Chapter 13

16Duverger de Haurane, abbot of St. Cyran, regarded as the founder of Port Royal, wrote, in the year 1608, a treatise on suicide, which has, says Voltaire, become one of the scarcest books in Europe.He says the decalogue forbids us to kill. In this precept, self-murder seems no less to be comprised than murder of our neighbour. But if there are cases in which it is allowable to kill our neighbour, there likewise are cases in which it is allowable to kill ourselves. We must not make an attempt upon our lives until we have consulted reason. The public authority, which holds the place of God, may dispose of our lives. The reason of man may likewise hold the place of the reason of God,—it is a ray of the eternal light.Voltaire, disposed as he was to advocate the right of committing suicide whenever a man considered death preferable to a dishonourable life, had sufficient sagacity to see through the glaring sophistry of St. Cyran’s reasoning on this point. The same author says, “A man may kill himself for the good of his prince, for that of his country, or for that of his relations.”

16Duverger de Haurane, abbot of St. Cyran, regarded as the founder of Port Royal, wrote, in the year 1608, a treatise on suicide, which has, says Voltaire, become one of the scarcest books in Europe.

He says the decalogue forbids us to kill. In this precept, self-murder seems no less to be comprised than murder of our neighbour. But if there are cases in which it is allowable to kill our neighbour, there likewise are cases in which it is allowable to kill ourselves. We must not make an attempt upon our lives until we have consulted reason. The public authority, which holds the place of God, may dispose of our lives. The reason of man may likewise hold the place of the reason of God,—it is a ray of the eternal light.

Voltaire, disposed as he was to advocate the right of committing suicide whenever a man considered death preferable to a dishonourable life, had sufficient sagacity to see through the glaring sophistry of St. Cyran’s reasoning on this point. The same author says, “A man may kill himself for the good of his prince, for that of his country, or for that of his relations.”

17It is evident that the great dramatist considered that suicide was opposed to the divine will.“Against self-slaughterThere is a prohibition so divine,That cravens my weak hand.”Again, he says—“Or that the Everlasting had not fixedHis canon ’gainst self-slaughter!”

17It is evident that the great dramatist considered that suicide was opposed to the divine will.

“Against self-slaughterThere is a prohibition so divine,That cravens my weak hand.”

“Against self-slaughter

There is a prohibition so divine,

That cravens my weak hand.”

Again, he says—

“Or that the Everlasting had not fixedHis canon ’gainst self-slaughter!”

“Or that the Everlasting had not fixed

His canon ’gainst self-slaughter!”

18Warder’s “Letters from the Northumberland.”

19London Medical and Surgical Journal, vol. v. p. 51.

20In a table given by Professor Caspar, of Berlin, one hundred and three cases of suicide are attributed to mental affections; thirty of these may be classed under this head, and thirty-two under that of fear and despondency combined.

21The massacre of St. Bartholomew lasted seven days, during which more than 5000 persons were slain in Paris, and from 40 to 50,000 in the country. During the execution, the king betrayed neither pity nor remorse, but fired with his long gun at the poor fugitives across the river; and on viewing the body of Coligni on a gibbet, he exulted with a fiendish malignity. In early life, this monster had been noted for his cruelty: nothing gave him greater pleasure than cutting off the heads of asses or pigs with a single blow from hiscouteau de chasse. After the massacre, he is said to have contracted a singularly wild expression of feature, and to have slept little and waked in agonies. He attributed his thirst for human blood to the circumstance of his mother having at an early period of his life familiarized his mind with the brutal sport of hunting bullocks, and with all kinds of cruelty. It is recorded that, when dying, he actually sweated blood.

22Hist. Eccles. edit. Duaci, 1622, pp. 643-4.

23Meaning the Duke of Gloucester.

24King Henry, Act 3.

25Dr. Johnson’s Rasselas.

26Goëthe, in allusion to one of his own early attachments.

