Alexandria Gazette & Advertiser

Within a week, two suicides have been committed in our city, one of which was under the pressure of commercial embarrassments. This is a shocking example to a moral world. Much has been said and written against this crime, and denunciations of Holy Writ, the anathemas of inspired writers, the opinion of the wise and the just, the frowns of society, still we find men so weak, so rash, yet timid: unable to bear up in a manly manner against the frowns of fickle fortune, rushing into the presence of their God, uncalled for, "unannointed, unanealed." If the obligations which are due to the Divine Author of our existence, are thus sported with: if the obligations due to society are disregarded; if the world to come; if future fame and honor, and life everlasting are held thus light and trivial, what is to become of us?

Men when they enter into public life or pursue any business of hazard, should be ever prepared to meet the reverses with fortitude and resignation. There is scarcely any pursuit which has not its corresponding risks and dangers. A gale of wind drives a vessel on shore and destroys the hope of the adventurer, a fire consumes the warehouse of the merchant: a pestilence stops his trade; a friend fails, owing him money. These are the natural consequences which may happen in trade; shall we then joyfully participate in the blessings of a golden harvest, yet shrink appalled from the frowns of fate? If we are to believe that our destinies are in the hands of an all seeing Providence and "that they are, all nature cries aloud," why rebel against his will, why attempt to resist his decree? Submit humbly to his dispensations, and with chastened humility and grateful feelings bow before the supreme arbiter of the universe—Apart from the immoral effects and pernicious tendency of suicide, there is something cowardly in the act itself. Man fears to face misfortune, and shrinks from trouble and calamity he resorts to the pistol or poison for relief, as the intemperate man flies to liquor to assuage his woes.

Suicide, committed to avoid the importunity of creditors, is dishonorable. If you cannot pay your debts, there is a moral obligation for you to live, in order to labor for that purpose: the Life of a debtor is the property of his creditor, and the worst kind of fraud is to deprive him of it. In this state, an unfortunate man in business is never driven to despair. If he fails, owing to any cause, he has only to call his creditors together, and share among them all that he has left, and be a free man again. The walls of a prison have no terrors in such cases, as the inmates of our prison are the poorest class, and confined for the most trifling sums. There is no terror in the law which can drive a man to despair. We have daily instances of the fickleness of fortune, which smiles to-day and frowns to-morrow.

With as much reason may we plunge into the sea because the sun does not shine, as to commit suicide because we have no money to pay our debts. Weak minds may be victims to such despair: but firmness in adversity, and mildness in prosperity, qualifies a man for all the "changes that flesh is heir to."

[Nat. Adv.