EDUCATION, RELIGION, AND MORALS.
Quite closely connected with the consideration of these influences,
are others partly dependent on them, the manners and customs of a
population, the extent of civilisation, and education, and their
religious and moral state. The manners and customs are to a great
extent peculiar to each race, while the members of each race are all
apt to take on an amount of civilisation by means of education, which
varies in a quite indefinite manner. No amount of argument or inquiry
seems, however, to invalidate the statement that a preponderant rate
of suicide, and a high rate of madness exist in countries the farthest
advanced in our modern ideas of civilization, and in education, and in
modern modes of thought.
The intensely complicated state of modern society lays ambushes for
us of myriads of dangers, difficulties, annoyances, illnesses, and
worries, which to the denizen of a savage country are entirely unknown.
That the influence of modern education is to increase the suicide-rate
is proved by statistics of many sorts; from tables of the percentage
amongst those “able to read and write,” and the reverse; from the
conscription tables of France and Italy, and from the fact that those
countries which possess the higher standard of general culture, furnish
the largest contingent of voluntary deaths, other data being equal, or
allowed for.
M. Brouc, indeed, went so far, many years ago, as to affirm that, given
the number of persons in the public schools of a country, he could
deduce the number of suicides which took place there annually.
I subjoin a comparison between the percentage of population at school
and the suicide rate in Italy, tabulated by Morselli:-
────────────────────┬────────────────┬──────────────
│ Scholars per │ Suicides per
──── │ Hundred │ Million
│ Inhabitants. │ Inhabitants.
────────────────────┼────────────────┼──────────────
1863-64 │ 5·44 │ 27·2
1865-66 │ 5·59 │ 28·7
1867-68 │ 6·05 │ 31·0
1869-70 │ 6·06 │ 27·5
1871-72 │ 6·44 │ 32
1873-74 │ 6·80 │ 36·5
1875-76 │ 7·15 │ 35·3
1877 │ 7·45 │ 40·6
────────────────────┴────────────────┴──────────────
The same effect is exhibited by tables showing the relative numbers of
newspapers published in each State; the more numerous these are, the
higher the voluntary death-rate; and in States where the literature
is of the higher type, scientific and critical, we find, _mutatis
mutandis_, a higher rate than where the journals simply contain news
and politics.
Brierre de Boismont gives a classification of 4,595 French suicides, in
respect to education; a _résumé_ follows:─
────────────────────────────┬─────────┬─────────┬────────
──── │ Male. │ Female. │ TOTAL.
────────────────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┼────────
Well instructed │ 467 │ 106 │ 573
Read and write well │ 601 │ 188 │ 789
Read, but write ill │ 1,145 │ 511 │ 1,656
Read, but do not write │ 1 │ 2 │ 3
Illiterate │ 36 │ 29 │ 65
Data unknown │ 969 │ 540 │ 1,509
────────────────────────────┴─────────┴─────────┴────────
In respect to England, the Report of the Registrar General for 1880
contains a statement, which I subjoin, of the effect of education on
the proportion of voluntary deaths, calculated on the averages of the
ten years 1869-78, with regard to the numbers of adults who were able
to sign their names in the marriage registers.
Counties where 27% } 57·5 million of
were unable to sign the } inhabitants.
register }
Counties where less } 69·2 per million of
than 27% but more } inhabitants.
than 17% were unable }
Counties where less } 80·2 per million of
than 17% were unable } inhabitants.
But, on the other hand, the proportions of crime against the person
were the lowest on record, and the better educated counties showed the
minimum.
The rule that suicide rate increases with the amount of education is
more generally observed than almost any other tendency which we have
to consider; and it is probably an accurate statement without any
reservation; however unpalatable such a dictum may be, I am not aware
of any state where the reverse holds good. The general opinion has
always been that this rule is only true when the form of education is
faulty; the pages of many authors will show the argument that secular
knowledge must be judiciously combined with religious teaching, or
else such a result may appear; but the facts seem to lead us to the
awkward dilemma, that either the religious teaching is seldom duly
administered, or else that even piety is unavailing as a deterrent.
Prophets have not been lacking for several years past, who have never
ceased to warn us that our present system of removing Christian
teaching from the necessary curriculum of our public schools, will
inevitably increase crime and suicide in the rising generation.
And I fear there can be no doubt that this coming generation will show
a higher rate, but whether the diminution of religious instruction will
be the cause, will be open to question.
Personally, and speaking with reference to the masses of the
population, I think it is likely to cause such an increase; because,
although it may be preferable for well-educated men and women to
confess to honest doubt, in preference to acquiescence in a form
of faith which they cannot heartily hold; still, in minds of less
development, for whom a thorough education is impossible, greater
stability of character is ensured by an early inculcated religious
conviction of the sanctity of life, and an idea of the duty of waiting
on Providence to guide our concerns.
THE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION.
It is impossible to deny that, in respect to the influence of religion
on the proportions of suicide in Europe, the maximum rate constantly
falls to Protestant States, to the Roman Catholic next, then the Greek
Church, and, lastly, the minimum falls to the Jews.
