The City of God

Yet that it was done greatly rather than well, Plato himself, whom he had read, could be his witness: for he would surely have done it himself, and would have prescribed it, had he not judged—with that same mind with which he saw the immortality of the soul—that it should not be done, but rather that it should be forbidden.

What kind of example is that of Cato, who, not bearing the victory of Caesar, killed himself. Chapter XXIII

But, they say, many killed themselves so that they would not fall into the hands of their enemies. We do not merely ask whether it was done, but whether it should have been done. For sound reason must be preferred even to examples; to which, indeed, examples also agree, but those which are the more worthy of imitation, the more excellent they are in piety. The patriarchs, prophets, and apostles did not do this. Because even the Lord Christ Himself, when He admonished them to flee from city to city if they suffered persecution, could have admonished them to lay hands upon themselves so that they would not fall into the hands of their persecutors. Furthermore, if He did not command or advise this, so that those to whom He promised to prepare eternal mansions might emigrate from this life in this way, whatever examples nations that do not know God may put forward, it is manifest that this is not permitted for those who worship the one true God. But even so, they do not easily find anyone of whose authority to prescribe—besides Lucretia, about whom we have said enough above—except that Cato who killed himself at Utica. Not because he alone did it, but because he was considered a learned and upright man, so that it might be thought that what he did could rightly be done. Concerning his deed, what should I say, except that some of his learned friends, who prudently dissuaded him from doing this, judged it to be a deed of a weaker rather than a stronger soul: whereby it was demonstrated not as honesty preventing base things, but as weakness not sustaining adversities. Cato himself judged this in his own dearest son. For if it were base to live under the victory of Caesar, why was the father the author of this baseness to his son, whom he instructed to hope for everything from Caesar’s kindness? Why did he not also compel him to death with him? For if Torquatus laudably killed his son, who, against orders, had fought against the enemy even as a victor, why did Cato, who did not spare himself, spare his conquered son? Or was it baser to be a victor against orders than to bear a victor against one's honor? In no way, therefore, did Cato judge it to be base to live under the victor Caesar, otherwise he would have freed his son from this baseness by his fatherly sword. What is it, then, but that as much as he loved his son, for whom he both hoped and wished that he be spared by Caesar, so much did he envy Caesar’s own glory, lest he also be spared by him—as Caesar himself is said to have said—or, to say something milder, he was ashamed.

That in that virtue by which Regulus was more excellent than Cato, Christians shine much more. Chapter XXIV

However, those against whom we argue do not want us to prefer to Cato the holy man Job, who preferred to suffer such horrible evils in his flesh rather than to remove all torments by a death inflicted upon himself, or other holy men from our scriptures of the highest authority and most worthy of faith, who preferred to bear captivity and the domination of enemies rather than to inflict death upon themselves. But from their own writings, I shall prefer Marcus Regulus to Marcus Cato. For Cato had never defeated Caesar, yet he disdained to be subjected to him, and chose to be killed by himself so that he would not be subjected. But Regulus had already defeated the Carthaginians, and as a Roman commander, he had brought back a victory—not to be mourned by his citizens, but to be praised by his enemies—yet, having later been defeated by them, he preferred to bear them by serving rather than to remove himself from them by dying. Therefore, he preserved both patience under the domination of the Carthaginians and constancy in his love for the Romans; neither removing his body from the enemies as a defeated man, nor his unconquered mind from his citizens. Nor did he do this—that he refused to kill himself—out of a love for this life. This he proved when, for the sake of his promise and oath, he returned without any hesitation to those same enemies whom he had offended in the senate more severely with his words than with his arms in war. Such a despiser of this life, then, preferred to end it through whatever torments the raging enemies might inflict, rather than to kill himself.