Word: murders
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Dates: during 1870-1879
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GENTLEMEN, - I trust you will give room in your columns to a few words in the interest of aesthetics, which would probably be excluded by the prejudices of a less enlightened periodical. My subject arises from the murders which have been committed recently in this neighborhood, and as I have already used the word "aesthetics" in regard to it, it is therefore needless to say that I am a disciple of De Quincey. I lay no claim to originality; my sole ambition is to raise a warning voice in defence of that art which derives its dignity, nay, its very...
...think these principles will commend themselves to every artist of sense and feeling; and yet how often are they flagrantly violated! Let us consider them separately. The death must be inflicted cleanly. It is plain that any departure from this rule tends to reduce murder to butchery. It is only a vulgar mind which can delight in blood or in mutilation; we may compare a piece of work treated in a bloody, filthy, or mutilating manner to the ranting of a poor tragedian. There is also another reason for this first principle: if the work is not done cleanly...
Secondly, unnecessary cruelty must be avoided. Surely, in these days of compassion it needs not to plead for this principle; it will at once be approved by all true artists. I thought at first that the rule should read "all cruelty"; but it is clear that the art of murder, like that of medicine (in the matter of vivisection), sometimes demands the infliction of pain; cruelty, in this sense, is not always avoidable. For instance, in that admirable and truly Gothic bit of art related by De Quincey, - the killing of the baker, - no inconsiderable amount of distress...
...suppose the murderer to be recognized as such in his flight, or worse yet, suppose him to be caught. Why, then all mystery flies away at once, and the horror created by the murder is diminished. People discover that the, before unknown, death-dealer is not the weird and relentless creature of their imagination, but a certain Mr. Thompson or Johnson, a small, mild-looking man, perchance, who has heretofore borne the best of characters, and who was doubtless actuated by exceptional motives of animosity in this case. They are sure, now, that they shall not be killed by this...
...LIFE in police courts and before grand juries seems to develop what might be called superb audacity. We lately heard of a prisoner, on trial for the murder of his parents, who made an eloquent and touching appeal for mercy to the jury on the ground that he was an orphan!" - Advance...