An average, estimated from a large collection of numbers by Morselli,
shows that the ratio is 58 per million in Catholic States, 190 per
million in Protestant States, and in the Greek Church 40 per million;
but the low suicide rate of the Slavonic races renders conclusions
as to the Greek Church most unreliable; but it seems to the author
that this is not an accurate deduction from the relative numbers, the
proportion allotted to Protestant countries being much too high.
Legoyt gives Catholics 62, Protestants 102, Greek Church 36, Jews 48,
and this seems an estimate more near the truth. Curiously enough,
Catholics far exceed Protestants in the statistics of total crime in
all countries.
With regard to the Jews, we are met by the difficulty of the
coincidence of race and religion, in the most marked form the world
has ever seen. The Jews are undoubtedly more liable to lunacy than
are Christians; in Bavaria, for example, there is one lunatic to 908
Catholics, 967 Protestants, and 514 Jews.
History renders it quite certain that in the days of Jewish purity, and
in the time of the kings up to the Babylonish captivity, the number
of suicides was very small. Self-destruction is not even mentioned in
the Pentateuch as a crime; it was apparently thought that the command,
“thou shall not kill,” obviously included it.
In later days the number increased; after the close of Old Testament
history, when the Jews became more mixed with other nations, it became
common. Many killed themselves in the Roman siege of Jerusalem, as
Josephus narrates; in 1521, forty Jews were imprisoned in France,
doubtless for purposes of extortion; they all killed themselves [Contes
de Guillaume de Nangis, p. 96]. And although many Jews put an end to
their existence during the times of terrible persecution of the Middle
Ages, notably 1200-1400, they have always preserved a reputation
throughout Europe for contempt of suffering, and for the avoidance of
self-destruction.
Coming now to the present day once more, I introduce here a Table,
compiled chiefly from Italian and German sources, which shows the
comparative suicide rates, in juxtaposition to the comparative
proportions of Catholic and Protestant inhabitants; it is very
suggestive, and calls for a few words respecting the Protestant
Religion. Compare Morselli, Influenze Sociali, p. 218.
────────────┬────────────────────────┬────────┬───────────┬───────────
│ │ │ Catholics │Protestants
│ │Suicides│ per │ per
──── │ COUNTRY. │ per │ Thousand │ Thousand
│ │Million │ of │ of
│ │ │Inhabitants│Inhabitants
────────────┼────────────────────────┼────────┼───────────┼───────────
{│Spain │ 19 │ 999 │ 1
Catholic {│Portugal │ 16 │ 999 │ 1
Countries {│Italy │ 44 │ 995 │ 2
{│Belgium │ 90 │ 996 │ 4
{│France │ 216 │ 982 │ 16
│ │ │ │
Mixed {│Ireland │ 24 │ 757 │ 234
Catholics {│Bavaria │ 102 │ 713 │ 275
prevail {│Lower Alsace │ 130 │ 642 │ 322
{│Baden │ 157 │ 648 │ 331
│ │ │ │
{│Holland, South │ 50 │ 367 │ 613
Mixed {│Prussia │ 168 │ 331 │ 651
Protestants{│Holland, North │ 54 │ 278 │ 663
prevail {│Wurtemburg │ 172 │ 304 │ 687
{│Black Forest │ 160 │ 259 │ 736
{│Oldenburgh │ 200 │ 228 │ 764
│ │ │ │
{│Swiss Protestant Cantons│ 279 │ 68 │ 922
{│England │ 74 │ 53 │ 946
Protestant {│Hanover │ 150 │ 29 │ 960
Countries {│Saxony │ 469 │ 21 │ 976
{│Denmark │ 265 │ 1 │ 999
{│Sweden │ 101 │ 0 │ 1,000
{│Norway │ 75 │ 0 │ 1,000
────────────┴────────────────────────┴────────┴───────────┴───────────
The Protestant Religion, more than any other, is the Religion of
Idea; Faith, Hope, and Charity, all ideals, are its aims; it refuses
all material assistance; neither image, nor cross, nor beads, is an
essential.
The Protestant is taught to educate his consciousness, and is
responsible alone for his own actions; he cannot lean on the reed of
comfort from Masses, or on the idea that a confession of his sins to a
priest absolves him from the result of them.
Protestantism tends to develop individual research into its doctrines,
self-reflection, and inward communings with one’s consciousness.
Mysterious and sublime dogma is the object of contemplation, with the
intention that such idealism shall bring forth fruit as good actions.
This system, so grand and overpowering is, it appears, liable to
derange weak minds, especially when by neglecting a due share of
taking one’s own worldly responsibilities, such aspire to be devotees,
inspired by the highest ideals, but declining to translate good
intentions into good deeds, and the active exercise of charity, and
duty to their neighbours.
