Suicide

Philosophy is the sovereign antidote to superstition and false religion.

Plain good-sense and the practice of the world can serve most purposes of life, but are ineffective against them.

Both history and daily experience has instances of capable men who are enslaved by the grossest superstition.

Even gaiety and sweetness of temper afford no remedy to so virulent a poison.

Women often feel many of their joys blasted by this importunate intruder.

But when sound philosophy has gained possession of the mind, superstition is effectively ended.

Love or anger, ambition or avarice, have their root in the temper and affections, which the soundest reason is scarce ever able fully to correct.

But superstition is founded on false opinion.

Superstition vanishes when true philosophy has inspired juster sentiments of superior powers.

The contest is here more equal between the distemper and the medicine. Nothing can hinder the latter from proving effectual, but its being false and sophisticated.

Tully says that the superstitious man is miserable.

He is even afraid of sleep. He examines his dreams, and finds visions of future calamities.

Death

Only death can end his misery. But he dares not kill himself. Instead, he prolongs a miserable existence from a vain fear that he would offend his Maker.

The presents of God and Nature are ravished from us by this cruel enemy.

Death would remove us from the regions of pain and sorrow. Yet she still chains us down to a hated being.

Some people have been reduced by the calamities of life to the necessity of suicide.

If their caring friends prevent their suicide, they seldom try to commit suicide again.

So great is our horror of death, that when it presents itself, it acquires new terrors and overcomes his feeble courage.

But when the menaces of superstition are joined to this fear of death, this fear deprives men of all power over their lives.

This is because they fear losing their pleasures and enjoyments.

Let us here try to restore men to their native liberty, by:

• examining all the common arguments against suicide, and
• showing that suicide may be free from guilt or blame, according to the sentiments of all the ancient philosophers.

If Suicide is criminal, it must be a transgression of our duty, either to God, our neighbour, or ourselves.

But Suicide is no transgression of our duty to God. In order to govern the material world, the Creator has established general and immutable laws which maintain all bodies in their proper sphere and function.

To govern the animal world, He has endowed all living creatures with:

• bodily and mental powers
• senses, passions, appetites, memory, and judgment.

These regulate them in their destined course of life.

These 2 distinct principles of the material and animal world continually encroach on each other. They mutually retard or advance each other’s operation.

The powers of men and animals are restrained and directed by the nature and qualities of the surrounding bodies.

• The modifications and actions of these bodies are incessantly altered by the operation of all animals.

Land transportation is stopped by rivers. If properly directed, rivers can be used for shipping through machines to serve the use of man.

But tho’ the provinces of the material and animal powers are not kept entirely separate, there result from thence no discord or disorder in the creation:

On the contrary, from the mixture, union, and contrast of all the various powers of inanimate bodies and living creatures, arises that surprizing harmony and proportion, which affords the surest argument of supreme wisdom.

The providence of the deity does not appear immediately in any operation. Instead, it governs everything by those general and immutable laws.

All events are the action of the almighty: They all proceed from those powers, with which he has endowed his creatures.

A house, which falls by its own weight, is not brought to ruin by his providence more than one destroyed by the hands of men.

Nor are the human faculties less of His workmanship than the laws of motion and gravitation.

The operation of God is in;

• the play of the passions
• the dictates of judgment
• the action of the limbs

He established the government of the universe through these animate and inanimate principles.

Every event is alike, important in the eyes of God. He takes in, at one glance, the most distant regions of space and remotest periods of time.

All events follow the general laws that govern the universe.

The revolutions of states and empires depend on the smallest caprice of single men.

The lives of men are shortened or extended by the smallest accident of air or diet, sunshine or tempest.

Nature still continues her progress and operation.

We have never observed that general laws are ever broken by particular volitions of the deity.

The elements and other inanimate parts of the creation carry on their action without regard to the particular interest and situation of men.

Likewise, men are entrusted to their own judgment in the various shocks of matter. They may employ all of their faculties in order to provide for their ease, happiness, or preservation.

A man might be tired of life and hunted by pain and misery. He might bravely overcome all the natural terrors of death and so commits suicide.

Will he incur the indignation of his creator by:

• encroaching on the office of divine providence, and
• disturbing the order of the universe?

Has the Almighty reserved to himself the disposal of the lives of men?

This is plainly false.

The lives of men depend on the same laws as the lives of all other animals. These are subjected to the general laws of matter and motion.

The fall of a tower or the infusion of a poison will destroy a man and an animal equally.

A flood sweeps away everything without distinction.

Human life is forever dependent on the general laws of matter and motion.

Is suicide criminal because it is criminal to encroach on these laws, or disturb their operation?

This seems absurd. All animals are entrusted to their own prudence and skill for their conduct in the world.

They have full authority, as far as their power extends, to alter all the operations of nature.

Without the exercise of this authority, they could not subsist a moment.

Every action, every motion of a man innovates in the order of some parts of matter, and diverts, from their ordinary course, the general laws of motion.

It follows that everyone has the free disposal of his own life. He may lawfully employ that power with which nature has endowed him.

In order to destroy the evidence of this conclusion, we must show why this particular case is excepted.

Is it because human life is so important that it is a presumption for human prudence to end life?

But the life of man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.

If human life were so important, the order of nature would submit life to human prudence.

If the killing of humans had a special province of the almighty, then the preservation of humans would likewise have a special place.

If a rock was going to fall to my head and kill me, and I step away [because of prudence], then I disturb the course of nature.

I invade the special province of the almighty by lengthening my life beyond the period dictated by the general laws of matter and motion.

A hair, a fly, an insect is able to destroy this mighty human being, whose life is so important.

