There is, then, a Supreme Being whom we _must_ obey, who created and owns human life primarily; there is also a moral law. On these facts rests the argument relating to the destruction of human life. How far, then, has a human being dominion over his own life, and, secondly, over the life of any one else?
St. Thomas,[2] Lessius,[3] and others offer as one argument to prove suicide is not licit, that it is an injury to society or the state of which the suicide is part, and to which the use and profit of his service rightly belong. Lessius, while developing this proof, acknowledges its weakness.
[2] _Summa Theologica_, 1, 2, q. 64, a. 5.
[3] _De Justitia et Jure_, lib. 2, cap. 9.
If there were only one man in the world, and no society or state, suicide would still be illicit, because its basic deordination lies deeper than society or the state. If suicide were a moral evil solely because it deprives the state of the suicide's life, then for the same reason no one might become a citizen of another state, emigrate, nor might man abandon society and live as a recluse. Moreover, if a man were detrimental to the state rather than beneficial, in this point of view that fact alone would justify suicide, and the state would then be justified in permitting or even commanding suicide; and we shall show later that the state has not this power.
It is true that the injury done the state or society by loss of use and profit, by scandal and similar evils, is a solid argument against suicide, as such injury aggravates the deordination of suicide, but in itself the injury done to the state and society is not the fundamental reason against suicide.
St. Thomas[4] argues against suicide because it is contrary to the charity a human being should have for himself. This is true ordinarily, and suicide takes on part of its guilt just because it is an offence against the rational regard a person should have for himself; yet this argument is not basic. We are told that if one sins against charity in killing his neighbor, _a fortiori_ he sins in killing himself. Yet suppose just what the advocates of euthanasia suggest, viz., that a neighbor is in great agony and incurable: then the act of killing him takes on a quality of charity rather than of uncharity. And so for the suicide: if the patient is willing to be killed, there would be no uncharity; if he were unwilling, then homicide in any form would be uncharitable and unjust. The argument from charity, therefore, is too narrow to fit the whole case; and its very weakness is a source of error for the advocates of euthanasia.