But It Is A Fact, Which I Will Prove. Let Me Ask You What Would Happen If You Were To Drive Recklessly Through The Streets And In Doing So Run Over Several People And Maim Or Kill Them?

"I would be arrested for manslaughter."

"Yes, and it would make no difference, except in the degree of punishment, whether you did it wilfully or negligently, you would be liable both civilly and criminally for injuring or killing another in such a manner."

Now Suppose Your Family Had Typhoid Fever, And You Should Throw Out Some Excrement And Poison The Well Or Stream From Which Your Neighbor Is Supplied And Sickness Or Death Results, (Which Has Occurred Thousands Of Times)

Would It Not Be Just As Bad As To Negligently Kill Him By An Infectious Disease, As To Kill Him By Negligently Running Over Him?

"Yes, I suppose it would, only the proof more difficult."

"But that does not alter the fact, nor atone for the criminality of negligently spreading infectious diseases and death, which is continually being done, but this is not worse than other life destroying negligence which is even more appalling in effect."

"I can not deny your facts nor your conclusions, for they are overwhelming."

"Let me give you another illustration. A friend of mine was called to see a child four years old who had a serious intestinal disorder. The child was soon convalescent, and the doctor said his visits need not continue, but at the same time cautioned the parents to be exceedingly careful about the child's diet for 'two or three weeks.' "

What Happened?

"Well, the day after the doctor's last visit the family had saurkrout for dinner and allowed the child to eat all it wanted under the belief that it would not hurt it,"

"And that probably killed it."

"Yes, it was taken ill at once and the doctor called, but when he found what it had eaten, and the condition the child was in. he bluntly told its parents that they had killed their child."

"That was certainly a most distressing thing for the parents."

"So it was, but not worse than occurs in nearly every family, although it may not be quite so immediately apparent."

I Suppose They Excuse Themselves On The Ground That They Did Not Know Any Better?

Very likely, but that is a poor excuse, for the knowledge could have been obtained.

This Suggests The Question* Is A Person Who Is So Careless And Indifferent To Things Pertaining To Life And Health, That He Kills Some One Less Culpable Than One Who Negligently Takes Life In Some Other Way?

"Doctor you put things so strongly, I think you could almost arouse the dead,and yet every word you have said is true."

"But what I have said only relates to the injury inflicted on others, and bad as it may seem, self-destruction is far more common and its effects almost endless."

You Don't Say! What Are You Trying To Make Me Believe We Are?

"Oh, don't get excited, for I want to bring out another point by asking you a question."

What Is It?" "How Would You Define Suicide?

"Well if one wilfully destroys his life, by making it shorter than nature intended, that would be suicide."

It Would Make No Difference Whether The Method Was Quick Or Slow, Would It?

"No, if it did it would be making a distinction without a difference."

Now I Suppose That Everyone Will Admit That The Moral Law Is Higher Than The Law Of The State, And If It Recognizes Negligence That Injures Another, The Same As If Wilfully Done, The Moral Responsibility Must Be Equally Great. Here Is Another Thing; It Must Be True, That Each Individual Exists For A Purpose, And If So Who Can Measure The Wrong Of Thwarting Nature, By Cutting Off The Natural Term Of Life?

"Doctor, you have proven that self-destruction is universal, and now you have gone farther and proven that it is practically suicide."

"Yes; wrongs are great or small in proportion to their effect, and it is difficult to see wherein an untimely death from one cause, that could have been avoided, is not as bad as from any other.

If the laws of our being were not so grossly violated one hundred years would be an average duration of life, and a hundred and fifty years not uncommon. The ordinary diseases of life should be wholly unknown, and though it may shock our slumbering senses, the facts make it necessary to say, that we take our own lives and are none the less culpable, because we do it ignorantly - the ignorance of negligence and careless indifference."

"That is good reasoning, and it is very strange that no one has ever written of it before."

"Yes it is, and the quotation from Shakespeare's Mid-Summer Night's Dream: 'what fools these mortals be' might be aptly applied. Just think, a young man will spend six or eight years in a university studying everything in the heavens and on earth except how to live, and if he doesn't kill himself before he finishes a course at college, he frequently does so in a few years afterwards. Here is another curious fact, a mother will sacrifice her life for the welfare of her child, but before it was born, she did not think it worth while to endow such vigor and character on her babe as to make it fit to live, and though she may love her infant babe far beyond any feeling that could be suggested by words, the chances are one to five that she will kill it before it is a year old by improper-feeding. "

"Then you are a believer in the scriptural text that the iniquity of parents shall be visited unto the third and fourth generations."

"Yes, in a measure that is true, but not absolutely; that is, not all iniquities are transmitted. Nature constantly strives to correct the mistakes which injure. Were it otherwise, the weaknesses and vices continually taken up by each generation would soon extinguish the race, if none were cut off."