Is it an absurdity to suppose, that human prudence may lawfully go against them?

It would be no crime in me to divert the Nile or Danube from its course, were I able to do it.

Where then is the crime of turning a few ounces of blood from their natural chanels!

Human life can become unhappy.

But I thank providence, both:

• for the good which I have already enjoyed, and
• for giving me the power of escaping the ill that threatens me.3

You fret at providence since you foolishly imagine that you have no such power.

You teach that:

• when my enemies gives me trouble I should be resigned to providence.
• their actions are the operations of the almighty as much as the actions of inanimate beings

When I fall on my own sword, therefore, I receive my death equally from the hands of the deity, as if it had proceeded from a lion, a precipice, or a fever.

You require that I submit to providence in every calamity that befalls me.

But you still grant me human skill and industry to avoid or escape the calamity.

Why may I not employ one remedy as well as another?

If my life is not my own, it would be criminal for me to put it in danger.

Then there would be no heroes who go into the greatest dangers. There would also be no Wretches who also get into dangers.

All beings have their power or faculty through their creator.

No one can encroach on the plan of his providence, or disorder the universe.

The horror of pain might prevail over the love of life.

A voluntary action might anticipate the effect of blind causes.

These are the consequence of those powers and principles, which He has implanted in His creatures.

Divine providence is still inviolate, and placed far beyond the reach of human injuries.

The old Roman superstition,4 says that it is impious to:

• divert rivers from their course, or
• invade the prerogatives of nature.

The French superstition says it is impious to:

• inoculate for the small-pox, or
• usurp the business of providence, by voluntarily producing distempers and maladies.

The modern European superstition says that is is impious to end our own life, and thereby rebel against our creator.

I ask: why is it not impious to build houses, cultivate the ground, and sail on the ocean?

In all these actions, we employ our powers of mind and body to produce some innovation in the course of nature.

They are all therefore equally innocent or equally criminal.

But you are placed by providence, like a sentinel, in a particular station.

When you desert it, without being recalled, you are guilty of rebellion against your almighty sovereign, and have incurred his displeasure.

I ask, why do you conclude, that Providence has placed me in this station?

I owe my birth to a long chain of causes that depended on voluntary actions of men.

But Providence guided all these causes. Nothing happens in the universe without its consent and co-operation.

If so, then neither does my death, however voluntary, happen without its consent.

Whenever pain and sorrow make me tired of life, I am recalled from my station.

It is providence that has placed me now in this room.

I can leave it when I think proper, without deserting my post or station.

After death, the principles of which I am composed, will still perform their part in the universe.

• They will be equally useful in the grand fabric, as when I was alive.

The difference to the whole will be no greater than between my being in a room and being in the open air.

• The one change is of more importance to me than the other, but not more so to the universe.

It is a kind of blasphemy to imagine, that any created being can disturb the order of the world, or invade the business of providence.

It supposes, that that being possesses powers and faculties, which it received not from its creator, and which are not subordinate to his government and authority.

A man may disturb society and thereby incur the displeasure of the almighty.

But the government of the world is placed far beyond his reach and violence.

And how does it appear, that the almighty is displeased with those actions, that disturb society?

By the principles which he has implanted in human nature, and which inspire us with a sentiment of remorse, if we ourselves have been guilty of such actions, and with that of blame and disapprobation, if we ever observe them in others.

Is Suicide a breach of our duty to our neighbour and to society?

A man, who retires from life, does no harm to society.

All our obligations to do good to society seem to imply something reciprocal.

I receive the benefits of society, and therefore should promote its interest.

But when I withdraw from society, can I be bound any longer?

But allowing, that our obligations to do good were perpetual, they have certainly some bounds.

I am not obliged to do a small good to society, at the expence of a great harm to myself.

Why then should I prolong a miserable existence, because of some frivolous advantage, which the public may, perhaps, receive from me?

If upon account of age and infirmities, I may lawfully resign any office, and employ my time altogether in fencing against these calamities, and alleviating, as much as possible, the miseries of my future life: Why may I not cut short these miseries at once by an action, which is no more prejudicial to society?

But suppose, that it is no longer in my power to promote the interest of the public: Suppose, that I am a burden to it: Suppose, that my life hinders some person from being much more useful to the public.

In such cases, my resignation of life must not only be innocent but laudable. Most suicidal people are in some such situation. Those, who have health, power, or authority, have commonly better reason to be in humour with the world.

A man is engaged in a conspiracy for the public interest and is seized and is threatened with the rack. He knows that the secret will be extorted from him.

He can satisfy the public interest best by ending his own miserable life.

This was the case of the famous and brave Strozzi of Florence.5

Suppose a criminal was justly condemned to a shameful death.

Why can’t he save himself from all the anguish of thinking about the coming exection?

He invades the business of providence just as the magistrate did who ordered his execution. His voluntary death is equally advantageous to society, by ridding it of a bad member.

There are people who believe that age, sickness, or misfortune make life a burden even worse than annihilation. They would consequently believe that suicide is consistent with interest and with our duty to ourselves.

No man ever threw away life while it was worth keeping. For such is our natural horror of death, that small motives will never be able to reconcile us to it.

Anyone who kills himself without apparent reason was cursed with such an incurable depravity or gloominess which poisoned all enjoyment.

If Suicide is a crime, then only cowardice can impel us to it.

If it is not a crime, then our prudence and courage will make us kill ourselves immedately when life becomes a burden.

’Tis the only way, that we can then be useful to society, by setting an example, which, if imitated, would preserve to every one his chance for happiness in life, and would effectually free him from all danger of misery.