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J-INTOLN"
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THE NAMELESS CRIME:

A DISCOURSE,

delivered in the

FIRST CONSTITUTIONAL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH,

iMwdias/ m^M, lapH] §Ss mm^

BY REV. H. DUNNING, Pastor.

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BAIiTIMOKE JOHN W. WOODS, PEISTER,
202 Baltimore Street.
18 6 5.

ADDRESS.

Brethren and Friends :
Having to speak to you to-night of a crime
that has no name, it would seem appropriate that my
discourse should have no text. Let the horrid crime
itself he my text.
On the last Sabbath morning, it being my first op
portunity after the commission of that unparalleled
crime which deprived the nation of its beloved and
honored head, I took occasion to speak to you, in
general terms, of the horrible fact itself, which had
struck the nation dumb by its atrocity. I then gave
utterance, promptly and decidedly, to the feelings
which were excited in my own heart by the shocking
event. On Wednesday last, at the hour of the funeral
solemnities in Washington, while we here, in com
mon with the whole nation, were bowed in sympathy
and sorrow, I took occasion as was most befitting at
such a time, to speak of some of the more remarka
ble characteristics of that great man upon whose
shoulders God had twice devolved responsibilities,
greater and weightier than almost ever fell upon
man ; and who had thus been, by the brutal hand of
violence, snatched away, ere, as it would seem, he
had finished the work God had given him to do.
I am now to speak of that nameless crime by which
the land has been deprived of the honored represent-

ative of its life and authority ; the people of their
beloved and trusted President ; and Freedom and
Humanity of their most faithful friend. I deem it
my duty at such a time to speak, and to speak in all
fidelity, irrespective of the favor and the frown of
men ; and I should speak what I believe the appalling
occasion bids me speak, though an hundred devils
stood before me, frowning and forbidding.
The nameless crime is my theme ; and why do I
call it a nameless crime? Because there is not in
our language a word which expresses this horrid
deed. For killing in almost every form or relation,
there is a name specific and descriptive : for this there
is none. It is not homicide ; that term does not by
any means express the whole of this crime. It is
not murder ; killing a man "with malice afore
thought" does not fill out the measure of this iniquity.
It is not merely assassination, for here was more
meant and done than the mere stealthy killing of a
man. It is not regicide, for our President was no
king. It is not tyrannicide, for our twice chosen
head of thirty millions of people, of the people, in
sympathy with the people, beloved of the people,
was no tyrant. How then shall we express the as
sassination of the elected head of a free nation ?
There is no word that contains and describes the
deed. It is only by circumlocution of horrid phrase
that you can express it. Let it remain a nameless
deed forever ; a horrid blank in human language.
Of this nameless crime, who can describe its atrocity
and wiclcedness ? Look at the spirit which generated
and accomplished the deed. It is the spirit of rebel
lion, of rebellion against divinely constituted author
ity and law. The Bible teaches us that government

is of God : ^^ The powers that he are ordained of God."
Human government therefore finds its basis, support,
strength and authority in God. Resistance to a di
vinely constituted government is therefore resistance
to God. ^'Whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the
ordinance of God." Now the spirit of this crime is
the spirit of rebellion intensified to the highest pos
sible degree. It strikes not only at the representa
tive of government, but at the authority of govern
ment ; and through the representative, at those he
represents ; and through them, at all government it
self; and through government, at God, the author of
government. The spirit of this crime first developed
itself in heaven. There it struck at God, and could it
have realized its malignant purpose, it would have
dethroned and have annihilated God.
The spirit of this crime is the animating spirit of
all sin. Its aim is the destruction of all government,
human and divine. It would annihilate God, and de
vastate the universe. And this reveals to us the ap
palling enormity of this nameless crime.
And when we consider the relations existing between
the victim of this crime and the criminal himself, its
atrocity reveals itself in still darker colors. This
blow, be it remembered, was not aimed at Abraham
Lincoln, the man, the citizen, the individual, but at
Abraham Lincoln the President. The assassin had
no hatred of the man, -perhaps no living being had ;
but of the President, and because he teas President.
But the President, as such, is only the representative
of national life and authority. He is the nation em
bodied. The blow then was aimed at the nation, the
life and heart of the nation, and could it have real
ized its horrid malignity in desired result, it would

