Book 5
1
The foregoing discussion has indicated the answer to the question, Is it possible or not for a man to commit injustice against himself? (1) One class of just actions consists of those acts, in accordance with any virtue, which are ordained by law.The argument seems to be, that suicide does not prove the possibility of a man’s committing injustice, in the wider sense of any illegal injury, against himself. Suicide is an act of injustice in this sense, since it is the voluntary infliction of bodily harm not in retaliation and therefore contrary to law; but it is an offense not against oneself but against the State, since it is punished as such. For instance, the law does not sanction suicide (and whatOr perhaps and any form of homicide that it does not expressly permit. it does not expressly sanction, it forbids).
2
Further, when a man voluntarily (which means with knowledge of the person affected and the instrument employed) does an injury (not in retaliation) that is against the law, he commits injustice. But he who kills himself in a fit of passion, voluntarily does an injury (against the right principlei.e., the principle of retaliation.) which the law does not allow.
3
Therefore the suicide commits injustice; but against whom? It seems to be against the state rather than against himself; for he suffers voluntarily, and nobody suffers injustice voluntarily. This is why the state exacts a penalty; suicide is punished by certain marks of dishonor,At Athens a suicide’s hand was buried apart from the body; Aeschin. 3.244. as being an offense against the state.
