MURDER” 
 
 AN ADDRESS 
 
 DELIVERED BY 
 
 Hon. JOS. B. GUMMING 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 Contestants for the Prizes Awarded for Proficiency in the 
 Study of English Literature and Language, at Emory 
 College, Oxford, Ga., June 28, 1880. 
 
 Chronicle Job Print, 
 Augusta, Ga. 
 
My theme is murder. I shall not fatigue you with tec- 
 tinical definitions of the crime and with nice distinctions be- 
 tween it and other kinds of slaughter. I shall confine myself 
 to sketches of some classes of murderers, and some of the 
 methods, by which the atrocious crime is committed. I shall 
 then endeavor to arouse in your minds and hearts a strong 
 feeling, if it does not already exist there, against the inhuman 
 practices which I shall speak of, and I hope to have you join 
 me in heartfelt regret that capital punishment is not meted 
 out in every instance of guilt; and also in a sentiment of 
 gratitude that enlightened gentlemen have inaugurated here 
 in Emory College a movement for the suppression of this 
 awful crime. 
 
 I have said that I shall not trouble you with definitions 
 and nice distinctions, and I shall not. But nevertheless I shall 
 distinguish between some of the characteristics of the crime 
 and of the criminals. I shall show that the largest class of 
 murderers are not impelled by particular malice, but are ac- 
 tuated by what is known as general malice. They are those, 
 who entertain no settled purpose to murder and provide them- 
 selves with no particular weapons of destruction, but slay with 
 anything at hand — as it were a stone, a club, a ragged stick. 
 They do not meditate deliberate murder : but their moral sense 
 is feeble and their ignorance is great, and they murder without 
 rightly knowing that they do so. This class, though more 
 numerous, is less dangerous than any other; because the mem- 
 bers of it soon betray their true character, and all are on 
 guard against them. 
 
 Another class goes better prepared for the commission 
 of the crime. Its members do not attempt it so frequently, 
 but there is a deadlier certainty in their efforts. They, too, are 
 not at heart deliberate murderers, but they find their proto- 
 tynes and congeners among the bearers of the concealed pistol. 
 Neither my murderer, nor the pistol hero, starts out with the 
 deliberate nurpose of murder, but the convenient appliances 
 are at hand, and so they do murder on every apt occasion. 
 
 The only other class, which T shall specify, is that of the 
 deliberate murderer — those who. in States which grade the 
 c'-'me, would be rated murderers in the first degree. These 
 s-t m their closets, their offices, and plan murder, meditate it. 
 work it un laboriously, and then go forth and commit it delib- 
 erately. To this class belong the poisoners. 
 
 3 
 
For the purpose of description, and to summon the mur- 
 derer before you more conveniently, I shall adopt the device 
 of the old dramatists— -notably Shakspeare — who, disdaining 
 ordinarily to give names to the miscreants whom they em- 
 ployed for the exigencies of the tragedy, simply numbered 
 them ‘‘First Murderer, " "Second Murderer,” and so on. And 
 so at the proper time I will give the equivalent of the stage 
 manager’s signal : "Enter first murderer,” “enter second mur- 
 
 derer,” "enter third murderer.” 
 
 But in order that I may allay any nervousness among 
 the most timid of my auditors, I take this early occasion 'to 
 state that the murder, of which I have spoken and propose 
 further to speak, is not "the unlawful killing of a human being 
 in the peace of the State with malice aforethought, either ex- 
 press or implied ;” and neither my first, second nor third mur- 
 derer drips with human gore. The murder I speak of is the 
 murder of the King’s English, and the murderers are those of 
 our own household. If any one breathes freer at this an- 
 nouncement I beg that he will not abate, in any considerable 
 degree, the indignation and horror which would be justly ex- 
 cited by the thought of actual human murder; for strong 
 should be our reprobation of the unprovoked, unnecessary, 
 unspairing slaughter of our unoffending language. 
 
