Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1858-06-08

and exhibitions of criminal justice; the false
PHILOSOPHERS, in various forms, now so preva
lent, which teach the indulgence of animal APP
petiteS, and throw seeming sanctity around
the exercise and the qualification of human pas
siOns whether exhibited in the pandemoniums
of free love manifested in the dissolutenessn and
debaucheries of polygamy, or made apparent IN
their monStrOuS consequences, threatening the
disruption of states, and the disntegTation OF
social systems by the prurience their false
philanthropies. These all alike tend to one
common end; individual degradation and indis-
criminate ruin, OF into q social division and per-
petual conflict between the intelligent, virtuous
and orderly members of society, and those great,
disorganizing and increasing elements OF brute
force, misguided prejudice; sentimental pruri
ences and degraded Ignorance, which all cOaeScc
so readily, aud act unitedly, and mutually
strengthen and infame each, and which are al
ready, with a dangerous current, setting in and
undermining the foundations of the republic.
This is not the time to show in detail, that the
actual fruits which eXhited in the criminal
calendars of courts of justice, in the desolation
of households in the relaxing discipline of so
ciety, and in the weakening bonds which bind us
all together as people and as a nation, are the
logical and practical results of those distempered
fancies; and they end in union with all natural
uroclivities to viciotsneSS. hat philosophy
which Claims the same freedom for the ignorant
and the vicious, which is necessary and proper
for the wise and the virtuous man, who exercises
moral tyranny over his own passions and APP
petites, subduing them to law of Holiness
that philanthropy which claims indulgence and
ease and RIGHTEOUSNESS (for there are no middle
terms for SUCH for the ignorant and IMPROVE
dent, in society where toll and intelligence are
necessary to its preservation and success, or to
the deyelopemeut or perfection of any sys-
TEN OF idea of human progress; any such base
less PHILOSOPHERS, any silch crude and unlicensed
philanthropies, but foster that dissoluteneSs of
manners and morals which make children con-
denim their parents; which unoose the necessary
restraints of society, break down the barriers
of order erected by virtue and intelligence, and
shall in general dissoluteness, render property,
reputation and life worthless and insecure by de
grading their estimate iii the common corruption.
The plague spot has made its appearance.
The ranking poison manifests itself in orgies to
which am painfully compelled to allnde: it is
brought forth to public observation in courts of
Justice; it lnfects literature and cOrruptS legs-
lation. The facts of its existence, which sur
round us everywhere, are the evidence OF our
weakness and wantonnesS; and while those who
are connected with the administration of crimi
nal Justice must not fail in al hour which may
be the turning of the tide all good citizens must
see in the signs of the times, and in
bounded freedom great moral necessity for
sterner restraints on vice, and intieXlbllity in
their execution, and they will at the same time
aid, as they can, in turning the current OF pub
lie feeling from unhealthy and destructive direc-
tons into that channel of purity and living faith
which has been SO evidently ditfusing itself
through the heart of the nation, and bringing
multitudes 10 worship at the throne of our God.
Better, far better is il to see crowds gathering
through our temple doors than taking part in
scenes of folly and of crime, or to be compelled
to enforce the penalties of violated law, and re-
move the guilty from the warm and cheerful
light of freedom and activity to the solitude of
the prison house, and the ignominy and dread
penalty of the gallows. Such, in an unprece-
denied manner, have been my melancholy du-
ties at this term.
The term of this Court opened with the trial
of causes exhibiting in the parties but the ordi-
nary moral delinquencies of society, and which,
of themselves, would have attracted no particu-
lar attention. But as the calendar progressed,
the disgust and adherence increased, until the
worst features of all the worst cases were COM
bined in one horrible exhibition of human de-
pravity-the murder of Mary Ann Montony in
the midst of orgies which disgust and appall us
One case tried ut this term shows the fatal
ruin of one false step. female has been SEN
fenced to the penitentiary for five years, who,
if her own simple and terrible tale is to be
believed was once the honored and beloved
daughter of a worthy family. false step,
Maynard indulgence of forbidden love, dis
regard of the holy instinct, and violation of
the sacred command 10 nonor lny IaLner anu
thy MOTHER precipitated her into irretrievable
ruin, and to the horrors of an agonizing des
pair, which in a moment of anticipated death,
made her wish for DEATH though there were no
consultations in memory and no hopes in the
dread eternity into which she seemed almost to
have passed made her wish for death that she
might be with the lost-the selfdenounced
doom of the fallen spirit on itself in its con-
seriousness of loss of virtue and life of infamy
aud crime.
She belonged to the same class of unfortunate
beings whose murder is about to be expi2ted by
YOU John Burns, in the sentence of the law
which it is my sad duty to pass upon You.
The history of your life, unsOvernable man, has
been developed in the progress of :he cause
which has resulted i'll your conviction of MUIR
der in the first degree. Each fact in your life,
as it was directly stated or incidentally dropped
out in the evidence, hut deepened the convic-
ton of your depravity, and increased the belief
in your guilt of the crime with which you stood
charged The whole tenor of your life; the
crime with which you We're charged on for
mer occasion, and for which you were i'm
prisoned; the threat of vengeance against the
deceased for the testimony which she bore
against you and which in all probability was
true; the time, the place, and the conduct (not
to be named) occurring during the night OF the
murder; the stab, the stone with its clotted
blood and female hair; the crushed skull and the
concealed weapon worn upon your person fitted
to produce this fatal result and all proved to have
been done and used by you, by witnesses, it is
true, degraded and abandoned, your associates in
deprayitv but to whom motive to commit this
further and greater crime could be imputed; al