CORELLI ON " SUICIDE."

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXVI, Issue 8425, 25 January 1899, Page 4

CORELLI ON " SUICIDE."

Miss Jlaiui: Conni.i.i has given her views on suicide in the following letter : — " 1 may slate at once that I do not consider suicide justifiable under any circumstances whatever. "It is quite true that God has given us freewill in the matter of ending our lives if we wish, but at the same time we must not forget that freewill was not ours when we came into the world. There can be no doubt that we are brought into it for some purpose known only to the Creator, and it is but ii coward's act to shrink — nay shirk — the work He has given us to do. "The most diliicult course is the most heroic, : to die is easy ; it is but the matter of a few minutes ; but to live a life of hardship, toil, privation, and sorrow, and to live it, well, is the work of a hero. Does not our frail human nature exult and glow when we hear of some grand act of selfabnegation or extreme bravery, or when we read of the splendid acts of bravery and heroism that men have performed ever since the world began ? Therefore, arguing o la Socrates, the most difficult to do is the best and the bravest. "No: This gift of freewill is a very sacred one. And who knows but what there are invisible spectators of our acts watching as to whether we use it to the best of our ability us soon as we become conscious of the gift ? " If we use that freewill to consummate an act, of cowardice (suicide) we immediately state plainly that we care nothing for the precious gift of God which Ho gave us in the beginning, and what the result of that contempt may be we cannot possibly imagine, save that cowardice is intinctively despised by both earth and Heaven."