to clothe them in new language, and to endeavour to make up in precifion and perfpicuity, whatever he may seem to want in originality: and thus perhaps he may be able to gain fome credit by the adoption, where he could have none from the birth. A number of quotations and notes are difperfed through the work, fome to illuftrate, and others to enliven, the serious business in hand; and with regard to these, the author has not obferved a fcrupulous uniformity; having fometimes given them in their original language, at others in a tranflation either of his own or another's, as feemed best to himself. There seems nothing else to be noticed in this place; only, that as the time is arrived in which the labours of his retirement are to be fubmitted to the eye of public obfervation, the author feels many an uneafy and anxious fenfation for the judgment that awaits him. This is further increased, left his performance should not be found worthy of the countenance of thofe honourable and refpectable perfonages, who have condefcended to patronife its publication by the credit of their names; and to whom he here offers his grateful acknowledgments. But his beft confidence is in the ferious importance of his fubject, which he trusts will compenfate for many a failure in its mode of execution; fince where the defign is well-meant, the public are ever ready to decide with candour and indulgence.-Could the author but be justified in forming the pleafing hope, that one profligate and thoughtless liver might ever be brought to such a sense of his duty to God and fuch an awe of futurity, as to be convinced of the heinous guilt of fuicide;-or that one apt to indulge in a train of melancholic ideas could be perfuaded into a complacency with life, and be deterred from lifting his arm against himself-" by any thing that was advanced in the following pages," he fhould deem it the richest compensation and fruit of all his labour !—May the Almighty bestow such a blessing on his earnest endeavours, as may tend to accomplish fo defirable an end! A FULL OBSERVATIONS ON THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF SUICIDE, TENDING TO ESTABLISH ITS GENERAL GUILT. CHA P. I. On the term Suicide, and its different acceptations.Applied both to the action and to the agent.-Signifies" felf-killing."-Though in ftrictness applicable to every " one, who voluntarily fhortens his own life by any means whatever, yet to be confined in this inquiry to the procuring an immediate felf-deftruction by fome method of violence.-Suicide an increasing evil.—Its guilt being great, where guilty at all, makes it neceffary (as far as it can be done) to diftinguish between its criminal or innocent commiffion.-Its commiffion does not always imply guilt.-Killing not always murder.-Lunacy, violent depression of spirits approaching towards it.— The pofition, (however humane) which afcribes all fuicide to madness, not to be juftified. The inquiry never made concerning the guilt or innocence of fuicide in itself, B itself, but only whether lunacy can be proved to excufe it?—Though fuicide, when at all imputable, is always most highly cenfurable, yet there may be degrees of its guilt.-Some general inducements to fuicide mentioned, not founded on any previous guilt in the perpetrator.-Other inducements from previous guilt.-Some are defenders of its practice, and write, and argue in its favour; (these are most pernicious members of fociety.)—The proportion of guilt not equal in all fuicides.—Man not able to decide with precision on each particular cafe, which must be left to an allrighteous and difcerning Judge.-Human ftri&tures, like human laws, must be general.—Short summary of what is to be proved in the argumentative part of the following work. TH HE term "Suicide" is in general applied both to the action and to the agent; so that a perfon is faid either to have committed fuicide, or to have been a fuicide. It is a compound [A] term, fignifying "a man's killing himself;" and in ftrictness is applicable to every one, who in any shape voluntarily shortens the period of his own life. But as life may be shortened by a variety of means, it is neceffary to make fome diftinction in the application of the term, fo as to confine its extended meaning to that limited fenfe, in which it is generally understood, and in which it is defigned to be used in the following inquiry. Though therefore a person may either curtail the period of his mortal existence, by purfuing fome general line of conduct, (be it either laudable or vicious,) which gradually tends to accelerate his end, or may hazard his immediate diffolution, by fome action or undertaking extremely perilous; though in both cafes he may be faid to haften his own end, (and thereby to become in some measure a suicide), yet this being rather an unavoidable consequence of fome other action, than a primary intention or even wifh of its author, is not the object of the prefent difcuffion. The following obfervations are meant to be confined to that species of felf-destruction alone, which proceeds immediately and voluntarily, without other view or defign, to compass its end, by using [A] Sui cædes. The word "Suicifm" has been used by fome few writers to exprefs the action itself; but this feems to convey no determinate meaning, as it drops the most material part of the compound term. If it were neceffary to frame a new word of this kind, the author conceives it should rather be "Suicidifm" than "Suicifm."-However, no innovation of words has been attempted in the following work, as it appeared unnecessary. forcible and violent means to get rid of life. Indeed, though fuch an indulgence of the paffions, or such a gratification of vicious and abandoned habits, as tends to impair the human conftitution, to fap the vitals of health and strength, and, after endangering life at all times, ultimately to bring its votaries to accelerated and untimely ends; though fuch a line of conduct be in a moral light a most guilty species of fuicide, yet it would be deviating too wide of the mark, to enter into its difcuffion any further, than as fuch a course of life is so often found to terminate in actual self-murder. But as of all vicious and evil habits, "Gaming" is the most frequent promoter of desperate fuicide; gaming shall not pass unnoticed hereafter. There is also another kind of suicide, (for such it must be called) which is frequently and instantaneously brought on, by complying with the impulses of modern honour, in the hazard of the "Duel." Here, indeed, the act of deftruction (when death enfues) is performed by the hands of another; but its danger being promoted, or at least voluntarily submitted to by the person himself,-how great foever the crime of self-murder may be, (and great it certainly will be found) a large portion of its guilt must be imputed to himself. The unchriftian practice of duelling indeed approaches so near to that immediate and actual fuicide, which is to make the subject of the following pages, that it might be deemed an omiffion not to enter on its confideration in a proper place. But the fpecies of fuicide, which is to engage our present attention, deviates fo widely from the first principles of human nature, that fortified, as mankind are, by the strong and prevalent impulfes of felf-love and felf-preservation, one fhould think all enlargement on the fubject would be needlefs, as well as all caution against its commiffion futile and nugatory. However, experience too well justifies the neceffity of the notice, and the particular temper of the times, fo fraught with diffipation and infidelity, leads to a dread, that it is yet an increasing evil. How luxurious habits of life, light notions of virtue, and unfteady, or rather no principles at all of religion, tend to promote frequent fuicide, will be explained hereafter. In the mean time, as it may be confidently afferted, (on the strength of what will foon be proved) that its commiffion implies an heinous offence against the providence and moral government of the Deity, the good order and happiness of society, and a man's most important selfinterests, it is but common justice previoufly to distinguish, as clearly as may |