unwittingly slain his neighbour, yet he must leave all that was dear to him, and flee in danger of his life to the city of refuge, and continue there a prisoner, perhaps as long as he lived, and certainly to the death of the high-priest : nor could his confinement there be dispensed with : there was no more commutation of sentence allowed for him, than for the murderer himself. The injunctions of God relative to this deserve particular notice : " Ye shall take no satis- faction for the life of a murderer, which is guilty of death ; but he shall be surely put to death. And ye shall take no satisfaction for him that is fled to the city of his refuge ; that he should come again and dwell in the land, until the death of the priest. So ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are : for
BLOOD DEFILETH THE LAND, AND THE LAND CANNOT BE CLEANSED OF THE BLOOD THAT IS SHED THEREIN, BUT BY THE BLOOD OF HIM THAT SHED IT."
In the remarks that we shall have occasion to make on this ordinance, we must of necessity be more par- ticular than we could wish : but in all that we may say upon this most interesting subject, we beg to be understood, not as presuming to criminate any in- dividual, but as declaring in general terms what we believe to be agreeable to the mind of God, and what we are bound in conscience to declare with all faith- fulness.
That there is an ardent wish in all our legislators, and in all who superintend the execution of the laws, to maintain the strictest equity, none can doubt: a conviction of it is rooted in the mind of every Briton ; and the bitterest enemies of our country are compelled to acknowledge it. But in some respects there is in our laws an awful departure from the laws of God; I should rather say, a direct opposition to themb:
b Adultery, by the law of God, was punished with death, with the death of both the offenders : but by our laws the penalties attach only, or principally, when the crime is committed by the wife, and then only on her paramour. That the penalties have on some occa- sions been heavy, we confess ; but never once too heavy. Yet from the nature of the pecuniary mulct, it happens, that the very penalty