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The history of Greece extends back to such a remote period that it is not clearly evident what the general opinion on Suicide was among its early inhabitants. However, a few landmarks occur. In such a dim past as the time of the Trojan War, Ajax, one of the Grecian heroes, slew himself, in a fit of passion, brought on by offended vanity. Lycurgus, the legislator of Sparta, was one who killed himself for his country’s good.

Strabo, the historian, in his Tenth Book, tells us that at Ceos, the country of Simonides, B.C. 500, it was an established custom to allow the act of self-destruction to persons who had attained the age of 60, or who had become incapacitated by their infirmities. Several suicides can be directly traced to oracles; the great Oracle at Delphi has become especially notorious; Codrus, king of Athens, and Aristodemus, killed themselves distinctly in consequence of these oracular utterances.

There is a tradition mentioned by Plutarch, Pliny, and Virgil, that on the coast of Epirus, on the peninsula called Neritos (Virgil, Æneid, iii., 271), overlooking the Ionian Sea, was the hill then named Leucate, or Leucadia; here stood a Temple dedicated to Apollo, and from this rock a suicidal leap into the sea became the common sequence to disappointed love, for the Greeks of those times. Sappho, a poetess, whose love for Phaon was unrequited, is said to have originated the custom; an arm of the sea has, since then, cut off this promontory from the mainland, and the island is now called St. Maur. Tradition is evidence of the existence of a custom, even if it be objected to as proof of an individual fact.

Timon of Athens, the Misanthrope, whose exact era is also uncertain, is narrated to have been a suicide; he met with some curable accident, but from his intense dislike of his fellowmen he refused all assistance, and allowed himself to die unrelieved. This was the philosopher who is said to have kept in his garden a fig-tree specially convenient for hanging oneself on, and which he refrained from having cut down, so as to be able to accommodate his friends. Shakespeare’s play “Timon of Athens,” refers to this odd character.

The Spartans, that brave and hardy race, are known to have disapproved of Suicide; it is narrated that an honourable burial was refused to Artemidorus, who sacrificed his life unnecessarily at the battle of Platœa, which was fought B. C. 479, between the united Greeks and the Persians. Among the suicides of Greece, however, occur the names of some of her greatest men, lawgivers, orators, generals, philosophers, and statesmen; although we find in Greek custom more condemnation of the practice than in Roman law.

In Thebes, it was a custom that no honours should be paid at the death of a suicide, and no funeral rites were allowed; the body was ordered to be burned in the absence of the relatives of the deceased.

At Athens, a suicide was not allowed to be burned and his ashes preserved, as was the custom for the rich and great, if such died in war, or by a natural death. See Samuel Petit, “De Legibus Atticis.”

The body was buried instead, and the right hand struck off and buried in a separate place. See Æschines, Ctesiphon, and in Plato, Laws, Book ix., regulations are laid down for the burial of suicides.

Aristotle, in his Ethics, v., cap. xi., describes his views of the crime, calling it a “sin against the state,” and adds that the memory of the Suicide should be marked by infamy.

A reference to the List of Notable Suicides which follows in Chapter III., will show that persons of the highest intelligence have committed suicide at each epoch of ancient history.

In a survey of the history of Rome we find mention of an Epidemic of Suicide among the soldiers of Tarquin the First; they were ordered to the task of excavating sewers in Rome, and believing this work to be derogatory to their dignity, they killed themselves in large numbers: the tendency was checked by an edict that the bodies of all suicides should be exposed to public view nailed on crosses. See Pliny, Nat. Hist., Book xxvi. cap. xv.

But in the very long period during which the Roman state was advancing to greatness, and throughout the times of the Republic, suicide was a very rare occurrence.

In the later part of Rome’s history, during the empire, it became a very prominent crime; when luxury and sloth predominated, and the doctrines of the philosophers Zeno and Epicurus became fashionable, suicide became rampant. In the reigns of Claudius, A.D. 42, and Nero, A.D. 55, even Seneca, that cultured villain, acknowledged its practice to be excessively frequent, although he ultimately committed the act himself. At this time the prevailing sentiment was thus tersely expressed, “Mori licet cui vivere non placet,” in the language of the Stoic school.

