b. stoffel - hobbes on self-preservation and suicide

8/10/2019 B. Stoffel - Hobbes on Self-preservation and Suicide

1/8


2/8

27

second. