The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-11-03
WHY DO THEY DIE +?
An Inquiry Into the Causes and
Methods of Suicide.
THE RECENT RAPID INCREASE
The Popular Error-Not Generally Insane
The Greeks, Romans and Jews-ingeRious
Inventions and Horrible Methods.

Was the philosopher Seneca crazy when he
entered the warm bath and opened his velnsf
Were all the hundreds of noble Romans who
made happy dispatch of themselves insanef
Surely not.
The Greeks rarely committed suicide, bat .
at one time it was quite the fashion in Rome.
1t is the rarest of rarities for slave to com
NIT suicide, though a slave owner often does. /
Extensive inquiry fails to develop a single /
case of an American Negroes committing sui |
eide, though there have been few cases !
among mulattoes and octoroons. Shall it be /
said. then, that the superior race thesuicidal:
Surely not, for the Greeks were at least the /
EQUALS of the Romans, and the lsraelites are |
certainly the equals OF any race-aDd who /
ever heard of an Israelite committing suicide.
The solution must be sought elsewhere.
PERHAPS religious belief has something TO
do with it, but it wouli be hard to prove it
One fact, however, gives US cIew: Among
the lowest races of mankind and in the low
est intellectual grades of any society, suicide
is practically unknown, and among the very
highest in race or culture il is extremely
rare, while in the middle or lower middle
classes il is most common. 1t is those who
are midway on the course, whether as races
or individuals, those who are in the struggle,
who lose heart and rush unbidden into eter-
pity. This is only another way OF saying
that where the battle is fierceSt there are the
most wounds and sudden deaths; those who
have won the victory and those lying idle IN
camp and designing no struggle are fairly
well satisfied with the situation. The cult
ured and well-to-do New Yorker is, on the
whole, as willing to live as the naked Sene-
gambian-
OVERTURNED ENERGIES.
Sociologists have lately made an mpor-
tant discoyery-that it is impossible to civil
ize any race rapidly, and that if the attempt
is persisted il the race viii die The change
IN a peoples externals must correspond with
an internal change to be healthful, and as the
latter change is organic it takes several gen
erations to complete it. 1t was once sup
posed that Indians and Kanakas died off,
because of intemperance and the white
Nuns diseases" but il is now proved that the
Kanakas, of the Sandwich Islands for in
stance. are more virtuous and temperate
than they We're two centuries ago. All the
same they have shrunb from 800, 900 to 0,OC0.
The rapid inflow of new impressions on I'M
prepared nerve centers breaks them down.
Then suicide becomes common, though in the
savage state it was unknown. Today q
Sandwich Islander can lie down and die
whenever he takes the notion, with no dis
ease whatever.
The French have popular impression that
in November and December the melancholy
Loudoners crowd the bridges over the
Thames to take the last leap, and many a
Briton honestly believes that an air tight
! room with scuttle of burning charcoal sup
plies the ordinary mode of death to the once
gay Partisan whose health or fortune Is ex-
! hausted. In truth, both countries have their
occasional epidemics Of suicide. 1t is au-
thentic history that at one time in Rome a
citizen gave public notice that a tree i'll his
grounds on which many honorable gentle
men had hanged themselves was to be cut
down soon, and therefore all who wished to
use so highly distinguished tree for suicidal
purposes must make haste.
OLD ROMAN SUICIDES.
Select at random any dozen or twenty emf
pent men contemporary with Julius Cesar,
and you will find that about half of then
committed suicide Lucretius devoted many
years to writing a work to prove that there
were no gods and then killed himself. An
other gentleman of that era used to give lit
tie suppers costing 5000 or so, and on losing
J
une was reduced to about S40O,0 900, he de
cIared that he could not live O pauper and 81
poisoned himself. At Milesium the maiden'
decided to die en- maSse, but when many has
thrown themselves into the wells and reser
voirs, the city fathers adopted law that al
suicides corpses should be exposed naked IL
the forum, so the girls consented to live. Tht
explanation of all this is as above stated
A. So 10 rl1a UNIT 10.
Romans rarely committed suicide, and afteI
the empire was firmly established the act wa
much less common. Those who know tn
worst and those who know little or nothing
I are content to live; those long anxious final
ly become anxious TO die.
It is scarcely possible to conceive of an,
method of suicide not already employed b,
some one: but whenever one strikes a move
method he is sure to have host of imitators
Hanging, drowning, poisoning, stabbing o
other form of cutting, shooting and jumping
from high places are most common. The oil
Romans had way of falling on their owl
swords, deeming that most fitting for brav
men. Many women have swallowed no
Goals, powdered glass and other destructiv
articles. Cleopatra applied an asp to he
bosom, and it is worth noting that she ba
had no imitators Women have a horror Q
serpents, and they are not easily obtained a
the time desired. France leads all other ma
lions in suicides, Us in the last year for whic
we have the record 216 persons killed then
: selves in each 1000, 600 of the population, an
the increase is rapid. OF 1872 suicides i
one year one-fffth were in Paris, and smother
ing by charcoal fumes is the favorite methot
In London nearly all suicides are with til
knife and razor THE river is too closel
watched, and it is plain truth that in this n
spect the British are the worst ''outthroatE
in Europe.
, HORRIBLY INGENIOUS METHODS
l In Indiana not long since a man arrange
a hroadax to fall on his neck as soon as
candle by his side burned down far enoug
! TO sever a rope; he then took dose Of opiul
and went 10 sleep in the right position; Il
az fell and beheaded him. In the next thrt
months many cases of improvised guillotin'
wsrs reported. Whenever a man jumps fro,
!. high tower In Paris the guards are increase
and extra vigilance is required, for man
more win try to initiate him. A young lad
in New York kneit before an omnibus to G,
= run over, but, strange to say, the driv'
stopped in time for policeman 10 rescue he
: Tbs cases occasionally reported Of wskme
!, humping into iron fdfhaces or other sfps
heated places raise the question Of morris
irrryulsaN Painful as the conclusion may b
II ia certain that many persons have Jumps
frSn latsy buildings, or into cascades
whff1pools on momentary impulse, and mar
g one has confessed that he or she dared nt
resaain long at Niagara Falls and gaze On Il
smooth, swift stream of the upper rapidR