And, with this terse summary of the proved facts before our eyes, we ask a question of our own: What overwhelming evidence of insanity would not an intelligent and honest juryman require, to refer such a case to the category of criminal irresponsibility? Sir Thomas Wilde vigorously and contemptuously crushed under foot the mischievous sophistries of the medical evidence. "If eccentric acts were proof of insanity, many persons who were wrenching knockers off doors, knocking down watchmen, and committing similar freaks, _were laying up a stock of excuses for the commission of crimes_!" "The trick of laughing suddenly, without cause, was so common, that if this were token of imbecility the lunatic asylum would overflow with gigglers!" "The prisoner had all along displayed a morbid desire to be talked about; and the letters and documents produced had been written with that feeling and object. A criminal should not be permitted to write out for himself a certificate of lunacy!" "Was his making no attempt to escape, a proof of an unsound mind? If he _had_ made such an attempt, it would have been a great proof of madness! He was surrounded on all sides by the multitude. He took such a reasonable view of his situation, as to see that he had no chance of escape, and gave himself up quietly!" "The prisoner had been allowed the unrestrained use of firearms and powder, and was well acquainted with their fatal effects on human life. Would his mother have _trusted a madman with them_? and left her mad son in the same house with her daughter?" "The medical men went to Newgate _pre-disposed and pre-determined to see a madman_." "Suppose the prisoner unfeeling, violent, indifferent to his own fate, and preferring notoriety to any other consideration: what evidence did that supply of his being in a state of moral irresponsibility?--that moral irresponsibility which secured the very existence of society." All this surely sounds like an irresistible appeal to good sense. Lord Denman directed the jury with corresponding clearness and decision, and also in full conformity with the views of the Solicitor-general, and with the subsequent annunciation of the law by the judges.[19] "If you think the prisoner was, _at the time_, labouring under any delusion which prevented him from judging of the effects of the act he had committed, you cannot find him guilty. He might, perhaps, have been labouring under a delusion affecting _every_ part of his conduct, and not directed to one object alone: if that were so at the time of his firing, he could not be held accountable for it. But if, though labouring under a delusion, he fired the loaded pistols at the Queen, knowing the possible result--though forced to the act by his morbid love of notoriety--he is responsible, and liable to punishment."