6
have annihilated not only the government, but the
nation whose embodied life the government is.
Now, the intense malignity and enormity' of the
crime reveals itself in the fact that its perpetrator
was living at the time only on the forbearance and
leniency of the President. He openly professed to
be, he was publicly known to be an enemy of the
government whose protection he enjoyed, whose pro
tection he was base enough to continue to enjoy and
to abuse for its attempted destruction ! Yet, though
thus known as a declared enemy, he was spared and
protected from judgment by the misplaced forbear
ance of that government against which he lifted his
assassin hand, and at which he aimed this deadly
blow ! His freedom and life as a declared enemy of
government, in this hour of its great struggle for con
tinued existence and authority, had both been for
feited. He was permitted the enjoyment of both by
the too great leniency of the President. That len
iency he outraged by the murder of him that showed
it ! If anything can show the hideous enormity of
this crime, and its desert of a double damnation, this
fact reveals it.
But its criminality is still further enhanced, by the
fact, that, its noble victim was, at the time medita
ting an amnesty to all the thousands who had been
engaged in long and bitter strife against the govern
ment of which he was the twice chosen representa
tive and executive, and who were, just in this hour
of victory, wholly in his power. At such a time, when
clemency, when forgiveness, when an earnest desire
to assuage the bitterness engendered by this unhal
lowed and conquered rebellion ruled in the heart of
this good man ; at such a time, in contradiction to

every impulse of gratitude or generosity, this fear
ful deed was done ! It was in wicked harmony in
deed with the base ingratitude of them who had been
nursed at the bosom of the republic, but who had
striven to drive the assassin's dagger to her maternal
heart. And then too what blindness, what stupidity what
desperate infatuation in this crime ! What could it
accomplish now for the cause it was designed to aid ?
Had it been committed four years ago, it might have
been extenuated by the wicked plea of the aid it
would render to the then newly inaugurated rebel
lion ; but now it can have no such diabolic justifica
tion ; on the contrary, it is manifest that nothing
could operate so seriously to the detriment of their
cause who had already, whether willingly or unwill
ingly, submitted to the government. Nothing could
have been done which will so certainly cement, weld,
intensify, and augment the loyality of the nation. A
hundred victories could not have produced such a re
sult. The blindness, the infatuation of the deed are
astounding. How does iniquity overleap itself, and
perish in its folly !
The question now here arises, and it is one which
will be long pondered by the world, and which must
have an answer, how could this deed have been done ?
How COULD this crime have been committed ?
We are now too near the commission of the hor
rid crime itself to answer this question fully. But in
part you may see the explanation of the possibility
and the fact of its commission in the well hnown life
and character of the assassin. His long practice in
theatric displays and mock crimes and tragedies had
made him insensible to the guilt of real crimes. It

8
had doubtless given birth to the feeling that it would
furnish a sort of grand theatric display before the
world ; that it would be a grand tragedy, enacted
upon a grand scale in real life, the victim of which,
should fall from the most exalted seat of power,
the auditory of which should be the world, and
the chief actor therein, as the assassin himself de
scribed it, should win for himself immortal fame.
Smitten, perhaps, with an accursed ambition for
such fame, long cherishing the spirit which has in
flamed the heart and nerved the arm of this rebel
lion from the beginning ; harboring the most deadly
hostility towards the government, whose representa
tive the President was ; long brooding over the dark
iniquity, and plotting it with his co-conspirators;
urged on by those who were engaged in the same
diabolic effort against the nation's life on a grander
and more open and acknowledged scale ; thus exci
ted, stimulated, urged on, restrained by no moral or
religious influences ; dissuaded, withheld alas ! by no
kind friend ; finding only unhallowed stimulation in
the drinking saloon and in the brothel ; fired by the
demon spirit of that institution which the rebel Hunter
declared was the cause of the whole rebellion, whose
friend and defender he was ; thus animated and
urged ; and thus unhappily unrestrained ; this young
man at length, after many purposed attempts, found
strength of diabolic purpose with which to strike the
fatal blow. To a certain extent this would seem to
account for the crime. In our horror of the deed,
we may exclaim, of the suspected criminal, in words
with which he must have been familiar, and which,
perhaps with tragic strut across the stage, he had
often quoted:

"Beyond the infinite and boundless reach
Of mercy, if thou didst this, this deed of death.
Art thou damned."
And what a lesson have we here to the young and
to all upon the influence of theatric displays and of
the theatric spirit. The performing and the witness
ing of fictitious crimes, prepares the heart for the
commission of real crimes.
And what a startling exhibition have we here of
the depravity of the human heart. This crime proves
to us that there is no conceivable enormity of wick
edness ; no height or depth of possible iniquity
which does not lie concealed in the human heart.
You ^have only to excite the sleeping serpent in
every bosom ; only to awaken and arouse the pas
sions there slumbering ; only to present the proper
infernal motives ; to stimulate by the proper excite
ments ; to withdraw restraints, and it will strike at
the heart of God himself. We may start in horror,
shocked at such a suggestion, and like the young
courtier of Damascus exclaim, in affected or real in
nocence of evil intent, "What ! is thy servant a dog,
that he should do this thing !" but, like Hazael, the
assassin, we may discover, when too late, the strength
of the evil and the weakness of the good within us.
We are startled at the enormity of these crimes
against human government, and it is well that we are ;
portentious would the sign be if we were not ; but
this is only a repetition of what is daily attempted
against the divine government. E.ebellion against
God is an attempt to destroy the government of God ;
and sin against God strikes a blow at his existence.
This huge crime is but the development of that
evil spirit which lies in all our hearts. Unrestrained

