The Daily News. THURSDAY, MAY 5. ABOUT SUICIDE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 381, 5 May 1910, Page 4

The Daily News. THURSDAY, MAY 5. ABOUT SUICIDE.

There is appalling matter for reflection | in the cables recently received on the: ■ number of cliikl suicides in Russia. Itj is ore of the unhappy conditions of ad-1 vancing civilisation that suicide becomes j more common, just as insanity does, and it gives pause to the optimist if with j increasing prosperity and comfort the number should also increase of human beings who find their existence intolerable, We say "if," because in reality it is not the increasing prosperity of civilisation that has any relation to the number of suicides. Among the submerged, the "people of the abyss," those derelicts who wander homeless and hungry in the great cities of the world, there are not many cases of .self-destruc-tion. One finds it more often among men who have at least a small income than among the utterly destitute. The cause is not due to any sharp contrast between the prosperous and penniless. It is due to the increase of education, the greater mental strain on us, perha'ps to the lessened superstition, -wlaich. in the form of crude religion, kept many of the weak from facing the uncertainties of the great Beyond. In a rude and primitive people one seldom hears of suicide. In the duller mind and more leisurely existence of a rural community it is rare. The yokel does not commit suicide. He has not the imagine, tiou, and he feels less acute!}' the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." But in a town-bred generation, whose nerves are racked, where the brain is continually active and likely to be weary, it is then that some imaginary burden seems to be too great to be borne. We lose, amid the storm and stress of a town life, our sense of perspective, so that, to nerves already worn, to a brain fevered by much brooding, some trifle takes on a vital importance. Civilisation increases our mental perception, both for joy and sorrow. We are capable of feeling more pleasure, and more pain. Our senses are quickened, and our powers of resistance lessened, and then some little kink in the overwrought brain disturbs our balance. But that children should thus defy the strongest law of nature is terrible to contemplate. Happily amongst us British, at home no less than in this Dominion, such cases are almost unknown, but in Germany and Russia child suicide is increasingly common. Professor Albert Eulenberg, a celebrated German neurologist, recently published an ' article in which he stated that between the years 1880 and 1903 there were 1152 cases of suicide among boys and girls attending German schools. Of these no ■ less than 812 'were children under 15 years of age. The causes were usually of'the most trivial, but, as in Russia, generally the failure to pass an examination. For various reasons, the failure

to pass a school examination in Germany entails more serious consequences than with us. Promotions to a higher class take place, we believe, only once a year, and failure in this, combined with the military service and severer regulations as to age limits for various examinations, may often materially atfect a boy's career in atter life. But even so, and making every allowance, it is impossible that the actual results of a school failure should be so great as to impel a healthy boy to take his life. Of course, the answer may be made that the boy is not healthy, mentally, but that is only shifting the question, for it does not explain why there should lie so many children of unsound moral or mental strength in a virile nation like the Germans, reputed phlegmatic and unemotional. In Russia one mi"* 1 ■perhaps, explain it more easily. The Slav is of melancholy temperament, and barely civilised from the European standpoint. It is possible that with advancing education the children might realise the apparent hopelessness of the struggle of the educated classes against a corrupt Government, and so, in despair, might take their lives. But it is a lamentable thing that children, at an aee when boundless hope and belief fill the mind, should be so neurotic and morbid as to see only the worst and fear to face it. The statistics of suicide show an increase in every country, and it is Temarkable that, roughly, -women form only from 15 to 30 per cent, of the total number. Whether this is due to the fact that women have greater moral strength, or worry less, or have less to worry them, one hardly knows. No doubt the gentler instinct of the sex recoils from taking their own life, fust as naturally as taking another's life. The very form their self-destruction usually takes, namely, drowning, shows a more passive act than the more violent methods adopted by men. The British, it is comforting to note, stand about the lowest in the international percentages of suicides, but in all countries the rate is higher among the educated than among the uneducated. In the humanitarian times, when the unfit, the criminal, and the imbecile, are so sedulously kept alive and allowed to perpetuate their kind, suicide is about the only manner in which civilisation eliminates those unfit to bear the increasing strain, though unfortunately many of those who succumb to the struggle are rather the victims of temporary weakness than of inherent inability to survive.

CURRENT TOPICS A GREAT ORGANISATION. That the public do not gauge the value of the Salvation Army by ( thu amount of brass music it emits or the literary value of its "testimony'" is emphasised every year by the organisation's balancesheet. Quite apart from the religious aspect of the "Army's" work, its most commendable feature is its recognition that a .woman or a man or a child has a body to be fed as well as a soul to "save." Under the leadership of ttie eminent General Booth, the Salvatioji Army has made itself absolutely indispensable. It tackles work that no other religious organisation had the "stomach'' to tackle; it battled against public ridicule and simply insisted on saving bodies. Its ancient vilifier.s became its ardent supporters. The amazing extent of its operations —all »rown from the tiny shoot planted l>y Mr. Booth twenty-live years ago—is bounded only by the confines of the habitable world; the ''Army" speaks all languages, tackles all men, all businesses, and is the finest example of unselfishness extant. Church ''armies'' have failed, because sound without deed must always fail. The Salvation Aimv has not failed because its people thought it worth while to make a definite business of saving bodies and giving the under dog a chance. What the Australasian Governments think of the Salvatioji Army is shown by the figures published this morning, showing that the aggregated subsidies total nearly £II,OOO a year. Its many industries bring much money to the funds, but there has never been any question that the whole of the money earned, donated, or given in subsidy is used solely for the extension of the '"Army" work. The social institutions .of the "Army" are now indispensable. The Governments, through the courts of law, use. them for children, women, and men. The percentage of cures effected is splendid, and as far as the children's homes are concerned, they give the youngsters a chance that would otherwise be absent to tight the battle of life without handicap. Throughout New Zealand Judges and Magistrates are unanimous in praise of the work done by the "Army," and it is not to b# forgotten that the devoted work done by the New Zealand staff and its officers throughout the Dominion is not done for self-aggrandisement—for no "•Army" oflicer is paid a heavy salary. The two provincial commanders in New Zealand (Colonel Knight and Brigadier Albiston) are in reality keen business men whose organising capacity might earn them handsorfie positions in commercial life. The ''Army" is a fine example of discipline, esprit de corps, and a whole-hearted concentration of forces on .one point —the betterment of tile physically need}-, the outcast, and the unfortunate. The organisation is to-day honored throughout the world, and its initiatory trouules are but a bad dream.

