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The Voice of Our Exiles or Stray Leaves From a Convict Ship, Ed. by D. Ritchie
The Voice of Our Exiles or Stray Leaves From a Convict Ship Ed by D Ritchie Author:Daniel Ritchie General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1854 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: THE PESTONJEE BOMANJEE JOUMAL. No. I. -- April 25, 1852. Trust no future, howe'er pleasant! Let the dead past bury its dead I Act -- act in the living present, Heart within, and God o'erhead. Let us then be up and doing, With a heart for any fate : Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labour and to wait, Longfellow. OPENING ADDRESS. History presents no parallel, and the present age no example, of a nation performing such munificent acts of Christian love and pure philanthropy as we behold and feel are accomplished by our fatherland. Our noble country looks with pity on her errant children ; and while a stern necessity compels her to vindicate the supremacy of her laws, by punishing the violators of them, she yearns to reclaim, to forgive, and to restore to their positions in society those who have rendered themselves outcasts, and forfeited their rights as members of a free community. With a wise and generous humanity she looks with indulgence upon those who have wronged her, feeling that they are rather the creatures of accidental circumstances, temporary temptations, defective education, or undeveloped intelligence, than beings constitutionally or irreclaimably depraved. Hence she is anxious to train the judgment of the criminal so as to render it an imperative director of his actions -- an unerring light by which he may behold the true and lofty destiny of man -- the past, with its opportunities, its hopes, and its privileges squandered ; and in the future, to contemplate a new life, where all may efface the stigma that rests upon their name, and become honourable and virtuous...« less