_Tedium vitæ_, or _ennui_, is said to be a frequent cause of suicide. We have heard of an Englishman who hanged himself in order to avoid the trouble of pulling off and on his clothes. Goëthe knew a gardener, and the overseer of some extensive pleasure-grounds, who once splenetically exclaimed, “Shall I see these clouds for ever passing, then, from east to west?” So singularly developed was this weariness of life, this feeling of satiety, in one of our distinguished men, that it is said of him that he viewed with dissatisfaction the return of spring, and wished, by way of change, that everything would, for once, be red instead of green.[32] “—— Within that ample nich, With every quaint device of splendour rich, Yon phantom, who, from vulgar eyes withdrawn, Appears to stretch in one eternal yawn: Of empire here he holds the tottering helm, Prime-minister in Spleen’s discordant realm, The pillar of her spreading state, and more, Her darling offspring, whom on earth she bore. For, as on earth his wayward mother strayed, Grandeur, with eyes of fire, her form surveyed, And with strong passion starting from his throne, Unloos’d the sullen queen’s reluctant zone. From his embrace, conceived in moody joy, Rose the round image of a bloated boy: His nurse was, Indolence; his tutor, Pomp, Who kept the child from every childish romp. They rear’d their nursling to the bulk you see, And his proud parents called their imp—_Ennui_.” _Hayley’s Triumphs of Temper._ It is rare for an Englishman to commit suicide from ennui. The English are different in this respect from the French people. The causes which lead to suicide in this country, are those connected with sudden reverse of fortune, or grievous disappointments, which are allowed to prey upon the mind until the individual seeks relief in the arms of death. In great commercial communities, where men may be reduced, in a few minutes, from affluence to beggary; where the hopes and aspirations of years are levelled in a moment to the dust, and the individual finds himself exposed to the insulting pity of friends, and the searching curiosity of the public, we need not feel surprise, when all these circumstances rush upon a man’s mind in the sudden convulsion and turbulence of its elements, that he should welcome the only escape from the abyss into which he has been hurled. It has been stated, by a competent authority, that the week following the drawing of the last lottery in England, no less than fifty suicides were committed!