The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1894-08-17
THE EVIL OF SUICIDE.
DR.. Talmage Discourses on It's
Spread and the Cause.
Infidelity and Agnosticism to Blame-The
Fate of the Man Who Deliberately
Snaps the Bond Between His
Body and His Soul.

1 1HS AotCot oCriuoH StsCn Oub
the press by Rev. 7. Dewitt Talmage
was upon the subject of Suicide" the
text being from Acts xvi. 27-2S: "He
drew out his sword and would have
killed himself, supposing that the
prisoners had been fled. But Paul cried
with loud voice, saying: Do thyseli
no harm" The sermon is as follows:
Here is a would-be suicide arrested
in his deadly attempt. He was sher.
if, and, according to the Roman law, a
bailiff himself must suffer the punish
ment due an escaped prisoner; and il
the prisoner breaking Jail was sen.
fenced to be endungeoned for three OF
four years, then the sheriff must be
endungeoned for three or four years
and if the prisoner breaking Jail was
to have suffered capital punishment,
then the sheriff must suffer capital
punishment.
The sheriff had received especial
charge to keep sharp lookout for Paul
and Silas. The government had not
had confidence in bolts and bars to
keep safe these two clergymcn, about
whom there seemed to be something
strange and supernatural.
Sure enough, by miraculous power,
they are free. and the sheriff, waking
out of a sound sleep, and supposing
these ministers have run away, and
knowing that they were to die for
preaching Christ, and realizing that he
must therefore die. rather than go I'M
der the executioner's AK on the morrow,
and suffer public disgrace, resolves to
precipitate his own decease. But be-
fore the sharp, keen, glittering dagger
| of the sheriff could strike his heart, one
of the unloosened prisoners arrests the
blade by the command: ''Do myself
no harm"
In olden time, and where Christian
ity had not interfered with it, suicide
was considered honorable and sign
of courage. Demosthenes poisoned
himself when told that Alexander's
ambassador had demanded the sur
render of the Athenian orators.
Isocrates killed himself rather than
surrender to Philip of Macedon9 Cato,
rather than submit to Julius Caesar.
took his own life, and after three times
his "OultoS iittu DCCh uIcSSttl. tOEc
them open and persisted. Mithridates
killed himself rather than submit to
Pompey. the conqueror. Hannibal de-
stroyed his life by poison from his
ring, considering life unbearable. Ly-
curgus suicide, Brutus suicide.
After the disaster of Moscow Napoleon
always carried with him preparation
of opium, and one night his servant
heard the eX-emperor arise. put some
thing in glass and drink it, and soon
after the groans aroused all the attend
ants, and it was only through utmost
medical skill he was resuscitated from
the stupor of the opiate.
Times have changed, and vet the
American conscience needs to be toned
up on the subject of suicide Have
you seen paper in the last month that
did not announce the passage out of
life by ones own behest? Defaulters.
alarmed at the idea of exposure, quit
life precipitately. Men losing large
fortunes go out of the world because
they cannot endure earthly existence.
Frustrated affection, domestic infe-
licity, dyspeptic Impotence, anger, re-
morse. envy, jealousy. restitution, mis-
anthropy are considered sufficient
causes for absconding from this life by
paris green, by laudanum, by bella
donna, by Othello's dagger, by halter,
by leap from the abutment of bridge,
by firearms. More cases of '.felo de
Sc" in the last two years of the worlds
existence. The evil is more and more
spreading.
A pulpit not long ago expressed some
doubt as to whether there was really
anything wrong about quitting this
life when it became disagreeable, and
there are found in respectable circles
people apologize for the crime which
Paul in the text arrested. | shall show
you before get through that suicide
is the worst of all crimes, and l shall
lift warning unmistakable. But in
the early part of the sermon wish to
admit that some of the best Chris
.ians that have ever lived have
committed self-destruction, but al
ways in dementia, and not response
bic. 1 have no more doubt about
their eternal felicity than have of the
Christian who dies in his bed in the
Gelirium of typhoid fever. While the
shock of the catastrophe is very great, /
I charge all those who have had Chris |
han friends under cerebral alteration |
step off the boundaries of this life, to |
have no doubt about their happiness. |
The dear Lord took them right out of |
their dazed and frenzied state into per-
~ cot Chrscf
the insane you may know from the |
kind way he treated the demoniac of |
Gadara and the child lunatic, and the |
potency with which he hushed the |
tempests either of sea or brain.
Scotland, the land prolific of intel |
lectual giants had none grander than
Hugh Miller. Great for science and |
great. for God. He came out of the /
best Highland blood, and he was a
descendant of Donald Roy. a man
for his piety and the rare gift
of second sight. His attachments,
elm bling up as he did from the quarry
and the wall of the stonemason, drew
forth the astonished admiration of
BucklaEd and Mulchison. the scient-
iSts, and DIR. Chalmers. the theologian,
and held universities spellbound.
while he told them the story of what
ne had seen of God in the old red sand
stone.
That man did more than any being
hat ever lived to show that the God of
The hills is the God of the Bible, and
ne struck his tuning forks on the
-ocks of Cromarty until he brought
yeology and theology accordant in di-
zine worship. His two books, entitled:
Footprints of the Creator" and the
Testimony of the Rocks" proclaimed