The Sun.
London, England, 1824-01-15 00:00:00

'fll URI' EL f 4.

As we were the first to express our surprize
and regret that the public Journalists should
suffer a fake conception of the callous indiffer-
ence Of TIIURTELL to appear
like heroic forti-
tude, and hence, to endeavour to excite commis-
seration for the fate of the culprit, we are glad
to see that our sentiments are supported by those
of a respectable contemporary
in the following
judicious observations:—

" Not many days ago, it did appear to us that
nothing could present itself to our observation
more fitted to affect a well constituted mind with
disgust and horror, than the late assassination for
which Thurtell has been executed. We regard-
ed it as a murder most heartless, most treache-
rous—in its motives the most sordid and base—in
its details the most inhuman and revolting. The
murdered man was the intimate companion of the
murderer, soberly led out to be butchered in cold
blood. The crime was brought home to this
Thurtell by evidence that satisfied every rational
creature who heard or read it. The verdict which
condemned him was never impeached : the justice
of the punishment was as clear as the atrocity of
the criminal ; yet, to our amazement, we now
discover the greatest sympathy expressed in
a thousand quarters for him by whom the
crime was perpetrated. " Manly, dignified
" consistent, courageous" Martell! Such are the
misplaced epithets bestowed profusely upon a
being, whose only title to distinction above the
common herd of desperadoes was just a more
complete animal indifference to pain inflicted on
himself or others. His defence made a " deep
impression !" Why ? Because he had got it by
heart in prison. He had spouted it before the

illiterate turnkeys. He had studied it as a player
does the speech set down for him. His flinty
nerves, aided by a thorough self-deception as to
the influence of the testimony upon the Court
and Jury—by an utter absence of those reflec-

tions and of that religion which teach man to be-
hold in death something more-than a mere transi-
tory agony—by a seared conscience, and by a
power of hypocrisy, acquired most effectually
among those in whose lives there is most to con-
ceal—all these united enabled him to display a
bold front in presence of the multitude. But

that such an exhibition should have been ad-
mired—that the callous performer should have
been, as he has since been, applauded—not only
among the ill taught and unreasoning vulgar, but
by some of those whose duty it is to correct their
errors and to imbue their minds with right notions
of morality, is a subject of bitter and mourn-
ful meditation. These remarks have not been
made in a spirit of uncalled for harshness to the
dead, or without unfeigned commiseration for
a sorrowing family, stricken to the heart by
his dreadful crimes, and by their punishment.—

But we owe to society a debt which is paramount
to all others. As members and conductors of a
free press, our obligations to the catne of virtue
and morality are co-extensive with the privileges
which we exercise. If this depraved sensibility
be not rebuked at once, the best feelings of a
kind and generous people may be perverted to
the most dangerous, and the essential difference
between good and evil be at length entirely lost
sight or."—(Times)