A Treatise On Madness And Suicide

Author : James J O'Dea
Publisher : CreateSpace
ISBN 13 : 9781500707910
Total Pages : 334 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (79 download)

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Download or read book Suicide written by James J O'Dea and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2014-07-31 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: AT first sight a book on suicide would not seem attractive to the average reader, and yet, as treated of by Dr. O'Dea, the subject proves to be full of interest. An understanding of the psychology of suicide-of all crime, indeed-is of great practical importance to society. The appearance of a work like the one before us, shows a growing recognition of the importance of such a study. In all ages suicide has had a literature, although it has been dealt with in a very different spirit at different periods of the world's history. Rig-Veda, the Hindu sacred book, by a corruption of its original text, enjoined the self-sacrifice of the widows; the Greek exponents of Stoicism and Epicureanism were the advocates and panegyrists of suicide; among the Christian Fathers, St. Cyprian upheld it for martyrdom, St. Jerome commended it for the preservation of chastity, while St. Augustine denounced it as altogether sinful; Donne, Dean of St. Paul's, in the seventeenth century, became its apologist; Montaigne reviewed it in his essays; Hume defended it in a special treatise; Rousseau devoted to it two letters of his "Nouvelle Heloise"; Dante consigned its victims to the seventh circle of hell. These, and many other facts of great interest, are brought out in the historical sketch which forms the first part of the book of Dr. O'Dea. Esquirol, Falret, De Boismond, Durand, Fardel, Maudsley, and many others, have written of suicide in its relation to insanity. Dr. O'Dea that suicide is, per se, no more evidence cf insanity than crime against the lives and properties of others. Suicides may be either sane or insane. Of the total of suicides, at least one third are caused by manifest lunacy, while another third, or perhaps even a larger proportion, are due to latent insanity. Morselli, of Turin, has recently published a volume, in which the statistical method is applied with great force and ingenuity to the solution of many of the vexed problems of suicide. This work appeared too late to be referred to by Dr. O'Dea. According to Dr. O'Dea, the most important of the special causes of suicide are included in the following list: age, sex, hereditary influence, insanity, imitation, education, literature, domestic troubles, love troubles, intoxicants, financial losses and embarrassments, occupation, habitation, race and nationality, and atmospheric and climatic influences. His points are enforced by charts and tables. Under the personal causes of suicide, he discusses various organic diseases which lead to it, the effects of temperament or mental condition, and the relation of suicide to insanity, to which we have already referred. He holds that attempts at suicide should be punished by the law, but believes that the most efficacious means for the prevention of suicide will be found in religious and moral training, and in medical treatment. The book is a valuable contribution to the science of to-day. -"Penn Monthly," Volume 14