 The murderer of the first class needs not much attention. 
 Ide is for the most part a sinner through ignorance. The class 
 is composed of that large number of our fellow-creatures, who 
 make deadly havoc of the ordinary every day language, cur- 
 rent in the household and in the mart. The little that will be 
 said of the murderer of this class, will contain this of extenua- 
 tion, he slays without malace. ITe has no malice against verbs, 
 adverbs, nouns or pronouns. Against adjectives, participles, 
 prepositions or conjunctions he has no ancient grudge ; he 
 does not even know them. His usual victim is syntax; but 
 he has no particular malice against syntax. The parts of 
 speech have done him no harm, and he has no sweet revenge 
 against them to gratify. Yet he slays them with a pen. that 
 is deadly, and a tongue, that spares not. As he acts without 
 malice, perhaps he should not be styled a murderer. But the 
 law sometimes departs from pure logic and is guided by a 
 sound policy. Thus, it is the policy of the law. which will not 
 permit a man, too intoxicated to entertain any purpose, mali- 
 cious or otherwise, to slay a human being and the slaughter 
 to be aught but murder. The same policy pronounces him a 
 murderer, who wantonly hurls a stone into a crowed and slavs 
 
 4 
 
one whom he hated not, knew not. On the same principle 
 must we deal with that man, who blindly lays about him with 
 a tongue, lost to all sense of linguistic duty, or with a pen, 
 that recks naught of parts of speech, and with one or the 
 other weapon commits reckless and indiscriminate slaughter. 
 
 I call this first murderer "the grammatical murderer” — 
 which appellation, however., is not subjective but objective, 
 and designates not the criminal himself, who is not at all gram- 
 matical, but his victim, the murdered, grammar. 
 
 Let us, however, be just, and accord to this class of mur- 
 derers such mitigation of their crime as can be found in their 
 ignorance. The crime here spoken of consists in those sole- 
 cisms of syntax and even blunders of orthography, prevalent 
 among the ignorant and the careless. As savage people lightly 
 slay their fellow-creatures, not because the God of all the 
 earth has made their hearts by nature worse than the hearts 
 of enlightened peoples, but because, in their ignorance, they 
 are like the beasts of the forest ; and as the corrective with 
 them is knowledge and enlightment, so with those enemies of 
 orthography and syntax, the spelling book and the grammar 
 will in time convert those blind ravagers of the language into 
 good citizens of the Republic of Letters — And with this hope- 
 ful view I dismiss them. 
 
 I wish I could speak as hopefully and as charitably of my 
 second murderer, who, with the same caution already given in 
 the case of the first murderer in reference to subjectiveness 
 and objectiveness, I call the purity murderer — the assassin of 
 the purity of the language. 
 
 This offender is more enlightened than . the first, and to 
 that extent can claim less of charitable forbearance. W hile 
 the former lays about him in stupid recklessness with such 
 weapons as chance provides, the second arms himself before- 
 hand. It is true he entertains no settled, deadly malice 
 towards the purity of the language ; but he has his ends to 
 attain, and he will slay it if it interferes with them. He makes 
 deadly assaults upon the language by the use of words not 
 belonging to it. or. if belonging to it. wrested from their 
 legitimate use and signification. He has many lethal weapons 
 in his arsenal, but his favorite is a barbarous one, bearing a 
 barbarous name — SLAXG. 
 
 There are some implements of destruction, the very sight 
 of which inspires horror. I have seen in collections of medie- 
 val weapons poniards twisted and curled and toothed, so a> 
 not only to inflict death, but to car: v torture with it. In the 
 
 a 
 
same spirit of diabolism is fashioned the horrid "creese" of the 
 Malay pirate. And our own free American bowie knife, with 
 its manifest capabilities for making a dreadful incised wound, 
 then enlarging it, and by deft turning to the right and left, in- 
 flicting a high degree of tortue is calculated by its sight merely 
 to curdle the blood of the ordinary citizen. 
 
