Edwards uses the phrase “oh who can express what the state of a soul in such circumstances is! ” in order to

illustrate that this type of suffering is unimaginable

Explanation:

The pain or suffering that the speaker is going through is tremendous in such a way that the speaker considers that there is not a single arrangement of words that could possibly describe that state in which the speaker is in.

the central idea is basically saying that juveniles that have committed a crime will not have the same consequences as the   adults that have. they will have a softer punishment than what the adults have that is harsh in some ways.

the passage can be best described as: "the british legislature extended an unwarranted jurisdiction".

we can say that because the text clearly states how the people of the colonies warned the british about their excessive desire to rule over them, without taking into consideration the difficulties their brothers had experienced in america: they struggled to establish the colonies, to adapt to new types of weather, fight with the natives, etc., and how they now see (or then saw) the only way out was to cut all ties with the british, since they ignored the people's petitions.