July Term, 1886, No. 109, E. D. Error to the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Wayne County to review a judgment on conviction of murder in the first degree.

The facts and questions raised are fully set out in the following charge to the jury in the court by Seeley, P. J.

The defendant is charged before you with the crime of murder. Murder is the unlawful and malicious taking of human life. Whether this defendant is guilty of this offense is for you to determine from the evidence in the case. Before the commonwealth may ask you to render a verdict of guilty she must satisfy you by evidence, beyond a reasonable doubt, of the guilt of the defendant.

The law presumes the innocence of every man, and that presumption remains until it is rebutted by competent evidence.

A reasonable doubt as to the guilt of the defendant inures to his benefit and would require of you a verdict of acquittal.

Now, what is a reasonable doubt ? What do we mean by this term which is so frequently used in criminal proceedings ?

It is more easy to describe it in some of its aspects than it is to define it. Various attempts have been made, with greater or less success, to produce a definition of this term “reasonable doubt.” It is a doubt, where the mind hesitates because it is not convinced; not where a convinced mind hesitates because of fear of consequences in declaring its conclusion. That is not doubt, that is timidity. It is not only a doubt; it is a reasonable doubt which inures to the benefit of the defendant; a rational doubt. Thai is, it must not be fanciful, conjured by an overwhelming sense of responsibility or apprehension of consequences, but must arise out of the evidence in the case.

It exists where the careful consideration of all the evidence leaves upon the mind an honest and conscientious difficulty in believing; where the evidence by reason of its insufficiency or want of credibility fails to convince the mind.

You are not to place your minds in an attitude of resistance, and so doubt because you are unwilling to be convinced, and so, as jurors, refuse to be convinced by evidence which would convince you as men.

The grave interests which depend upon your verdict may well require of you the greatest carefulness in the scrutiny of the evidence, lest it may lead you to an erroneous conclusion, but they neither call for nor warrant timidity on your part in consideration of, nor antagonism to, the influence of the evidence.

Simple preponderance of evidence, inclining you to believe in the guilt of the defendant, will not justify a verdict of guilty; nor is the commonwealth required to establish such guilt beyond the possibility of doubt; such certainty is unattainable usually in such proceedings.

The law presumes every man to be innocent, as we have said, and that presumption must remain until, by evidence, guilt is established beyond a reasonable doubt.

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