10
by education and by the providence and the grace of
God, we are all assassins. Let us not cease then to
thank God for his protection in the past, and to pray
for restraining grace in the future, ^^ But for the grace
qf God," exclaimed John Bunyan, as he saw a de
graded wretch lying in the street, "But for the grace
of God, there lies John Bunyan, and so may we say,
"But for the grace of God, I am that assassin; I am
that fugitive from justice, accursed of God, and loathed
and feared hy men !" Let us then incessantly praise
and pray for that restraining grace.
And have you not observed, my friends, how God
in his providence is here presenting a test of character
to this whole nation ? "As a man thinketh in his
heart, so is he. He who approves this deed, who "in
his heart" rejoices in it, or palliates or excuses it ; he
who does not find his whole moral nature abhor and
revolt at it, is himself, shall I add herself, an assassin.
He or she only needs the opportunity, the withdrawal
of restraints by God, the proper stimulation and
hardihood, to strike again to the heart of our present
President, If you hear a man palliate or excuse that
deed, never trust yourself alone or in a dark night
with him. Neither your reputation, nor your charac
ter, nor your life would be safe with him. He that
approves or excuses a crime committed, is himself,
in the sight of God, guilty of that crime, and at the
bar of God must answer for it. Here then, we say,
God is applying a test of character to every man and
woman in this nation, and to his unerring eye there
is revealed by this test, who is a murderer, who is an
assassin and who is not, "Be ye not partakers of other
merHs sins."
Finally, let us thank God that though this blow

11

was aimed at the life of this nation, the nation still
lives, and it is all the more vividly and intensely alive,
because of this its sore bereavement. No dagger's
point can reach its life. You may take its chosen
head away, but still it lives, and will live, though an
hundred Presidents die.
"In all the centuries we can find but two or three
equal calamities. Assassinations indeed there have
been of sovereigns, ministers, but in not more than
two or three instances has a ruler been taken whose
person seemed so vital to the State ; yet n-ever did
the loss prove fatal to the country, C^sar was
stabbed in the senate house — yet Rome lived even
after the mighty Julius fell. Henry IV, the great
est of the Kings of France, was stabbed in the streets
of Paris, by a hired assassin. But though he died,
his country was still great and powerful. But a
heavier calamity it was which struck down William,
Prince of Orange, nearly 300 years ago, for the little
State of Holland seemed to rest on his single arm,
and when he fell, it seemed as if he carried down the
hopes of his country into the same grave. But God
was a wall of fire round about them. So when the
great Gustavus Adolphus fell, not by an assassin,
but, in ba'ttle, it seemed as if it were a blow fatal to
the cause of Protestanism in Europe. But the same
being who nerved the arm of Gustavus, raised up
other defenders. Thus men die, but nations live.
And so we cannot doubt it will prove here. The
God of our father who has led us through all the
dark periods of our history, will still be our protec
tor and guide." — N. T. Evangelist
And let us, in this day of our national humiliation
and sorrow, by the contemplation of the enormity

12
and horror of this crime, learn to hate and loathe and
pray constantly for deliverance from all crime and all
wrong. Let us cultivate a deeper and broader and
more sacred respect for all lawful authority. Let us
instill into the minds of the young a spirit of rever
ence for and obedience to all lawful authority and
government. Let us teach them the sin against God,
which lies in resistance to that government ; the crime
before God and man of them that would destroy that
government ; and the unspeakable enormity and
guilt of this crime which has struck the world aghast
with horror, and smitten the national heart with an
incurable grief. Let us teach them the most sacred
duty of praying for their i-ulers, though even their spir
itual guides set them not the example ; and that they
tliat refuse thus to do, not- only disobey God, but
condemn themselves of the unutterable meanness of
consenting to receive and to enjoy the protection of
a government, which they hate and would destroy.
And let us see in this great and appalling overflow
of crime the permissice providence of God; who for wise
reasons, now as always, has permitted so great an in
iquity, not because he could not have prevented it,
but because he intends out of so great evil to bring
forth good to this nation, and glory to himselE
Let us remember that, "He icHI make the wrath of
mail to praise him^" and tJie remainder thereof he wiU
rtstra itu — ^AxTEN.

Date Due

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

Gift of
STUART W. JACKSON
Yale 1898