The City of God

He judged, without a doubt, that it is a great crime if a person kills himself. Among all their men, worthy of praise and illustrious for the marks of their virtues, the Romans produce no one better than him, whom neither happiness corrupted—for in such a great victory he remained very poor—nor unhappiness broke. For he returns to such great destruction unafraid. Furthermore, if the bravest and most illustrious men, defenders of their earthly fatherland and, though worshippers of false gods, not deceitful ones but very truthful oath-keepers, who could strike their defeated enemies by the custom and law of war—if these men, defeated by their enemies, did not want to strike themselves, and though they did not fear death at all, preferred to bear their victorious masters rather than to inflict it upon themselves—how much more will Christians, who worship the true God and sigh for the heavenly fatherland, refrain from this crime? Even if divine providence has subjected them to enemies for a time, either to be tested or to be corrected, He does not abandon them in that humility, for He, the Most High, came so humbly for their sake. Especially since they are not bound by the laws of any military power or such service to strike the enemy himself once he is overcome.

That sin should not be avoided through sin. Chapter XXV

What evil error, therefore, creeps in, that a person should kill himself either because an enemy has sinned against him, or lest an enemy should sin against him, when he does not dare to kill the enemy, who is either a sinner or the sin itself? But, they say, one must fear and beware lest the body, subjected to hostile lust, might entice the mind to consent to sin through seductive pleasure. Therefore, they say, one should kill oneself before one commits this, not now on account of another's sin, but on account of one's own. In no way, indeed, will the mind do this—that it should consent to the lust of its flesh, stirred up by another’s lust—if it is subject to God and His wisdom rather than to the concupiscence of the body. Nevertheless, if it is a detestable crime and a damnable sin even for a person to kill himself, as manifest truth proclaims, who could be so foolish as to say: "Let us sin now, lest we perhaps sin later; let us commit homicide now, lest we perhaps fall into adultery later"? If iniquity dominates so much that it is not innocence, but rather sins that are chosen, is it not better to have an uncertain adultery in the future than a certain homicide in the present? Is it not better to commit a disgrace which might be healed by repentance, than to commit such a crime where there is no place left for healthy repentance? I have said this because of those men or women who think they should inflict death upon themselves not for the sake of avoiding another's sin, but their own, lest, even stirred up by another’s lust, they might perhaps consent to their own. But may it be far from a Christian mind, which trusts in its God and, having placed its hope in Him, relies on His help—may it be far, I say, that such a mind should yield to any pleasures of the flesh for the sake of consenting to impurity. But if that concupiscential disobedience, which still dwells in mortal members, is moved beyond the law of our will as if by its own law, how much more is it without fault in the body of one who does not consent, just as it is without fault in the body of one who is sleeping.

Regarding those things which are not permitted, although they are known to have been done by saints, by what reason they are to be believed to have been done. Chapter XXVI

But, they say, certain holy women in the time of persecution, to avoid those who were attacking their modesty, threw themselves into a river that would both seize and kill them; and they died in that way, and their martyrdoms are celebrated with very great veneration in the Catholic Church. I do not dare to judge anything rashly concerning these. Whether divine authority persuaded the Church, by some trustworthy testimonies, to honor their memory in this way, I do not know; and it is possible that it is so. What if they did this not deceived by human judgment, but commanded by God, and not erring, but obedient—just as we are not permitted to believe anything else about Samson? When God commands and makes it known without any ambiguity that He is commanding, who would call obedience a crime? Who would accuse an act of piety? But not for that reason does he act without sin whoever has decided to sacrifice his son to God, because Abraham did this laudably. For when a soldier, being obedient to the authority under which he is legitimately established, kills a man, he is not guilty of homicide by the law of his city; indeed, unless he does it, he is guilty of having deserted and despised his command. But if he had done it on his own initiative and authority, he would have fallen into the crime of shedding human blood. Thus, for what he is punished if he does it...