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De civitate Dei (CCSL)

Caput XXVI: De his, quae fieri non licent, cum a sanctis facta noscuntur, qua ratione facta credenda sint.

Sed quaedam, inquiunt, sanctae feminae tempore persecutionis ut insectatores suae pudicitiae deuitarent, in rapturum atque necaturum se fluuium proiecerunt eoque modo defunctae sunt earumque martyria in catholica ecclesia ueneratione celeberrima frequentantur. de his nihil temere audeo iudicare. utrum enim ecclesiae aliquibus fide dignis testificationibus, ut earum memoriam sic honoret, diuina persuaserit auctoritas, nescio; et fieri potest ut ita sit. quid si enim hoc fecerunt, non humanitus deceptae, sed diuinitus iussae, nec errantes, sed oboedientes? sicut de Samsone aliud nobis fas non est credere. cum autem deus iubet seque iubere sine ullis ambagibus intimat, quis oboedientiam in crimen uocet? quis obsequium pietatis accuset? sed non ideo sine scelere facit, quisquis deo filium immolare decreuerit, quia hoc Abraham etiam laudabiliter fecit. nam et miles cum oboediens potestati, sub qualibet legitime constitutus est, hominem occidit, nulla ciuitatis suae lege reus est homicidii, immo, nisi fecerit, reus est imperii deserti atque contempti; quod si sua sponte atque auctoritate fecisset, crimen effusi humani sanguinis incidisset. itaque unde punitur si fecit iniussus, inde punietur nisi fecerit iussus. quod si ita est iubente imperatore, quanto magis iubente creatore. qui ergo audit non licere se occidere, faciat, si iussit cuius non licet iussa contemnere; tantummodo uideat utrum diuina iussio nullo nutet incerto. nos per aurem conscientiam conuenimus, occultorum nobis iudicium non usurpamus. nemo scit quid agatur in homine nisi spiritus hominis, qui in ipso est. hoc dicimus, hoc adserimus, hoc modis omnibus adprobamus, neminem spontaneam mortem sibi inferre debere uelut fugiendo molestias temporales, ne incidat in perpetuas; neminem propter aliena peccata, ne hoc ipse incipiat habere grauissimum proprium, quem non polluebat alienum; neminem propter sua peccata praeterita, propter quae magis hac uita opus est, ut possint paenitendo sanari; neminem uelut desiderio uitae melioris, quae post mortem speratur, quia reos suae mortis melior post mortem uita non suscipit.

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The City of God

Chapter 26.--That in Certain Peculiar Cases the Examples of the Saints are Not to Be Followed.

But, they say, in the time of persecution some holy women escaped those who menaced them with outrage, by casting themselves into rivers which they knew would drown them; and having died in this manner, they are venerated in the church catholic as martyrs. Of such persons I do not presume to speak rashly. I cannot tell whether there may not have been vouchsafed to the church some divine authority, proved by trustworthy evidences, for so honoring their memory: it may be that it is so. It may be they were not deceived by human judgment, but prompted by divine wisdom, to their act of self-destruction. We know that this was the case with Samson. And when God enjoins any act, and intimates by plain evidence that He has enjoined it, who will call obedience criminal? Who will accuse so religious a submission? But then every man is not justified in sacrificing his son to God, because Abraham was commendable in so doing. The soldier who has slain a man in obedience to the authority under which he is lawfully commissioned, is not accused of murder by any law of his state; nay, if he has not slain him, it is then he is accused of treason to the state, and of despising the law. But if he has been acting on his own authority, and at his own impulse, he has in this case incurred the crime of shedding human blood. And thus he is punished for doing without orders the very thing he is punished for neglecting to do when he has been ordered. If the commands of a general make so great a difference, shall the commands of God make none? He, then, who knows it is unlawful to kill himself, may nevertheless do so if he is ordered by Him whose commands we may not neglect. Only let him be very sure that the divine command has been signified. As for us, we can become privy to the secrets of conscience only in so far as these are disclosed to us, and so far only do we judge: "No one knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him." ¹ But this we affirm, this we maintain, this we every way pronounce to be right, that no man ought to inflict on himself voluntary death, for this is to escape the ills of time by plunging into those of eternity; that no man ought to do so on account of another man's sins, for this were to escape a guilt which could not pollute him, by incurring great guilt of his own; that no man ought to do so on account of his own past sins, for he has all the more need of this life that these sins may be healed by repentance; that no man should put an end to this life to obtain that better life we look for after death, for those who die by their own hand have no better life after death.