ABSTRACT
Charles Henry Hopwood was called to the bar in 1853, and joined the northern circuit. He was elected M.P. for Stockport in 1874 as an ‘advanced Liberal,’ lost his seat in 1885, but was elected for the Middleton division of Lancashire as a Gladstonian Liberal in 1892. The field has been left too much to be occupied by theorists and pedants in penology, or the science of punishment, and the claims of flesh and blood have been disregarded. The public sways to and fro, and is subject to heats and chills, now inclining to and clamouring for severity, and now full of compassion and stirred by indignation at the excess which its previous conduct had done much to encourage. The judgment seat should be occupied with a sympathy for wretchedness, pity for the criminal tempering the just indignation which cruel violence, wickedness, and depravity naturally excite.
