Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1924-05-03
SUICIDE
BY DR.. Frank Crane

BY DR.. Frank Crane
IT AM an old man, over seventy" writes a
man from Nebraska to me. 81 own a
nice little farm and am financially
we'll fixed yet am very much dissatisfied
On account Of poor health and home trouble,
life seems a burden to me- Suicide is upper
most in my mind. I cannot get rid of it,
much as | try yet the idea is horrible to
me. My greatest trouble is poor sleep"
He wants me to tell him something that will
help him. Alas! would that could! | know
too WELL however, that every mans cure is
in his hands The soul is never freed
from its meshes of misery except by its own
efforts.
Suicide? 1t is the negation of the love of
life. Whatever says of life one says also
of suicide, which is the opposite of life.
The object of all my preachment is to
strengthen and make grow in health the life
instinct All I have ever written is an anti
dote for suicide.
7 want men to love the and the sea
little children and animals, each other and
women. SO long as one loves one wants to
live, even if it's only a pipe and a glass
1t is when all other desires die out that the
desire for death, which is but the ash of de-
sire, remains on the hearts hearthstone.
To cure my man l would give him some
thing to love- even dog.
this that the mind is obsessed by one idea;
it is so to speak, driven into corner by
some one trouble group of troubles; it is
at bay, it cannot ESCAPE. And the situation
is peculiarly aggravated when one cannot
sleep, for sleep is the greatest of all cities of
refuge
The only known way of escaping haunting
idea is by diversion, that is, by occupying
ones self with something else The suicidal
mania is the paralysis of ones power to
change the subject 1t is the abnormal
diseased fevered condition of ones power to
concentrate the mind.
II POSSIBLE therefore CD work, work hard
at something you ought to do, work until
very tired (2) play, at anything you be
absorbed in, games of cards, preferably out
door amusements, such as fishing, hunting,
golf, but whatever it is play hard and until
exhausted; 60 go away, break up the reg
uarity of life, in which the absorbing idea
has got itself intrenched, plunge into the
whirlpool of the city, or into the adventures
Of the Wilderness don't sit and die like
poisoned rat in a hole"
Just what is the right thing to do, you will
never know. All you do is to come
near to it as you can. Examine your heart
Find what you love, or love. Give your
self to it.
Above ALL seek to develop the highest keen.
est form of love known, that is, the desire to
sire indulge it, devote your mind, time and
substance to it. For it is the most life-gvng
sentiment a human being can have.
Set about making the little children Of your
place happy, even some one little child. Hunt
up the wretched, the downand-out, the failures
in your community and undertake to help
them to be friend to them, not only to give
them your money, but your attention. If it
bores you keep it up till you learn to like it.
This is the best known method Of curing the
obessed soul of its mania. 1t is better to hunt
souls than lions.
For after all suicide is the climax Of selfish.
ness, it is self-attention, self-pity self-study
brought to the point of fever
Quit thinking of yourself. Think of others
Only so can the sore self become sane and
sound.
"Sterne says that if he were in a desert
he would love some CYPRESS" writes Shelly
SO soon as the want Of power to love is dead
man becomes the living sepulchre of him
self. What is love? Ask him who
lives in this 1ifp2"