves, that the abettors of the Institution have frequently urged the case of the woman taken in adultery, and accused before our Lord, in defence of its principles; but as he did not exonerate her from the penalties of the law, Mr. H. does not consider it a case in point. But he should recollect that the object of the London Female Penitentiary is not to rescue criminals from the effects of the law were its principles founded upon 'such untenable ground, I would be the last person to advocate their cause. The fact is, the compassion of the supporters of the Asylum exerts itself to effect the reformation and conversion of the unfortunate woman; and when, from experience, "they are convinced of her amendment and

consistent conduct, they dismiss her with the admonition our Lord gave to the adulteress before mentioned-"Go, and sin no more." And I will here present the reader with a few instances, out of the many that are recorded in Scripture, in support of the principles of the London Female Penitentiary. "Let him know,

that he who converteth the sinner from the error of his way, shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins." Again, "When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no nced of a physician, but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance." He may also refer to the parable of the prodigal, and to the conversion of the Samaritan harlot, of Zaccheus, and of Mary Magdalen, together with many examples of the compassionate regard and benevolence our Saviour manifested to all who sincerely re

pented of their former wickedness, and the charitable veil he cast over their transgressions-no longer injurious to society, or necessary to be reprobated, the converts having seen the evil of sin, and entertaining a proper sense of its dreadful consequences.

Having thus taken into consideration Mr. Hale's chief objections to the principles upon which the London Female Penitentiary is founded, and the direful presages he holds out of its ultimate effects, here I must remark, that the more I have considered this highly interesting subject, the firmer are my convictions of its beneficial tendency rooted, and the more inflexible are my opinions as to the fallacy of his predictions. Having given nothing but the undisguised sentiments of my mind, actuated by no other motives than those of humanity, I com

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mit these remarks, however inadequate to my wishes, to the public ordeal, with confidence in the justice and expediency of the measures espoused therein. I leave the subject, satisfactorily convinced that the foundation now laid of this humane Institution will, if carried on with vigour, conducted with perseverance, and extended to the utmost limits of public patronage and munificence, be consummated in experience, a superstructure of inconceivable utility, and evidence to its sceptical opposers, that the misery and ruin they predicted as the result of its consolidation, were but the illusive phantoms of their own imaginations.

THE END.

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