790 



SliiAK >!- I. HAD 



SUICIDE 



gagar-refining industry of Britain (as in Greenock, 

 i|.\.) has suffered much from the Bounties (q.v.) 

 given by sugar-producing countries and foreign 

 tariff legislation. In 1872 Great Britain ini|Kirtccl 

 1.729,902 cwt. of refined sugar, and of unrefined 

 13,776,696 cwt. (of which 5,139,499 cwt. were from 

 British possessions). In 1888 the importeof refined 

 sugarwere6,871,681 cwt., and of unrefined 17,857,469 

 cwt. (of which 6,282,088 cwt. were beet-sugar, and 

 3,44(5,949 from British possessions). In 1897 the im- 

 ports of refined sugar were 15,830,759 cwt., and of 

 unrefined 13,553,527 cwt. (8,694,590 cwt. beet-sugar, 

 and 1,679,113 cwt. from British possessions). In 

 1872 the United States raised 146,906, 12.'> Ib. of sugar 

 at home, imported 1,509,185,674 II... and exported 

 Hi.'.i.-.s.s-j-j 1)>. In 1S1I8 it raised 7n7.!i:.l.s7s 11.., im- 

 ported 2,689,920,851 Ib., and consumed 3,277, 874,000 

 Ib. Much sugar is used by brewers. The cost of 

 sugar has sunk since about 1850 from 7d. or 8d. |>er 

 Ib. to 2d. In 1892 the sugar-refining industry of the 

 I ' nitf.l States passed almost wholly into the hands 

 of one syndicate with a capital of $85,000,000. 



See P. Soame*, Manufacture of Sugar (1872) ; Look, 

 Wigner, and Harland, Sugar Growing (2d ed. 1885) ; 

 Ware, Sugar Beet (1880) ; M'Murtrie, Report on the Cul- 

 ture of Sugar lieet (1881); Look and Newlandu, Sugar: 

 Handbook for Planter* and Kefinert (1889); F. G. 

 Wieohmann, Sugar Analyti* for Befineriet (1891); H. 

 L. Roth, Quide to tke Literature of Sugar (1890) ; also 

 the exhaustive article in Spon's Encyelopctdia of the 



Organic Analyiit (New York, 1888). For legislation, 

 aee Boizard and Tardieu, Hittoire tie la Lnj illation del 

 Sucret, 1664-1891. See aim the article SACCHARIN. 



Sugar of Lead. See LEAD, Vol. VI. p. 543. 



Sulil. a town of Prussia, standing in a romantic 

 valley on the south-west side of the Tlmringian 

 Forest, .S'2 miles by rail S\V. of Krfurt. It has long 

 been celebrated for its manufacture of firearms, 

 both military and sporting, and from the middle 

 ages down to the 18th century was no less cele- 

 brated for ite swords and war-armour. There 

 are also iron and machine works, potteries, and 

 tanneries. Pop. (1890) 11,533. 



Suliiii. PETKR KHKOERIK (1728-98), a Danish 

 historian, was lx>rn and died at C'o|>eiihagen. 



Suicide (a word coined in Kngland on a French 



in MI Id, 1 .11 1 of Latin elements ), according to English 

 law, is a Felony (q. v. ). A person found felo de 

 te (guilty of self-murder) by a coroner's jury was 

 formerly buried at a cross-road with n stake driven 

 through bis body, but this barbarous practice (a 

 survival probably of the vampire superstition) was 

 abolished in 1823. A person is felo lie sc if he 

 commits any felonious act which results in his own 

 death ; a person who shoots at another with a gun 

 which bursts and kills himself, a woman who .lies 

 of poison taken to procure miscarriage arc both 

 guilty of self-murder. If two agree to assist one 

 another in committingsuicidc, ami one survives, he 

 is guilty of murder. Policies of life insurance are 

 usually so framed as to ! void if the injured dies 

 by his own act, whether he is of sound mind or 

 not. In Sent land suicide involves 'single escheat ' 

 i.e. forfeiture of the movable estate of the 

 deceased to the crown ; but this rule doc* not 

 apply in cases of insanity. In the 1'nUed States 

 the constitutions of eleven states provide that the 

 property of suicides is not to be forfeite.l. 



