Meditation LXXXI.
Meditation LXXXI.
ON A COURT-MARTIAL.
Gibraltar Bay, August 8, 1759.
Every law is made to restrain from vice, and bind to duty; and every nation has its own code of laws, military and civil. The martial law is accounted severe; and there is a necessity for it, because mutiny and disobedience to orders, cowardice in the time of action, and desertion to the enemy—would have the most fatal effects. But whatever be the offence, a few considerations would not be improper at such a time for the members of the court-martial.
1. To do to the defendants, in their circumstances, as they would wish to be done to themselves if in these very circumstances.
2. To mind that making the defendant an 'example' to others is costly, when at the expense of justice.
3. To pass no other sentence on the lowest, than they would do on the highest for the same fault.
4. To consult how they can answer to their conscience and to God, for their decisions, deaf to everything but justice and humanity.
5. To incline rather to the side of mercy than severity; and thus to imitate God in his most amiable perfection.
6. To reflect, if they are as strict in punishing sins against God, as desertion against their king, and offences against themselves; and to consider whose honor should be most attended to.
7. To fix it in their mind, that in a little they must stand before the tremendous bar of God, where all distinctions cease. No more the sovereign and the subject, the admiral and seaman, the captain and the soldier, the judge and the defendant.
But from the proceedings of these courts I may learn instruction; for if earthly kings so punish deserters, will not the King of glory deal dreadfully with the backsliders in heart? Those he has taken into his honorable service, shall suffer severely, if they fall away from him. Sinners in the Christian world shall have the hottest hell; and of all sinners, those who once tasted of the powers of the world to come, shall suffer the most excruciating torments.
Again, this may remind me of that day when not only actions shall be tried—but even my inmost thoughts examined, and not one concealed. The sentence of this court only respects the body, and must be executed in time, though in the execution thereof, it should finish time to the criminal. But the sentence of that heavenly tribunal reaches my soul in all her powers, and stands in force, and is put in execution—through the endless ages of eternity. O that it may be a sentence of absolution and peace!
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