Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 October 1875 — The Suicide Mania. [ARTICLE]

The Suicide Mania.

From the memoranda of tlie large number of suicides which have been committed within the past two months it would seem that a perfect suicide mania, almost equaling an epidemic, is passing over the country, old and young, rich and poor, alike becoming its victims. Various causes are assigned by sociological philosophers tor the mental condition which superinduces suicide, and it is questioned whether one who is in the full possession of the mental faculties can or ever did succumb to it. To those who are in their right minds it does not seem possible, and for this reason, if for no other, the probabilities of the argument are on the side of those who contend that no person, unless afflicted with insanity, either spasmodic or as a disease, can commit suicide.

Be this as it may, however, a contemporary, with much show T of reason, assigns two causes as the chief ones which lead to self-destruction, viz.: Domestic troubles and financial embarrassments. To one who has read the long line of suicides which have occurred recently these causes are certainly the most prominent ones, and a remedy could easily be found could society be organized upon a more healthful basis. Marriages are too often recklessly entered upon without seriously counting their cost or the mutual obligations they impose, and after a brief period of time, when the glamour of romance has all passed away, and sober reality takes its place, the full measure of the mistakes made is realized, and it follows that either two unmated mates must fight out a peaceless battle of life, or resort to the divorce courts, desertion, mutual separation or suicide. Women, through their dependence and poverty, are generally the greater sufferers if mated with brutal or reckless men, and as to them honorable support is surrounded with greater difficulties they oftener become victims to the suicide mania than men. The reckless extravagance of fiving deemed requisite to occupy social positions of respectability, and to live beyond one’s real and ostensible means, as it leads to financial embarrassments, is, with the proud and ambitious, a potent stimulant for the suicide, who, too weak to-bear disappointment, flies to self-destruction for relief and oblivion. , While nothing can be more pitiable than a mental state of such intense despair and hopelessness that it seeks death as its only remedy, the sympathy which a community feels for the unhappy victims of such a condition ought not to mislead public opinion to an under-estimation of the great weakness of character which impels the suicide. While civilization makes self-destruction no longer dishonorable, and it is not held in the light of a cardinal sin, and the old customs whereby various brutalities of burial were practiced have become obsolete, still it is the duty of the press and all those who have power of molding public opinion to point out theYeal weakness which causes suicide, and show that those w f ho 'patiently take up the burden of life and bear it with good sense and philosophy are really the true heroes and heroines of the world.— Toledo Blqde.