27Love, it is said, often turns the brains of the Italians, even the men. M. Esquirol says, “Frenchmen seldom go mad from love. A Frenchman often kills himself in a sally of passion and feeling, but is seldom in love long enough to go mad about it.”

28“Love.”

29O’Meara’s “Voice from St. Helena,” vol. i. p. 57.

30“Life of Napoleon.” vol. viii. p. 244.

31It is worthy of remark that the judge who condemned, as well as the disciple who betrayed, our Saviour, were both driven by despair to suicide. The fate of Judas is recorded in the Gospel; the concluding scenes in the life of Pontius Pilate are related by two learned historians (JosephusandEusebius.) The former says that “Pontius Pilate, after having exercised great cruelties in his government of Judæa, was, before the Roman Emperor (Caligula), stripped of all his dignities and fortunes, and banished to Gaul, where it is said he suffered such extreme hardships of body and despair of mind, that, after lingering for two years, he became his own executioner.”

32Lessing.

33On Lunatic Asylums.

34Vide Mathews’ Life, by his widow, vol. ii. p. 158.

35Dr. Haslam.

36“Revue Médicale,” Dec. 1821.

37Under the heathen mythology, it was believed that the struggles of death continued till Proserpine had cropped the hair on the crown of the head, as victims were treated at the altar. Virgil has preserved this opinion in the fourth book of the Æneid, where he gives so fine a picture of the dying agonies of Dido.

38It is only by reasoning physiologically that we can conclude that the act of dying is not a painful process. In proportion as death seizes its victim, so must consciousness be suspended. What can be more painful to the beholder than to witness the convulsive struggles, and the foaming at the mouth, of a person in an epileptic fit, who, when restored to consciousness, has no recollection of what has occurred? He remembers the premonitory indications, and that is all. Death is but an epileptic struggle. A phenomenon attends the dying moment which we do not recollect to have seen noticed. A man who fell into the water, and who rose several times to the surface, had a consciousness of the hopelessness and awfulness of his situation; he felt that death was inevitable. With this conviction on his mind, he saw presented to him a picture of his past life; the minutest action in which he had been engaged was brought in a kind of tableau before him. Circumstances that had long been forgotten were conjured from his brain, and he had a bird’s-eye view of his past career. Possibly, this may occur to every person at the moment of dying. The expressions of those placed under such circumstances would indicate as much.

39Foreign Quarterly Review, vol. xvi.

40Vol. xxi. for 1837.

41It is related by Lord Bacon, in his “Historia Vitæ et Mortis,” that a friend of his, who was particularly anxious to ascertain whether criminals suffered much pain in undergoing the sentence of the law, on one occasion suspended himself by the neck, having for that purpose thrown himself off a stool, on which he supposed he could readily remount, when he had carried his experiment sufficiently far to satisfy his curiosity. The report goes on to state, that the loss of consciousness which followed would have led to a fatal termination of the experiment, had not a friend accidentally entered the apartment in time to save the life of the adventurous experimentalist. Foderé relates a similar incident of one of his fellow-students. This young man, after an argument respecting the cause of death in hanging, resolved personally to gratify his curiosity, by passing a ligature round his neck, and attaching it to a hook behind the door. To accomplish this, he had raised himself on tip-toe, and now gradually brought his heels to the ground. He soon lost all consciousness, but was cut down by a companion, who discovered him, in a state of insensibility, very soon after the commencement of the experiment, and by the prompt application of remedial measures he was finally recovered. From cases of this description we learn that the first effect experienced in hanging is the appearance of a dazzling light before the eyes, accompanied by tingling in the ears. These sensations are, however, momentary, for insensibility and death rapidly close the scene.

42Gazette Litteraire.

43Foreign Literary Gazette.

44In 1806, upwards of sixty voluntary deaths took place at Rouen, during June and July, the air being at that time remarkably humid and warm; and in July and August of the same year, more than three hundred were committed at Copenhagen, the constitution of the atmosphere presenting the same characteristics as it did at Rouen. The year 1793, presented in the town of Versailles alone the horrible spectacle of thirteen hundred suicides.