 Like unto all these is the weapon “slang." It is uncouth, 
 it is deadly, it is torturing. With these characteristics, it is a 
 favorite with the purity murderer. The class, contributing 
 most freely to this type of murder, are the local editors and 
 paragraphists of the newspapers ; and slang is their chosen 
 weapon. But conversationalists also use it. Your popular 
 orator enlivens the dullness of his discourse by flourishing it ; 
 the young men, emulous of the reputation of society wits, 
 brandish it even in the parlors of the polite and, alas! alas! 
 as Lucrezia Borgia, the most fascinating woman of her time, 
 cultured in intellect, rich in accomplishments, charming in 
 manners, beautiful under the warm sky of Italy with the 
 beauty of the North — the blue eye,, the fair skin, the blonde 
 hair — not morose and gloomy, as one would suppose from her 
 career, but gay, light hearted, sunny tempered— as this paragon 
 of womanly attractions was withal a pitiless murderess, so. 
 alas ! alas ! the adorable young woman of the period wields 
 this weapon of slang without stint and without ruth. I will 
 not liken her to Athene standing by Achilles and guiding the 
 flight of his javelin, for while in this Homeric picture there 
 are blood and death there are also open war and the gleam 
 of knightly weapons ; but rather do I liken her to the dreadful 
 shape of Ate, revelling with uncouth and horrid weapons in 
 indiscriminate slaughter. 
 
 Some crimes bring their own swift retribution. None 
 more surely than the use of slang. The form the punishment 
 assumes is almost total deprivation of speech. I have not the 
 time to elaborate this idea, but I shall endeavor to illustrate 
 it by a familiar example. The simple, frequently grand and 
 beautiful, always appropriate, terms to express things inpor- 
 tant or imposing in the physical or the moral world, have 
 dropped out of the speech of a large number of our fellow- 
 citizens, addicted to the use of slang. Instead of the language 
 of civilized man, selected and used according to the require- 
 ments of each occasion, these wretched criminals, overtaken 
 by a punishment of their own providing, are reduced on all 
 occasions to the use of the same monosyllable — “boom." Like 
 the monotone of an idiot is the utterance which greets even - 
 
 6 
 
reference to what is striking or grand. The prosperity of the 
 country, “boom the happiness of the people, "boom the 
 enthusiasm of an assemblage of freemen, “boom the popu- 
 larity of a candidate, “boom his worked up, manufactured 
 strength — this also “boom." Great feats of arms, "boom." 
 Great triumphs of oratory, “boom." The raging of a storm, 
 “boom.” — The majestic flowing of a river, “boom.” The 
 blessing of Heaven, shown in succession of rain and sunshine, 
 producing the waving fields and promising the abounding 
 harvest, “boom.” Anything, Boom ! Everything BOOM ! 
 
 Deprive the poor creatures of this idiotic monosyllable, 
 and they are reduced to a condition verging on dumbness. How 
 many editors, how many speakers, how many conversation- 
 alists have lost the language, in which to describe greatness 
 or grandeur in anything by reason of their dependence on this 
 absurd gibberish. 
 
 But our greatest horror is reserved for the poisoner. So 
 I designate the style murderer. The speaker, the writer, who, 
 perverting the language from its proper use, viz: to serve as 
 the simple but grand vehicle of the ideas of the mind, the 
 emotions of the heart, the longings of the soul : to be the 
 teacher, the entertainer, the messenger of truth, the pure hand- 
 maiden, ready to serve mind and' heart in her own chaste and 
 simple way — the writer, who perverts the language, which 
 ought to be thus regarded, into an instrument of strained con- 
 ceits, bombastic utterances, extravagance in words with mean- 
 ness of ideas — who, using it not merely for speaking or writ- 
 ing somehting which it were well to write or speak, but for 
 effect only, for the gratification of vanity in fine writing or 
 fine speaking; who, discarding all moderation of praise or cen- 
 sure, dealing in hyperboles, taking everything — ordinary mor- 
 tals and the ordinary affairs of life — out of their natural air 
 and light, elevates them to the stars or depresses them to the 
 realms of eternal night — him I call the poisoner. He is a 
 murderer, for these practices are deadly and require thought 
 and deliberation. And inasmuch as his death-dealing agencies 
 pervade the whole system of his victim, I call him the 
 poisoner. 
 
 The case of this murderer, I fear, is hopeless ; but thanks 
 to whatever overruling power, thanks are due — -there is a 
 specific antidote for his poison — “SIMPLICITY.” 
 