AX APPEAL FOll ENTHUSIASM. Mr. W. Amtnirv made an appeal to the provincialism of Xorth Taranaki people in Tuesday's issue of the Daily News, j and it is sincerely to he hoped that the points he made will be fully considered by folk who need convincing that this district tan do as well as any district in New Zealand on the showground. Mr. Anilmry's appeal was personal and intimate. He holds, as everyone knowing human nature must hold., that a direct appeal to the. individual is ,the truest method of obtaining the interest of the whole community. Thus, if one could count upon the general enthusiasm of all the children in every family in North Taranaki in regard to the show, one would be sure of the enthusiasm of their parents. Nothing spreads more quicklv than enthusiasm--except bad news. People are very imitative. One ivivid enthusiast in a small community is often respdtisible for an emdemie of enthusiasm. If Mrs. JoneA makes sure of letting all the neighbors know that she will exhibit some of her hard work at the New Plymouth show. Mesdames Smith, Robinson, While, (Ireen, and Black will purely enter something, ■ it' only to show that they can beat'her. The same feeling .will also exist among the men and the children. : It is not much help for doleful persons to ask. '"What's the good of North Taranaki having a show if .South Taranaki is holding one?" The good is in trying to beat outsiders in the value of exhibits, the increase of skill made necessary by all competitions, and the advertisement that such exhibits will give to the, district. Somebody told the News the other day that the Manawatu show was largely a Taranaki show—and so it is. Why not give 'Taranaki exhibitors at Palmerston North a chance to do their ■best in New Plymouth for New Plymonth's sake, ibut particularly for the sake of Taranaki. After all, these shows are a national concern, and illustrate the enterprise and energy and the skill of the .people as well as"the productiveness of the district. But besides good soil and strong people we want enthusiasm, and Mr. Anilmry's anneal to the individual is by way of -isV i.j for his enthusiasm. We, too, appeal for enthusiasm, because even from the commercial standpoint enthusiasm is i ■<> motive power that drives enterprise to success.

A MATTER OF GROCERIES. Most small events that happen in Auckland bring in their train !o<-a! attacks of sentimentalism ami emotionalism. To-day the whole community is disturbed because of Mr. Knvyett. tomorrow -beenuse a shipping ■company has selected another port of call, the'next, day because some furniture has been sold, the day after because it would rather have an old rattletrap buildimr sixty years of age than a new University College. Auckland is quite a rich place, and is at the present moment crying bitterly because when Government House noes the butchers and 'bakers won't have His K::<-eiien<-y's ncffisional custom. Auckland's I'niversi .v College is quite unworthy of the city's magnificence or the fact that AneklaVl is the hub of the universe and the admired of Christendom. Even if Auckland kept its ancient (!overnme:it iToi--Lord Islington would not mr-esvi'-ily live there. He might, nrefer to live in New Plymouth or Stratford—or anywhere. The Northern citv si <>n>.s to 1 e in a constant state of indicia'i >1 at <!».. injustices done to it, and the last insult added by the Government an ofl'er to raze a rattletrap building to the grouriM and to substitute ,-i new 7*niversi f v (ol'lege. A deputation led bv Mr. Clover and Captain Knvvett should wait on the Premier as soon as possible to protest in the most vigorous terms at the awful indignation suffered by the butchers and bakers of the Queen City.

a nn;sT boom. A!' hooms hurst, and most hoonia are caused by persons who have never seen t !'<- commodity they nre booming, l'ptnin lms lately '*one mad on rnhhpr, nid has iiourcd millions of noimds into tlir yreedv hands or' eoniiiierciiil erniiiii;ils. The British mvh'ic (nnd most other publics, too), in relation to are very much like sJict : n ic

tin- leader of the mob—they will jump into a river if lie jumps first. Tlie madnesses that seize whole communities are not to lie explained, and the individuals who -become mail are not to lie lilamed. It is inevitable tlwt. people should llo<'k to financial destruction at a signal, just as it is inevitable that one curious gazer will attract other curious gazers. Seeing that tens of thousands of people in Midland have been "let in" bv nn : >ber boonistcrs, it is a pity that primal methods could not he revived for a short time until the people had found the boonisters. The worst that, over -happens to a commercial thief is that he may pay a proportion of his illgottea train* m law costs. Xo criminal company promoter has ever been hanged bv the State.