The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1857-02-27
PHILOSOPHICAL SPECULATION ON
THE BURDELL MURDER.

| ne DOhDTLb MOhDCh.
The New York Tribune of the 18th inst
says, the limit TO the general emotion whic
this murder mas created is not yet apparent
Grow DIS still flock about the door Of thn
house which was to the victim house a
doom; the newspapers still discard all othe
intelligence to give US the latest revelation
and surmisrs; ut all iea.tables is recounte'
what has been heard during the day, and u
ali breakfast.tables what has been discover.
! ed during the night. ltis not often that N
event of such nature takes such absorbing
possession of the public mind. There haC
been other murders not unlike it in the frs
development of incident, but which had sooI
passed into oblivion. What then have occa
stoned the remarkable excitement and tn,
continued agitation in the public mind re
specting the Burdell murder! The Tribun,
answers the question thus:
1t is, we think, to be referred to the intel
leclual activity which has been aroused by
this remarkable deed; to the ncumen and an.
alysis which it has provoked; TO the STEADY
determination of the people to know all the
facts connected with this taking off. No or.
binary homicide can, of course, sustain this
interest Compared with this, all other kill
ngs seem vulgar. A man who wanders, in
the luxury OF intoxicaton, into low, dirty
beer. shop, full of bravos and cracksmen, may
reasonably expect To have his skull fractured
n man who at midnight, hns the temerity To
pass through bad neighborhoods, will net b.
ustonished by the club or the garrote; man
compele led to travel the highway at unspason.
able hours, is naturally bid to stand and de
liver; and if, refusing to do either, he is shot
down, the Coroncr's inquest excites no more
attention than paragraph detailing big
fire or bursting trcshet. But an nssassina
tion, without the apparent motive of cupid
ity, perpelrated in the fancied security of Il
dOmicile, and effected under circumstances
which justify double theory, has an irresist-
ibe facina,ion. and makes every man in
the community coroner. 1t is not easy
to say, whether the imagination or the reas
on OF the public be in such cases the predom.
inant faculty, or whether, in its exci:ations
the community is guided more by fancy than
by facts. 1t certainly discovers, very early
after surh an incident, that there is a power
ful if not predominant appeal to the imag.
ination in great murders, and this IS precisely
the feeling which trembles through the som.
bre curtains of tragedy, and which scares us
into an unutterable dread over the pages OF
Macbeth-which has lent dignity even to the
commonplares of George Barr well" and of
"Arden of Feversham" calls up
ghosts of the sheeted dead to squeak and
gbber about our couches--whch forms
the traditions and legends over which silly
maids are wont to quiver.
We would not underestimate the idenlism
of murder, but it is not to be compared, Ger.
tainly for any practical purpose, with that
intense nationality with which society seizes
upon an unusual homicide and insists upon
its deliberate aud philosophical investigation.
It has been our duty to watch the efferves.
cence of the public mind during the course
of recent events; we have received many
communications, good, bad and Indifferent
we have talked with hundreds, and hardly
with one who did not have his or her theory
and we must confess to certain degree OF
astonishment at the general skill in affecting
evidence which has been developed at tn
latent logic OF the community; at the cnpaci.
ty for dissecting testimony which has been
exhibited. Persons not at all of a profess
ional turn of mind have shown themselves io
BE- excellent lawyears, with a fine detective
talent. We certainly feel that in all this
there is an instructive effort toward self pres.
ervation, and determination that society
shall not be made unsafe without strng
gle. He who for purposes of gain, or prompt
ed by the whispers of a revengpful spirit, is
stripping his right arm for deed ofmidnghl
murder, should remember that to this inquest
of the world, to this scrutiny of the aggre-
gate mind, will his most secret acts be sub.
jected He may escape detection, but es.
cape is hardly possible.