The question as to the moral justification of 

 suicide has exercised the minds of ethical philo- 

 sophers from the days of Plato, Marcus Aurcliiis, 

 and Seneca down to the present time. Some 

 schools of thought, notably Stoics and their adver- 

 saries the Epicureans, defended suicide under 

 proper conditions ; Christianity has always refused 



to admit any justification for self-destruction, and 

 the Roman and Anglican churches deprive of 

 eccleMiiMieal burial those who have without doubt 

 wilfully committed self-murder. 



From the medical point of view suicide is in the 

 majority of cases a symptom of disease of the 

 brain. It is not now denied, however, by any 

 competent medical authority that sane men may 

 and do commit suicide ; and then the attempt is 

 unquestionably a crime deserving of punishment. 

 The brain constitution of some persons is such that 

 when they are under the immediate influence of 

 alcohol they always become suicidal. The next 

 kind of case in which suicide is attempted is one on 

 the Imrderland of disease. It is the man intel! 

 ually sound and not emotionally depressed who 

 simply loses for the time his primary instinct of 

 the normal love of life, ceases to have any fear of 

 death, and suffers from the tii'iliiim ritir of the 

 ancients, and who in this state, for trivial causes or 

 for no outward cause at all, attempts his life. 

 Some such men are in Hamlet's frame of mind : ' To 

 be or not to lie ? That is the question.' A man in 

 this state, which is often a hereditary one, cannot 

 always be reckoned insane, and yet be is in an 

 abnormal state of brain and mind. The mass of 

 suicides, however, are committed or attempted by 

 persons who are either insane or on the verge of 

 insanity, though as yet we cannot tell the per- 

 centage of sane and insane suicides. The two 

 forms of insanity in which suicidal impulses are 

 most frequent are melancholia and alcoholic in 

 sanity. Four-fifths of all patients suffering from 

 melancholia have suicidal feelings, and two fifths 

 of them make actual attempts on their lives. It 

 is a risk that should be considered and provided 

 against in every case of melancholia and in every 

 case beginning to suffer from alcoholism or alcoholic 

 insanity. The love of life, with efforts to preserve 

 it, is the primary and strongest instinct not only in 

 man, but in all the animal kingdom, without which 

 all animated creation would soon come to an end. 

 The loss of this is the most striking change that 

 can possibly take place in the higher faculties or 

 functions of the brain. The tendency to suicide is 

 very hereditary. Suicide may lie carefully contrived 

 and planned for month-, or it may be done through 

 a momentary morbid impulse. It may be done, and 

 commonly is done, from insane delusions, such as 

 that the patient is going to be killed and tortured, 

 that he is going to be tried, that his food is 

 ]K>isoned, that he is too great a sinner to live and 

 must make expiation, that he is the cause of e\il 

 to all around him, that he cannot recover, Ac. 

 Physicians especially guard against suicide with 

 patients who are very much afraid they are to 

 be put to death, arid who therefore might be 

 supposed to be too much afraid of dying to do 

 any harm to themselves. Prolonged sleeplessness 

 will sometimes lead to suicidal feelings through 

 brain exhaustion. Suicidal feelings are some 

 times the very first symptom of insanity, 1 

 anything mentally wrong is suspected and IM 

 any watching or precautions are therefore taken. 

 Attempts at suicide are sometimes made while 

 the patient is quite unconscious or in a state of 

 altered consciousness, so that there is no iccol 

 lection of it afterwards. Sometimes it is sng- 

 gcsted by the sight of a weapon or water or 

 any smh means of destroying life. When the 

 suicidal desire is strongly piesenl it is a mistake 

 to suppose that the patient'- former religions senli 

 ments, or his sense of duty, or his obligations to 

 those dependent on him, or any oilier rational 

 motive can be depended upon to prevent his com- 

 mitting the act. 



The modes of committing suicide vary in dilVn 

 cut countries, in the two sexes, and in different 



