It Is A Game At Hazard, At
Which All Expect The Turn Of The Die In Their Own Favour, Never
Reflecting On The Chance Of Ruin Till It Comes.
In fact, from what
I saw in the fortresses of Norway, I am more and more convinced that
the same energy of character which renders a man a daring villain
would have rendered him useful to society, had that society been
well organised.
When a strong mind is not disciplined by
cultivation it is a sense of injustice that renders it unjust.
Executions, however, occur very rarely at Copenhagen; for timidity,
rather than clemency, palsies all the operations of the present
Government. The malefactor who died this morning would not,
probably, have been punished with death at any other period; but an
incendiary excites universal execration; and as the greater part of
the inhabitants are still distressed by the late conflagration, an
example was thought absolutely necessary; though, from what I can
gather, the fire was accidental.
Not, but that I have very seriously been informed, that combustible
materials were placed at proper distance, by the emissaries of Mr.
Pitt; and, to corroborate the fact, many people insist that the
flames burst out at once in different parts of the city; not
allowing the wind to have any hand in it. So much for the plot.
But the fabricators of plots in all countries build their
conjectures on the "baseless fabric of a vision;" and it seems even
a sort of poetical justice, that whilst this Minister is crushing at
home plots of his own conjuring up, on the Continent, and in the
north, he should, with as little foundation, be accused of wishing
to set the world on fire.
I forgot to mention to you, that I was informed, by a man of
veracity, that two persons came to the stake to drink a glass of the
criminal's blood, as an infallible remedy for the apoplexy. And
when I animadverted in the company, where it was mentioned, on such
a horrible violation of nature, a Danish lady reproved me very
severely, asking how I knew that it was not a cure for the disease?
adding, that every attempt was justifiable in search of health. I
did not, you may imagine, enter into an argument with a person the
slave of such a gross prejudice. And I allude to it not only as a
trait of the ignorance of the people, but to censure the Government
for not preventing scenes that throw an odium on the human race.
Empiricism is not peculiar to Denmark; and I know no way of rooting
it out, though it be a remnant of exploded witchcraft, till the
acquiring a general knowledge of the component parts of the human
frame becomes a part of public education.
Since the fire, the inhabitants have been very assiduously employed
in searching for property secreted during the confusion; and it is
astonishing how many people, formerly termed reputable, had availed
themselves of the common calamity to purloin what the flames spared.
Others, expert at making a distinction without a difference,
concealed what they found, not troubling themselves to inquire for
the owners, though they scrupled to search for plunder anywhere, but
amongst the ruins.
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