A Catholic View of Prison Life [pp. 42-54]

A CA THOLIC VIEW OF PRISON LIFE.
ing young persons to jail; sending them, on the contrary, to an
industrial home, and subsequently placing them under the care
of chosen guardians, who should be responsible to the government for wise conduct. These three points are comprehensive of
many minor points, and, in particular, of the after-career of exconvicts.
In regard to that after-career, there exists in Englandthough on a small scale-what is called the Prisoners' Aid Society, a modern invention, which has unquestionably done good,
and which is prospered by the wisest philanthropy. Yet it is
obvious that no society can work with great success against the
obstinate and stupid verdict of society, which has gone forth all
over the country in the anti-Christian formula: "Let the excomnmunicated remain outcast for evermore." Society won't forgive
.any one who has been in prison; won't give him "a clean bill"
;and start him afresh. Society orders the police to hunt down
every ex-convict, and the police obey the mandate most scrupu.lously. The cruelty of such conduct is only equalled by the
hypocrisy with which society pretended to be shocked by the
"crime." If society were really shocked at any "crime" it
would take every care to draw a veil over it, to welcome the
sinner to true repentance, and to insure his having no further
provocation. But that detestable hypocrite, society, which revels in divorce-cases and in every scandal, and positively gloats
over every fall of a fair famed woman, will not hear of receiving
back to its impure arms the wretched culprits who have done a
sharp penance, and who would lead virtuous lives if they were
permitted. Now, this fact is absolutely inseparable from the consideration of the whole science of prison life, prison reform, prison
consequences. We have to teach society the first principles of
Christian philosophy before we can persuade it to take an interest in those criminals who have been sent to prison through the
evil example, in most cases, of society. This may perhaps be a
hopeless task. The world is too old to become regenerate. It
is too rotten to be converted to magnanimity. It is too soaked
in conventionalism, in the puerile falsehoods of "propriety," to
face truth with manliness or common sense. But though society
must be despaired of, as abandoned to its vanities, its toilets, its
money-worship, its animalism, there is still the huge army of
Catholic ecclesiastics who might take the whole subject into
their care.
May it be respectfully noted that the points which have been
touched upon are never alluded to from the pulpit nor in
[Oct.,
52