 But dropping the conceit of murder and murderers, how 
 really inexcusable the wrongs we do that which we lovingly 
 call our "mother tongue." If our sentiment toward it were 
 
 7 
 
more in keeping with this affectionate appellation how much 
 more careful and tender we would be with it. If even dis- 
 carding all sentiment, we consider it simply as a convenient 
 instrument of every day use, how much better we would find 
 it to keep it clean and bright. Regarding it as the vehicle of 
 the soul’s great creations, why convert into a creaking road 
 wagon this chariot of fire, fitted to scale the battlements of 
 Heaven. 
 
 In that respect, in which the language is most important 
 to us, our daily ordinary intercouse, it is as easy to use it 
 well as ill. As handled by the masters of it, it is pure, and 
 yet so copious as to need no assistance from the flippant 
 barbarisms of modern invention. Of course, there will be a 
 new language of arts and sciences as they are discovered or 
 expanded. I speak not of it, but of language as the vehicle 
 of intellectual and moral ideas — the vernacular of the old hu- 
 men heart — "The sole indestructible state Time can touch 
 with no change. Which before Rome, before Carthage was 
 such, as it will be when London and Paris are gone.” This 
 language needs no accession to its full and compact popula- 
 tion, but needs only to be protected from invasion by the bar- 
 barians. Style is form, and form is art. The loftiest heights 
 of art were reached long ago in language no less than in 
 painting, sculpture and architecture. And as the painter of 
 to-day cannot equal Raphael, of the fifteenth century, and as 
 even Thorwaldsen of our own time could not attain to the 
 height of Phidias in the age of Pericles; nor can the new 
 houses of Parliament be named with the Parthenon : so we 
 cannot improve in the style of writing and speaking upon the 
 old masters. Our attempts to do so but produce grotesque- 
 ness and deformity. Take the three ways, upon which I have 
 commented, by which the language is wounded in the house 
 of its friends, and consider a moment. When we compare the 
 diction of one speaking our every day language with correct- 
 ness and in simnlicity with the incorrect and slovenly manner, 
 in which his neighbor may handle the same instrument, what 
 reason can be given for the course of the latter? When we 
 read the glorious pages of Macaulay, rich to opulence in ideas 
 and expression, all couched in purest English, what reason 
 can be given for seeking reinforcements or slang? A hen we 
 read the clear, simple, easy, compact pages, so abounding in 
 the English classics, what reason can be given for the strained 
 but ineffectual, the extravagant, but weak, contortions of the 
 popular orator and the contemporaneous press. Xay. I with- 
 
 8 
 
draw these questions and frame an easier. I ask not for 
 reasons, but demand what excuse can be given for the sloven- 
 liness of ordinary speech, for the jargon of slang and the 
 labored vices of journalistic style? 
 
 One word more. The true mission of the champion of 
 the English language is not reform, but defense. The true 
 legend to be emblazoned on his shield is not Reformer, but 
 "Defender." His true policy is not the conquest of new 
 realms, but the integrity of the old. Take the dear mother 
 tongue as it exists under your watchful protection and guard 
 it sacredly ; and that you may appreciate the sacredness of the 
 duty, think what is that mother tongue in its purity, undis- 
 figured, undeformed, unpoisoned by the murderous practices 
 I have spoken of. It is all-sufficient for the wants of domestic 
 and friendly intercourse. It is the language, in which humor 
 and pathos have formed the closest alliance. It is the lan- 
 guage, in which the orator, secular or sacred, finds scope, 
 boundless as the air, free as the ocean. On the wings of this 
 English language, epic poetry has made its subliemst flights; 
 and in its accents, the lyric poets have sung their sweetest 
 strains. In its terms, have the truest principles of civil liberty 
 been formulated. It is Freedom’s true mother tongue. Clear 
 enough for the philosopher, sublime enough for the poet, ro- 
 bust enough for the orator, airy enough for the wit, tender 
 enough for the lover — in a word, possessed in its purity of all 
 linguistic excellencies, keep watch and ward over this great 
 treasure and repel all who would approach it with unhallowed 
 hands. 
 
 9 
 
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