tes of suicide; but what about the
equinoctial periods of March and September?

If light be the efficient cause, the tendency to suicide should be as
great at the time of the fall equinox as it is at the time of the spring
equinox; but this is not the case. Two hundred and seventy-two suicides
out of every thousand occur in the vernal equinoctial period and only
two hundred and fifteen in the autumnal equinoctial period, and this
proportion holds good throughout the whole northern hemisphere. Light,
therefore, must also be eliminated.

Morselli suggests that suicide is influenced by the first heat of early
spring and summer, which "seizes upon the organism not yet acclimated
and still under the influence of the cold season." But is there any such
thing as winter debility, and, if so, why should it last until June?
Many physicians, on the other hand, assert that during the period of
early summer the organism, instead of being debilitated, is working at a
high tension, that every function of mind and body is then more active
than at any other period of the year, and, that, consequently, there is
then greater liability to sudden mental and physical collapse. But there
is no evidence to show that suicides, generally, are caused by seasonal
overtension and subsequent collapse.

Goldwin Smith thinks that with the revival of vitality in the spring and
early summer "all feelings and impressions become more lively," those
that impel to suicide among the rest. But if all the feelings "become
more lively," why do not the stimulated sensations of joy and pleasure
on a beautiful day in June overcome, or at least evenly balance, the
stimulated sensations of suffering and unhappiness?

_Influence of Environment on Self-Destruction_

None of these explanations is at all satisfactory, and it seems to me
that the solution of the problem is to be found, not in the mere
physical action of light, heat, or weather on the human body, but in the
influence of the whole environment on the human mind. Sir Arthur Helps
was the first, so far as I know, to suggest that the increased tendency
to suicide in spring and summer is due to a psychological rather than a
physical cause. Speaking, in "Realmah," of the fact that suicides are
more frequent on pleasant days than on unpleasant ones, he says:
"Perhaps it is because, on these beautiful days, the higher powers seem
to be more beneficent; and the wretch overladen with misery thinks that
he can