But throughout the whole history of Rome there was no statute declaring it to be either a crime or a misdemeanour, and no punishment for the attempt, among the people; but the soldiers of the state were restrained by a Military Law, and the attempt punished by ignominy. One such statute was published by the Emperor Hadrian, A.D. 138. See Digest of Roman Law, “De re militari.”

Valerius Maximus, Lib. 2, cap. 6, a Roman writer of the first century, circa A.D. 31, tells us that at Massilia, a colony, the Senate kept a supply of poison, which was distributed to applicants for the purpose of suicide, if the Senate thought their reasons sufficient. See Montaigne, Essais, Liv. iv., chap. 3.

Pliny the Elder, A.D. 79, says there are three diseases, to escape any one of which a man has a good title to destroy himself, and the worst of these is stone in the bladder; and he adds, “it is a privilege of man which Deity does not possess.”

Tacitus, d. A.D. 135, remarks that among the nobles, suicide was the frequent result of misfortune, or the public disgrace of falling under the displeasure of the Emperor.

Marcus Aurelius, circa A. D. 150, is said to have remarked that “a man had as much right to leave the world as he had to leave a room full of smoke.”

Diogenes Laertius, circa A. D. 220, tells us that the greatest leaders of men advised the wise to its commission. Lib. viii., i. 66.

Livy, Cæsar, and Tacitus mention that the warlike, semi-savage races who peopled North and West Europe, the Iberians, Gauls, Cimri, and Germans, were all much addicted to self-slaughter, especially in order to avoid slavery, and the shame of defeat.

Livy also speaks of its prevalence among the people of Northern Africa, in the time of Scipio, a Roman general, who was engaged in the Punic wars, and who had ample opportunities of observation in those countries.

Plutarch, in his Life of Alexander the Great, narrates the death of the Brahmin Calanus, who burned himself with much ceremony in the presence of the Macedonian army, and apparently without any particular reason.

The Brahmin Sages of the Hindoo races taught the virtues of suicide, as a mode of escape from the pangs of disease and the weakness of old age.

Josephus, in his “History of the Wars of the Jews,” Lib. vii., cap. 34, gives a full description of the frightful suicidal slaughter among them at the siege of Jerusalem, in which he himself was engaged, and in which self-destruction his faithful guard Simon begged him to participate, and after its capture, some thousands, under Eleazar, retired to the fortress of Massada, and there killed themselves to avoid falling into the hands of the Romans.

The doctrines of Mohammed in respect to suicide are revealed in numerous parts of the Koran; it is spoken of as a crime which rouses all the anger of Allah, and warns believers that its commission will be punished in another life. See Koran, iv., v. 33. “Do not kill yourselves, for God is merciful, and whosoever killeth himself through malice and wickedness, shall assuredly be burned in hell fire.”

A celebrated Ottoman says, “This crime is of a more grave nature than homicide.” The Koran, Surah iii. v. 149, says, “Man does not die but by the will of God, and at the end of his appointed time.”

And the Mohammedan races have throughout history exhibited an avoidance of suicide, which is markedly seen where these dwell in apposition to the Brahmin races of India, who have always rejoiced in self-destruction; casting themselves into their sacred rivers, and leaving their old people on the banks to be drowned; throwing themselves beneath the wheels of their idol statues, and insisting on the self-sacrifice of the widows of their nation.

Legoyt mentions that in Armenia, in ancient times, the house of a suicide was cursed and then burnt.

The Tartar races of Central Asia avoid suicide.

In the ancient kingdom of Persia, it was a rare occurrence, no doubt because it was forbidden by the Magian religion.

The only Mohammedans who have approved of suicide have been dissenters from the pure faith of Islam; such sects as those of the Assassins under the leadership of the Sheik Al Djebal, the “Old Man of the Mountain,” and the disciples of Babek and Karmath, who massacred the inhabitants of Mecca in the tenth century.

In China and in Japan, even up to our own times, Suicide has been regarded as a virtue; life is held cheaply there, and if a mandarin or other official be superseded, he turns quite naturally to suicide as the proper end of his existence; but during the last few years in Japan, especially where there has been intercourse with Europeans, there are regulations intended to prevent it; ten years imprisonment is the punishment for the attempt in the case of lovers.