45This was Philip Mordaunt, cousin-german to the celebrated Earl of Peterborough, so well known to all European courts, and who boasted of having seen more postillions and kings than any other man. Mordaunt was young, handsome, of noble blood, highly educated, and beloved by those who knew him. He resolved to die. Preparatory to his doing so, he wrote to his friends, paid his debts, and even made some verses on the occasion. He said his soul was tired of his body, and when we are dissatisfied with our abode, it is our duty to quit it. He put a pistol to his head and blew out his brains. An uninterrupted course of good fortune was the only motive that could be assigned for this suicide.

46M. Falret.

47Dict. des Sciences Med., vol. liii.

48Previous to Cowper’s attempt at suicide, he had fallen into the company of two sophists, who both advanced claims to the right of self-destruction, and whose fallacious arguments won him to their pernicious views, which were, besides, aided by his recollection of a certain book containing similar reasoning, which, however weak in itself, now seemed to his disordered mind irrefragable.

49Dr. J. Johnson.

50Vide Dr. Conolly.

51Wordsworth.

52Thepossunt quia posse videunturfeeling is not sufficiently encouraged by medical philosophers in treating mental affections.

53History of Music.

54Edinburgh Medical Trans.

55Lib. xii. cap. 51.

56When Pope was on his death-bed, Bolingbroke observed to the weeping attendants, “I have known Pope these thirty years; he was the kindest-hearted man in the world.”

57Prior to the more urgent symptoms developing themselves, he appeared to be endeavouring to recollect Dr. B., and addressed him as Dr. Death.

58A medical student, twenty years of age, was seized with mania, arising from the presence of worms in the intestines. He felt the most acute pains in the different regions of his body, appearing to him as if persons were driving arrows into him, more particularly in the palms of his hands and soles of his feet. This caused him to utter most distressing cries, to seek to be alone, and prevented him from walking. The intolerable pains and madness left him as soon as the worms were expelled.

59“When powerful feelings or passions are in active operation, in the insane or in the sane, they draw the muscles of the face into particular forms; and, if they continue for a length of time to be greatly predominant, they impress upon the countenance an appearance indicative of the character. This is felt and acted upon unconsciously in the common intercourse of life. A good countenance is a letter of recommendation; and we have, in spite of ourselves, an unfavourable feeling towards a stranger where this is absent. Now in the generality of suicidal cases, the desponding feelings are in constant and active operation; hence there is usually a melancholy and gloomy expression of countenance. This arises from no mysterious cause peculiar to insanity, but is perfectly intelligible on common physiognomical principles; but there are numerous instances where the most experienced physician would be unable to detect, by inspection only, the slightest mark of either a disposition to suicide or insanity. The absence of this expression must not, therefore, induce us to suppose that this disposition does not exist.”—Sir W. Ellis.

60Ellis on Insanity.

61Indications of Insanity.

62Journ. Gen. de Médecine, Juillet, 1822.

63“Pain is an evil; death, the deprivation of every hope or comfort in this life. No man in his senses will burn, drown, or stab himself; for these all produce what are called evils; neither can any of these actions be executed without the probability of pain in the convulsive action or struggles of death. As no rational being will voluntarily give himself pain, or deprive himself of life, which certainly, while human beings preserve their senses, must be acknowledged evils, it follows that every one who commits suicide is indubitablynon compos mentis, not able to reason justly, but is under the influence of false images of the mind; and therefore suicideshould ever be considered an act of insanity.”—Dr. Rowley.

64Lowness of spirits ought to be regarded and treated as insanity, says Ellis, and not dreaded as its forerunner. For it is at this stage that suicide is resorted to. Should this not be the case, specific hallucinations may speedily appear, and the agony of mind will be endured as a consequence of bankruptcy, the unfaithfulness of a friend, the persecutions of enemies, or the ravages of an incurable disease. No demonstration of the untenableness of such grounds, no picture of brighter and happier circumstances, will avail to refute or encourage. The sufferer clings to his hoarded misery. There is generally great loss of physical strength in cases of this kind, and the pale emaciated countenance, dull and sunken eye, and listless dejected form, tell as plainly as the querulous complaint, or the long intricate description of sorrows and anticipated evils, to what class the patient belongs.

