Alfred Leroy, suicide.

— The Siècle of March 2, 1861 reports the following fact:

In a vacant lot, at the angle of the path called the Arcade path, which leads from Conflans to Charenton, workmen going to work, yesterday morning, found hanged from a very tall pine tree an individual who had ceased to live.

Notified of the fact, the police commissioner of Charenton went to the spot, accompanied by Dr. Josias, and proceeded to make the verifications.

The Droit says that the suicide was a man of about fifty years, of distinguished countenance, dressed in a suitable manner. From one of his pockets they drew a note in pencil, worded thus: “A quarter to twelve at night; I go up to the torment. God will forgive me my errors.”

The pocket also enclosed a letter without address and without signature, the contents of which are as follows:

“Yes, I struggled to the last extremity! Promises, guarantees, all failed me. I could have arrived; I had everything to believe, everything to hope; a breach of one's word kills me; I can no longer struggle. I abandon this existence, for some time so painful. Full of strength and energy, I am obliged to resort to suicide. I take God as witness, I had the greatest desire to discharge my obligations toward those who had aided me in my misfortune; fatality crushes me: everything is set against me. Abandoned suddenly by those whom I represented, I suffer my fate. I confess that I die without bitterness; but, whatever they may say, calumny will not prevent me from drawing noble sympathies in my last moments. To insult the man who has been reduced to the last of resolutions would be an infamy. It is much to have reduced him to this. The shame will not be all mine; egoism will have killed me.” According to other papers, the suicide was a certain Alfred Leroy, of fifty years, originally from Vimoutiers (Orne). His profession and domicile are unknown and, after the ordinary formalities, the body, which no one claimed, was taken to the morgue.

[Evocation of Alfred Leroy, suicide.]

Evocation.

Answer. – I do not come as one tormented; I am saved! Alfred.

Observation. – The words: I am saved! surprised the majority of those present. Their explanation was requested in the course of the conversation.

We learned from the newspapers of the act of despair by which you succumbed and, although we do not know you, we lament you, for religion requires that we share in the pain of all our unfortunate brothers; and it is to testify our sympathy to you that we call you.

Answer. – I must keep silent about the motives that impelled me to that act of despair. I thank you for what you do for me; it is a happiness, one more hope; thank you!

Can you say, first of all, whether you have consciousness of your present situation?

Answer. – Perfect. I am relatively happy; I did not kill myself for purely material causes; believe that there was more, as my last words demonstrated. It was an iron hand that seized me. When I incarnated on Earth, I saw suicide in my future. It was the trial against which I had to struggle. I wished to be stronger than fatality and I succumbed. Observation. – It will soon be seen that this Spirit does not escape the fate of suicides, despite what he has just said. As for the word fatality, it is evident that in him it is a remembrance of earthly ideas; one puts to the account of fatality all the misfortunes that cannot be avoided. For him suicide was the trial against which he had to struggle; he yielded to the impulsion instead of resisting, by virtue of his free will, and believed that it was in his destiny.

You wished to escape a deplorable situation through suicide; did you gain anything by this?

Answer. – There is my punishment: the shame of my pride and the consciousness of my weakness.

According to the letter found upon you, it seems that the harshness of men and a breach of one's word led you to your own destruction. What sentiment do you now experience toward those who were the cause of that fatal resolution?

Answer. – Oh! do not tempt me, do not tempt me, I beseech you!

Observation. – This answer is admirable; it depicts the situation of the Spirit struggling against the desire to hate those who did him harm, and the sentiment of good, which impels him to forgive. He fears that this question may provoke an answer that his conscience reproves.

Do you regret what you did?

Answer. – I have already told you that my pride and my weakness are its cause.

When living did you believe in God and in the future life?

Answer. – My last words prove it; I march toward the torment.

Observation. – He begins to understand his position, about which at first he could have an illusion, because he could not be saved and march toward the torment.

In taking that resolution, what did you think would happen to you?

Answer. – I had consciousness enough of justice to understand what now makes me suffer. For a moment I had the idea of nothingness, but I repelled it very quickly. I would not have killed myself had I had such an idea; first I would have avenged myself.

Observation. – This answer is, at the same time, very logical and very profound. If he had believed in nothingness after death, instead of killing himself he would have avenged himself or, at least, would have begun by avenging himself. The idea of the future prevented him from committing a double crime; with that of nothingness, what would he have to fear, if he wished to take his own life? He no longer feared the justice of men and would have had the pleasure of vengeance. Such is the consequence of the materialist doctrines that certain learned men strive to propagate.

If you had been well convinced that the cruelest vicissitudes of life are very short trials in the face of eternity, would you have succumbed?

Answer. – Very short, I knew it, but despair cannot reason.

We pray to God to forgive you and in your favor we address to Him this prayer, in which we all join:

“Almighty God, we know the fate reserved for those who shorten their days and we cannot hinder Your justice. But we also know that Your mercy is infinite. May it extend over the soul of Alfred Leroy! May our prayers also, showing him that there are on Earth beings who take an interest in his fate, relieve the sufferings he bears for not having had the courage to resist the vicissitudes of life! “Good Spirits, whose mission is to relieve the unfortunate, take him under your protection; inspire in him regret for what he did and the desire to progress through new trials, which he will know how to bear better.”

Answer. – This prayer makes me weep and, for this reason, I am happy.

You said at the outset: now I am saved. How to reconcile these words with what you said afterward: I march toward the torment?

Answer. – And how do you understand divine goodness? I could not live; it was impossible. Do you believe that God does not see the impossible in this case?

Observation. – Amid some answers remarkably sensible, there are others – and this is one of their number – that denote in this Spirit an imperfect idea of his situation. This has nothing extraordinary about it, if we consider that he died a few days ago.

(To Saint Louis) Can you say the fate of the unfortunate one we have just invoked?

Answer. – Expiation and suffering. No, there is no contradiction between the first words of that unfortunate one and his pains. He says he is happy; happy at the cessation of life. And as he is still bound by earthly ties, he feels only the absence of earthly evil; but when his Spirit rises, the horizons of pain, of slow and terrible expiation will unroll before him and the knowledge of the infinite, still veiled to his eyes, will be to him the torment that he glimpsed.

What difference do you establish between this suicide and the one of the Samaritaine? Both killed themselves out of despair and yet their situation is quite different; this one recognizes himself perfectly; he speaks with lucidity and does not yet suffer, whereas the other did not believe he was dead and from the first instants suffered a cruel torment, that of having the impression of feeling his body in decomposition. Answer. – An immense difference. The torment of each of these men takes on the character proper to his moral progress. The latter, a weak and broken soul, endured as much as he believed. He doubted his strength, the goodness of God, but he neither blasphemed nor cursed; his interior torment, slow and profound, will have the same intensity as the pain that the first suicide felt. Only the law of expiation is not uniform. Note. – The narrative of the suicide of the Samaritaine was published in the issue of June 1858.

In the eyes of God which is the more guilty and which is the one who will suffer the great punishment: this one who succumbed to his weakness or the one who, through his harshness, was led to despair?

Answer. – Assuredly the one who succumbed through temptation.

Will the prayer that we address to God for him be useful to him?

Answer. – Yes, prayer is a beneficent dew.