Until lately it was the custom for a man of honour who had been insulted by another, to rip his body open with a sword, in presence of his opponent, calling on him to do likewise; the aggressor was dishonoured for ever if he failed to do so.

The Peruvians and Mexicans, at the time of the Spanish conquest, killed themselves in large numbers rather than be slain or made captive by the invaders.─Falret.

The Priests of Ancient Egypt, who were the philosophers of the nation, by their doctrines of a universal soul and metempsychosis, contributed not a little to popularise suicide.─Bayle.

Sesostris, who had become blind, killed himself, with calmness and reflection.

But at a later date, following the death of Cleopatra, it became even more usual; a society existed for the purpose of associating together persons desirous of self-inflicted death.─Buonafede.

Among the Chaldeans, as among the Hebrews, suicide seems to have been rare.

On the coast of Malabar, it was the custom for wives to throw themselves on the funeral pyres of their husbands.─Voltaire. And among the Negro races of Africa the same custom has been noted.

Among the aboriginal natives of the North American Continent, somewhat similar customs prevailed to those referred to in India among the Brahmins; wives and slaves had to sacrifice themselves at a chief’s funeral.

The ancient Scandinavian tribes, the worshippers of Odin, anticipated their entry after death into the Hall of Valhalla, otherwise “the hall of those dead by violence,” and hence old persons and others who had failed to die in battle, were led to seek death at their own hands.

Christianity, the greatest Religion, founded upon and springing from the decadent Jewish Faith, at once condemned suicide, thus following up the traditions which the Jews had preserved from their earliest times.

The Fathers of the Christian Church denounced it; St. Augustine in his “City of God,” St. Chrysostom, and Thomas Aquinas, are particularly prominent in inveighing against the enormity of the offence, and yet even these condoned the sin in certain instances.

The Councils of the Church repeatedly censured it.

The Council of Arles, A.D. 452, condemned it as a crime, which could only be due to diabolical energy.

The Council of Braga, A.D. 563, repeated the condemnation.

The Council of Auxerre, A.D. 578, inflicted a penalty on its commission, viz.: no commemoration was to be made in the Eucharist, and no Psalms were to be sung at the burial.

The Council of Troyes of the ninth century renewed these ecclesiastical penalties.

Pope Nicholas I. says, “a suicide must be buried, but only lest the omission should be offensive to others.”

Charlemagne adopted the principle of refusing the Mass, but allowed psalms and charitable subscriptions for prayers for the dead to be used, because, he said, “no one can sound the depths of God’s designs.”

The Roman Catholic canon law, section De Pœnitentia, assures us that Judas committed a greater sin in killing himself than in betraying his master Christ to a certain death.

In our own country we find the Anglo Saxon King Edgar assimilated the crime of suicide to that of murder in general, and ordered that the suicide was not to be buried in holy (i.e. consecrated) ground, and neither psalms nor masses were to be used.

For several centuries afterwards, the civil lawgivers of England remained content to allow suicide to fall under Ecclesiastical Law, but at the Reformation the Ecclesiastical Statutes were incorporated with the Statute law of the realm, thus constituting it a civil offence as well as a great moral crime.

In France, Louis IX., Saint, d. 1270, enforced the penalty of the confiscation of the property of a suicide; and by the criminal law of Louis XIV., dated 1670, the statutes relating to suicide were revised, and the body was ordered to be dragged at the cart’s tail.

It became the custom of Normandy to insist on forfeiture of estate if the suicide was committed to avoid punishment, and not otherwise.

The Parliament of Toulouse also decided in this manner.

In the 14th century Charles V. imposed this law on all the country under his dominion; and indeed it remained in force in France until 1789, when it was repealed by the National Assembly, because it impeded human liberty of action. Suicide is not a crime in the Code Napoleon.

Yet in the early Christian centuries suicide lingered on as an occasional virtue, either for the purpose of preserving the faith, or to avoid apostacy, to procure the honour of martyrdom, or to retain the crown of virginity: some eminent Christian teachers have considered such deaths desirable. The Roman Catholic Saints Pelagia and Sophronia were examples of canonised suicides; and two widows, Berenice and Prosdocea, are praised by St. Chrysostom for destroying themselves to avoid pollution.