65Vide Lord Dover’s Life of Frederick, and Ray on Med. Juris.

66Dr. J. Johnson.

67Hill on Insanity.

68This was no doubt an hallucination of the senses. On another occasion, when in the House of Commons, Lord Castlereagh fancied he saw the same “Radiant Boy.” Does not this fact establish that his lordship’s senses were not always in a healthy condition? It is possible that when impelled to suicide he laboured under some mental delusion.

69Notes to Metzger.

70Annales de Hyg. pub. et de Méd. Lég. tom. v. p. 156.

71We have availed ourselves of Dr. Taylor’s translation of the particulars of the prince’s death, which are recorded with much minuteness in the “Annales d’Hygiène Publique, et de Médecine Légale.”

72Foderé, vol. iii. p. 167; from the Causes Célèbres. See also Grimm’s Historical and Literary Memoirs, (from 1753 to 1769,) vol. ii. pp. 41, 117, and 166.

73Travels in Asia, Africa, &c.

74To which may be added, anticipation of punishment, or disgrace from misconduct.

75Méd. Légale, iv. § 948; and Smith on Med. Jurisprudence.

76The committee made no report. Lord Delamere undertook to draw it up, but before he did so, parliament was prorogued. Bishop Burnet, who has given the particulars of the case with great minuteness, says, he had no doubt that the Earl of Essex committed suicide. He was subject to fits of deep melancholy, and maintained the lawfulness of suicide. This is also Hume’s opinion.

77This is confirmed by the fact that within the jurisdiction of the metropolitan police, the two districts in which the greatest number of suicides were committed or attempted, in 1836 or 1837, were those of the Regent’s Park and Stepney, through both of which the Regent’s Canal runs. This circumstance tends to shew that drowning is the mode of suicide most frequently resorted to in London, and that a canal offers greater facilities for that purpose than the river.

78The disposition to suicide may be manifested very early in life. M. Falret knew a boy, twelve years old, who hanged himself because he was only twelfth in his class. A similar case occurred at the Westminster school about seventeen years ago. Harriet Cooper, of Huden Hill, Rowly-Regis, aged ten years and two months, upon being reproved for a trifling fault, went upstairs, after exhibiting symptoms of grief by sighing and sobbing, and hung herself with a pair of cotton braces from the rail of a tent bed. A girl named Green, eleven years old, drowned herself in the New River, from the fear of correction for a trifling fault. Dr. Schlegel states, on the authority of Casper, that in Berlin, between the years 1812 and 1821, no less than thirty-one children, of twelve years of age and under, committed suicide, either because they were tired of existence or had suffered some trifling chastisement.

79“Oh, supreme God, who inhabitest the highest heavens, heal my afflictions; as with the wretched in hell, the joyful in heaven, shew mercy to the guilty.”

80Dr. Moore’s Travels through France, vol. i. let. 32.

81Hufeland’s Journal.

82Hist. de l’Acad. Roy., 1769.

83Paris and the Parisians, by Mrs. Trollope.

84Voltaire observes, that if Creech had been translating Ovid, he would not have committed suicide.

85We refer our readers, for a minute and deeply interesting account of this unfortunate woman’s career, to a work from which we have gleaned the above facts; the particulars of her life will be perused with great interest.—Videi> “Memoirs of Mirabeau, by himself,” vol. iii. chap. xi.

86Vide Frontispiece.

87A singular case of this kind was brought under the notice of the Westminster Medical Society by Dr. Stone, as an argument in favour of the possibility of a person committing suicide when in possession of a sane mind.

T. C. Savill, Printer, 107, St. Martin’s Lane, Charing Cross.

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