An aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house, and in
his own bed, is made the victim of a butcherly murder, for mere pay.
The fatal blow is given! and the victim passes, without a struggle or
a motion, from the repose of sleep to the repose of death! It is the
assassin's purpose to make sure work. He explores the wrist for the
pulse. He feels for it, and ascertains that it beats no longer! It is
accomplished. The deed is done. He retreats, retraces his steps to the
window, passes out through it as he came in, and escapes. He has done
the murder;--no eye has seen him, no ear has heard him. The _secret_
is his own,--and it is safe!
Ah! gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe
nowhere. The whole creation of God has neither nook nor corner where
the guilty can bestow it, and say it is safe. Not to speak of that eye
which glances through all disguises, and beholds every thing as in the
splendor of noon, such secrets of guilt are never safe from detection,
even by men. True it is, generally speaking, that "murder will out."
True it is, that Providence hath so ordained, and doth so govern
things, that those who break the great law of heaven, by shedding
man's blood, seldom succeed in avoiding discovery. Especially, in a
case exciting so much attention as this, discovery must come, and will
come, sooner or later. A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every
man, every thing, every circumstance, connected with the time and
place; a thousand ears catch every whisper; a thousand excited minds
intensely dwell on the scene, shedding all their light, and ready to
kindle the slightest circumstance into a blaze of discovery. Meantime,
the guilty soul can not keep its own secret. It is false to itself;
or, rather, it feels an irresistible impulse of conscience to be true
to itself. It labors under its guilty possession, and knows not what
to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of such
an inhabitant. It finds itself preyed on by a torment, which it dares
not acknowledge to God nor man. A vulture is devouring it, and it
can ask no sympathy or assistance, either from heaven or earth. The
secret which the murderer possesses soon comes to possess him; and,
like the evil spirits of which we read, it overcomes him, and leads
him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to
his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees
it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost hears its workings in
the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays
his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence.
When suspicions from without, begin to embarrass him, and the net of
circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles, with still
greater violence, to burst forth. It _must_ be confessed;--it _will_
be confessed;--there is no refuge from confession but suicide--and
suicide is confession!