Previous practicing too of the most deadly character. takes place. Friends are chosen. out. Witnesses are present. The broad light of heaven beams down upon the guilty scene; and then, all things being ready, the most deliberate aim is taken at the seat of life-the head, the heart, and the lungs. Can any murder be conceived of a more atrocious character than this? Does the highwayman or the assassin commit murder under circumstances half so aggravating? Murder, then, is committed in duels with ten-fold more deliberation than murder under any other circumstances, and murder is here committed without any adequate cause. "Trifles light as air," causes the most contemptible and silly, a rash word, a disrespectful look, an indiscreet remark, dropped in the heat of debate, the clashing claims of rival lovers, party politics, petty envy-oh! these are the causes for which men expose their blood, and rush upon the bosses of Jehovah's buckler. But it is said that the duelist feels no malice; that he fights merely for the point of honor. Neither does the highwayman feel malice. He who cuts the throat and rifles the pocket of the passing traveler, feels no malice; and if he could procure his money at a less costly price, would stay his murderous hand and let the trembling victim off. But what says the common law relative to this thing of killing without malice? It declares where one man assails another with a deadly instrument with an intent to kill, malice is implied. For if he have not a particular malice, he entertains a general malice-a malice against all mankind-an innate thirst for blood, which renders him unfit to live. But we deny that the duelist is free from particular malice. Duels are generally the result of the most deliberate malice; burning, diabolical malice; malice, which nothing will satisfy but the heart's blood. Duelists, as a class, are preeminently haughty, irritable and revengeful, and to overlook an insult, that magnanimous act of a noble soul, is, in their view, the height of pusilanimity. 4. Dueling is suicide, as well as murder, and suicide may be committed not merely by one's own weapon, but by the weapon of another. To permit another man deliberately to kill you, is the same as to commit the act yourself. Take away the circumstance of the duelist exposing his own life, and dueling becomes assassination. Add this circumstance and it becomes suicide. And who gave you authority to take away your own life, that most precious treasure, upon which such momentous interests depend? Your life is not your own. It belongs to your friends, your family, your creditors, your country. How dare you then, destroy that in which you do not possess an exclusive title? How dare you destroy that which was given you with which to work out your soul's salvation? Yea, the duelist puts himself upon an equality with the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ says, "I have power (or authority) to lay down my life." The duelist says "so have I !" 5. Dueling affords no reasonable prospect of securing the proposed end. The end or object proposed by the duelist is to gain satisfaction for some alleged insult, or to inflict punishment for some alleged crime. But how can the fighting a duel secure either satisfaction or punishment, seeing that the innocent is just as liable to fall as the guilty; seeing that the victim depends not upon the rectitude of the cause, but upon skill in the use of deadly weapons. Or, is the object of a duel to wipe off a disgrace, to repel a foul and infamous charge? How can it possibly effect this object? How can smoke, and noise, and blood alter the nature of things? I am accused of being a liar, how can the firing of a pistol make me a man of truth? I am accused of being a villain and a knave, how can the same process prove the charge false, and make me an honorable man? But absurd as it would seem to the dull comprehension of some of us, such is the magic power of an exchange of shots. According to the laws of honor, “it entirely varnishes over a defective and smutty character; transforms vice to virtue; cowardice to courage; makes falsehood, truth; guilt, innocence." In a word, it gives a new complexion to the whole state of things. The Ethiopian changes his skin, the leopard his spots; and the debauched and treacherous, having shot away the infamy of a sorry life, comes back from the field of perfectibility quite regenerated, and in the fullest sense, an honorable man. He is now fit for the company of "gentlemen." And let none dare dispute his title, or he will vindicate his tarnished honor by another act of homicide. Oh, what a cheap and expeditious mode of making gentlemen! 6. Dueling implies cowardice. Many brave men have fought, but their fighting was no part of their bravery. True, there may be courage, but it is only brute courage. Why is it that duelists often find such difficulty to screw their courage to the sticking point, and exhibit such woe-begone visages on the field of battle? Why so many wild and random shots ? But it is not the lack of physical courage for which we contend. The duelist lacks moral courage. He fights because he is afraid of public sentiment-afraid of being called a coward; he stands in awe of the sneers of the ungodly multitude. Who is the truly brave? He who conquers his corrupt passions. He who stems manfully the torrent of depraved public sentiment. He who dares to do what he knows to be right, and dares to abstain from what he knows to be wrong. But mark that little pusillanimous soul, violating his conscience, lest forsooth he may be called a coward-thus proving himself to be the very thing he would not have the world to think him! 7. Dueling, if it terminate fatally, damns the soul. "No murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” In the case of suicide we may hope there was insanity. In the case of execution for murder, we may see previous exhibitions of genuine repentance. But what is our hope of him, who falls in the very act of defying the authority of the great Jehovah-dies a murdererdies and goes to judgment—with blood upon his soul! They turn'd him on his back; his breast And brow were stain'd with gore and dust And through his lips the life-blood oozed, From its deep veins so lately loosed; But in his pulse there was no throb, Nor on his lips one dying sob; Sigh, nor word, nor struggling breath Heralded his way to death: Ere his very thought could pray, Unanel'd he pass'd away, Without a hope from mercy's aid— To the last a renegade. 8. Dueling is a most unjust and disproportioned code of iniquity. It inflicts the very same degree of punishment upon all offences indiscriminately. Death for a thoughtless word; and death for a deliberate act. Yea, it is a complete system of bullying. See with what instinctive sagacity this trained blood-hound selects his victim-always, if he can, insulting some one over whom he knows he has some advantage; and then dogging him from place to place to seek his blood. Oh, the horrors of this bloody code of honor; trampling with fiendish cruelty upon all the sacred feelings of the heart; stained with the blood of statesmen, fathers, husbands; revelling in the groans of widows, the wail of orphans, the shrieks of sisters, lovers, friends! Is there not some chosen curse, Some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven, 9. Dueling is condemned by the very confessions of duelists themselves. What bitter groans and regrets fell from the lips of Hamilton and Decatur! Observe the subsequent life and conduct of a successful duelist. Did you ever know such a man to be happy? Is he not pre-eminently miserable? afraid of being alone; plunging into one crime to avoid the reflection of another; drowning conscience in the intoxicating cup; and often becoming the victim of derangement. Then how conscience thunders and remorse goads; and the grim and gory ghost of the murdered one haunts him in his dreams! Oh, could he but drink of some oblivious stream and forget the past-forget that once he opened the fountain of the orphan's tears, and broke the widow's heart! But no, he cannot. Eternal justice will not suffer it. Oh! duelist, the remembrance of your deeds must follow you. Conscience will interpret everything into an accusation. When men fasten their eyes upon you, you will think they remember the man you murdered. When men stand in groups and speak in whispers, you will imagine they are talking about you. Every work of God, and every deed of man will be to you an accuser. Oh, the horrors of blood-guiltiness! How it clings like a hungry vulture to the guilty soul! |