The extraordinary lateral offshoots of the church, which are seen at
intervals, the various forms of Revivalism, and the proceedings of the
Salvation Army, are all to a certain extent mischievous; although they
are, no doubt, productive of some benefit to those who still remain in
gross ignorance and vice. Yet such violent temporary ebullitions of
theological activity do certainly unhinge men’s minds, and do foster
a higher suicide rate. The more permanent, but less violent, waves
of change in religious matters do more good, and at the same time
less harm; I refer to the alternating popularity of such forms as
Evangelicalism and Ritualism. Almost all sudden changes, especially in
faith and violent emotions, are harmful.
In general, as a result of the sum of religious statistics, too
numerous and voluminous for quotation here, we may generalise and
say that Catholics incline to suicide through madness, following
their vices, while Protestants fly to suicide as relief from domestic
troubles, monetary anxieties, remorse for wasted opportunities, and
regret for the absence of hoped for results; they are also more liable
than Catholics to suicide following religious mania.
Extravagances in religion are sometimes a symptom of madness; at
others, extravagances in religion lead to madness in enfeebled minds.
MORALITY.
The morals of a state cannot fail to have a deep and lasting effect
on the amount of crime and madness, and hence on the suicide rate.
But it is by no means easy to prove by statistics the actual rate of
influence; the social customs and modes of life are so very various,
and the different laws of each state with regard to moral sins are so
different. At the same time it cannot be denied that several important
nations, among whom the virtues of social family life are specially
studied, have a very high suicide rate, such as the Germans and Danes.
The average of suicide is found generally to run hand in hand with that
of the ratio of total crime. Crime has increased for many years in all
European countries except Britain and Holland. Suicide has increased
in all except Norway and Russia, and but slightly in England and the
Netherlands. Where there is an average annual increase of suicide,
there is almost always seen a synchronous increase of crime.─Morselli.
Still some countries with very small suicide rate have a very large
proportion of crime, as Spain and Italy, which have an average of one
convict to 8,130 inhabitants; while Denmark has one convict to 110,474
inhabitants, and England has one convict to 132,791 inhabitants.
It has been found that in respect to the departments of France, the
maximum of homicides occurred in connection with the minimum of
suicides.─Despine.
Also in Italy, in those districts where crimes against property
predominate, suicides are more frequent than in those divisions where
crimes of blood are frequent.─Morselli.
Parent Du Chatélet remarks that the suicide rate of prostitutes is very
low. Brierre de Boismont estimates the proportion supplied in Paris by
registered fallen women as 1-240 of all cases. This author also states,
of his series of French cases, that 40 per cent. were persons who led
bad moral lives, either drunkards, gamblers, thieves, prostitutes, or
persons living in adultery.
The proportion which falls to those who are in health, and lead regular
lives, is very small; whilst those who begin life in health, and
pander to their vices and appetites, abandon themselves, as statistics
definitely show, to a prospect of poverty, disease, and crime; to the
prison, the asylum, the hospital, and to a suicide’s grave.
And it is not only open vice that lowers the tone a man may even keep
all the conventional rules of morality, and yet fall in this manner,
if he neglect and ignore a cheerful acquiescence in those high moral
aspirations, which alone make the idea of a self-sought death an evil
to which nothing on this side of the grave can compare.
There need not be any difficulty in understanding that lack of moral
training, and imperfect and improper education, foster suicide; for it
is obvious that men will be more prone to sin, if they have had their
consciences weakened by bad advice, loose habits, and the companionship
of persons who take a light view of wickedness, and only sneer at
self-improvement and goodness.
A system of “laisser aller,” and “don’t care,” are stepping stones to
suicide; self-restraint and active efforts after perfection lead one
daily farther from it.
Aristotle, in the “Ethics,” Lib. 3, cap. 7, and Plato, in his “Phædo,”
remark that “Suicide is committed to avoid evil, and not because it is
honourable.”
The suicide judges that the possible evil after death is less than the
trouble he has now to bear; hence it is clear enough that the best
preventive is to fix on the crime the character of an evil much greater
than any that can happen to a man naturally.
Although it has been shewn that the spread of education is followed
by an increased amount of self-destruction, yet, if a large number of
suicides be analysed, the ratio of one-fifth only are well educated;
but then it must be remembered that only a small fraction of the
population is educated at all thoroughly. It is the spread of an
unsound system of partial education, the tasting of the Pierian spring
without drinking deeply, which poisons the mind; mere fragmentary,
rudimentary instruction unballasted by the requisite amount of moral
and religious teaching. The mere ability to read is, I think, liable
to become a great curse unless most carefully used, for it is only
too common to find that those who can only read, only read what
they had much better have left unread; such as sensational tales,
the criminal trials in the daily papers, political squabbles, and
narratives of suicides. There could be no stronger prompting influence
and determining cause of voluntary death to many an ailing and tempted
sufferer than the perusal of such literature.
In “Aurora Floyd” and “Lady Audley’s Secret,” two novels of high
standing, suicide is suggested definitely as a remedy for trouble, at
least twelve times.
Ch. Elam writes, “The great publicity given to the minutiæ of
atrocious crimes in the public press is undoubtedly a fruitful source
of crime. Dove, who poisoned his wife, confessed, after his conviction,
that the idea had been given to him by study of the case of Palmer, at
Rugeley.”