In this case, as in so many other cases, there is an analogy between rewards and punishments.It is an imperfection common to both these sanctions, that they are applicable to actions alone, and exercise only a distant and indirect influence upon the habits and dispositions which give a colour to the whole course of life.Thus, rewards cannot be instituted for parental kindness, conjugal fidelity, adherence to promises, veracity, gratitude, and pity: legal punishments cannot be assigned to ingratitude, hardness of heart, violations of friendly confidence, malice or envy---in a word, to all those vicious dispositions which produce so much evil before they have broken out into those crimes which are cognizable before legal tribunals.The two systems are like imperfect scales, useful only for weighing bulky commodities; and as an individual, whose life has been less guilty than that of a man of a hard and false heart, is punished for a single theft, there is also often a necessity of rewarding a certain distinguished service, performed by a man who is otherwise little entitled to esteem.
Thus, in regard to the moral virtues which constitute the basis of daily conduct, there is no reward which can he applied to them by general institution.All that it is possible to do is limited to seizing upon those striking actions, readily susceptible of proof, which arise out of extraordinary circumstances, as opportunities of conferring occasional rewards.
Rewards of this nature cannot be bestowed periodically:
the occasions for performing eminent services do not regularly recur.It is the action, and not the date in the almanack, which ought to occasion the reward.The French Academy annually bestowed a prize upon the individual who, among the indigent classes, had performed the most virtuous action.
The judges had always one prize to bestow, and they had but one.They must occasionally have experienced regret at leaving unrewarded actions of merit equal to that which gained the reward, and sometimes at being obliged to reward an action of an ordinary description.Besides, by the periodical return of the distribution, this prize would soon be rendered an object of routine, and cease to attract attention.
The institution of La Rosière de Salency may he produced in answer to the above observations: but it should be remembered that a village institution is of a different nature.The more limited a society.the more closely may its regulations be made to resemble those of domestic government;---in which, as we have already seen, reward may be applied to almost every purpose.It is thus that annual prizes may be established for agility, skill, strength---for every other quality which it may be desirable to encourage and of which the rudiments alway exist.
There is not a village in Switzerland which does not distribute prizes of this nature for military exercises: it is an expedient for converting the duties and services of the citizens into fêtes.Geneva, whilst it was a republic, had its naval king---its king of the arquebuss---its commander of the bow---its king of the cannon.The conqueror, during the year of his reign, enjoyed certain privileges, little costly to the state;the public joy marked the return of the national exercises, which placed all the citizens under the eyes of their grateful country.La Rosière de Salency , designed to honour virtues which ought to be perpetuated and renewed from generation to generation, might have a periodical return, like the roses of summer.
The Humane Society , established in England for the purpose of affording assistance to persons in danger of drowning, and providing the means of restoration in cases of suspended animation, distributes prizes to those who have saved any individual from death.In this case, the reward is not, as in the French Academy, confined to the indigent class alone: men of the first rank would consider it an honour to receive a medal commemorative of so noble an action.Besides, the mode of conferring these rewards has not been dramatised; the retired habits of virtue have been consulted, there is no public exhibition to which it is dragged, to be confounded or humiliated.Greater eclàt might, however, without adding to the theatrical effect, be given to these rewards, were an efficient report made of them to the king and both houses of parliament.
An institution of a similar nature, for the reward of services rendered in cases of fire, shipwreck, and all other possible accidents would still further contribute to the cultivation of benevolence;and these noble actions, brought in the same manner under the eyes of the legislators, and inscribed in their journals, would acquire a publicity of much less importance to the honoured individual than to society in general Indeed, though the reward applies only to one particular action, the principal object designed is the cultivation of those dispositions which actions indicate: and this can only be accomplished by the publicity which is given to the example, and the public esteem and honour in which it is held.
When, upon the site of the prison which had been the scene of an exalted instance of filial piety, the Romans erected a temple, they inculcated a noble lesson: they proclaimed their respect for one of the fundamental virtues of their republic.
