Atheism and European suicide in the 17th century

Chandak Sengoopta, in a book review of Georges Minois's work History of Suicide: Voluntary Death in Western Culture wrote:

“  |  Suicide became a prominent issue in England from the turn of the seventeenth century. The number of suicides, it was reported, had risen alarmingly and in the preface to his 1733 work, The English Malady, physician George Cheyne declared that he had been spurred to write it "by the late Frequency and daily Encrease of wanton and uncommon self-murders" (p. 181). According to Cheyne, the spread of atheism as well as the gloomy, melancholy-inducing climate of England were responsible for the rise in suicides; while his explanations were not always accepted, virtually nobody seems to have doubted that England had become the world capital of suicides. As Minois explains, there undoubtedly was a rise in the rates of reported suicides but, as far as one can tell from the available data, it was a European rather than an exclusively English phenomenon.[1] |  ”

|
|

## See also[edit]

* Resources for leaving atheism and becoming a Christian
* Evidence for Christianity
* Atheism and Mental and Physical Health
* Psychology, obesity, religiosity and atheism
* Irreligion and superstition
* Atheism and marriageability

## Notes[edit]

1. ↑ http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=3213