Somewhat
lightened was the _provincial_ panic by this proof that the murderer had
not condescended to sneak into the country, or to abandon for a moment,
under any motive of caution or fear, the great metropolitan _castra
stativa_ of gigantic crime, seated for ever on the Thames. In fact, the
great artist disdained a provincial reputation; and he must have felt, as
a case of ludicrous disproportion, the contrast between a country town or
village, on the one hand, and, on the other, a work more lasting than
brass--a [Greek: _chtaema es aei_]--a murder such in quality as any murder
that _he_ would condescend to own for a work turned out from his own
_studio_.
Coleridge, whom I saw some months after these terrific murders, told me,
that, for _his_ part, though at the time resident in London, he had
not shared in the prevailing panic; _him_ they effected only as a
philosopher, and threw him into a profound reverie upon the tremendous
power which is laid open in a moment to any man who can reconcile himself
to the abjuration of all conscientious restraints, if, at the same time,
thoroughly without fear. Not sharing in the public panic, however,
Coleridge did not consider that panic at all unreasonable; for, as he said
most truly in that vast metropolis there are many thousands of households,
composed exclusively of women and children; many other thousands there are
who necessarily confide their safety, in the long evenings, to the
discretion of a young servant girl; and if she suffers herself to be
beguiled by the pretence of a message from her mother, sister, or
sweetheart, into opening the door, there, in one second of time, goes to
wreck the security of the house.
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