Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1884-12-12
Suicides.

No one can fail to be struck BIZ the
apparently increasing number of sui
cides. 1t may be that the total percent
age OF these distressing deaths upon the
increment of the population has not in
reased, but it is beyond question that
suicide, as social calamity, has been
thrust on our notice of late more than
| in remoter years. Until the statistical
facts are made clear it would be idle to
speculate as to the probable cause of
this increase, ii there be one. 1t is,
however, not merely permissible, bit
polite, to bestow passing glance on
the subject as whole. Suicides may
be divided roughly into two great
classes; those in which the self-slayers
| are Intentionally conscious of what thev
are doing, and those in which they are
either unconscious of their acts or per-
form them under distinct hallucinations
or delusions of idea This last class
which. If not technically deiinitiye, will
serve for our immediate purpose is
not, we think, large one. Without
hair splitting, it NAV roughly be said
that the great majority of those who
kill, or try to kill, themselves in these
modern times and in civilized commu
mites are perfectly well aware of the
nature of the at they are
performing. or attempting. and do
the deed with a. so far. intelligent pur-
pose OF escaping from misery that
seems uncomfortable, or because OF some
terror or shame that for the time over
whelmS them. The law Is mercifully
interpreted for the sake of survivors /:
but, as matter of fact, scarcely one
IN a hfrn dr.n1 @f n
temporary insanity" are correctly so
described. 1t is heart breaking or
brain-teariCg trouble that makes men
and women long to die or impetuously
seek refuge in death, either in the be-
lief that in dying they will sleep. or
that consciousness will end in eternal
oblivion. We do not say that there is a
clearly defined process of reasoning in
all these cases, though in a majority we
believe there is; but in very few in
stances indeed is the real inner feeling
one which differs greatly from the
yearning to escape-anywhere, any,
where out of this misery. The rate al
which men and women live nowadays
has something to do with this feeling.
Boys and girls are men and women in
acquaintance with, and experiences o ,
life and its so-called pleasures and sor-
rows, at an age when our grandparents
were innocent children in the nursery.
The young men of the day are blase at
two OK three -and-twenty, the Young
women cnnuyee. Life is played oul
before its meridian is reached.
or the burden of responsibility is
thrust upon the consciousness al
period when the mind can
not in the nature of things be com
petent to cope with its weight and at
tendant difficulties. All this has been
said before. There is not new word
or a new thought in 1t. and yet it is a
very terrible and pressing subject.
We can not give it the go-by. Forced
education commenced too early in life
and pressed on too fast is helping to
make existence increasingly difficult.
We are running the two year-old colts
in crippling race, and running the
stock. If able and impartial observers
would make il their business to ascer
tain the facts about suicide, they would
he doing good and useful work We
believe, not without some data on
which to base our speculations. that
suicide is increasing. and that the
active cause of the evil is weak-minded-
ness. the result of forced development
and premature responsibility Hasty
and too early marriages, too anxious
struggles for success in lite, too hazard
Gus ventures in business enterprise, the
rush of undisciplined and unframed
minds into the arena of intellectual
strife. and above all, that swinging o,
the Self-consciouSneSS pendulum like
between excess of rigor in self-con-
troll and untempered license, which
constitutes the inner experience of too
many, are proximate causes of the
breakdown or agony of distress which
ends in suicide. The underlying cause
is impatience, social, domestic, and
personal, of the period OF preparation
which nature has ordained to stand on
the threshold of life. but which the
haste of progress" trests rs delay.
1t is not delay, but development; albeit
this is lesson rash energy has yet to
learn from sober science. London Lam
Get.