214 HEREDITY AND SELECTION IN SOCIOLOGY 



once the great national effort lias achieved its object, the develop- 

 ment of united Germany is heralded by a brusque increase in 

 the suicide-rate in 1872. 



In England and Wales the development of commerce follow- 

 ing on the conclusion of the new commercial treaties in 1868 

 is marked by the sudden rise in the suicide-rate for 1868 and 

 the years following. 



The lesson we may reasonably draw from these figures is 

 that every increase of national prosperity, in the three countries 

 observed, has been accompanied by a corresponding increase 

 in the suicide-rate. On the other hand, every crisis in the 

 national life has been accompanied by a corresponding decrease 

 in the rate. In France and Prussia we see the total number of 

 suicides diminish during the years 1870-71, only to increase 

 again in 1872, after the Franco-German War is over. What 

 does this mean, if not that society, in France and Germany, 

 was awakened to a sense of its responsibilities by the perils of 

 war ; and that the consequent integration of society resulting 

 from this realisation of a common danger acted as a powerful 

 check on the individualism which is at the basis of suicide, 

 considered in its social aspects ? 



We may conclude from these figures that patriotism, like 

 family life, like religion, is capable of acting as an inhibitory 

 factor on the liability to suicide in any given society. 



Before proceeding to examine in more detail the significance 

 of suicide as a social factor, we may forestall an objection which 

 may possibly be raised against our conclusion that Catholicism 

 affords greater protection against suicide than does Protestantism. 

 England, it may be said, is a Protestant country ; and yet in 

 England the increase of the suicide-rate is not out of proportion 

 to the increase of the population. During the period 1880-1900, 

 as we have seen at the beginning of this chapter, the increase 

 of the suicide-rate, in males, was 45 per cent. ; during these 

 twenty years the population increased at the rate of about 



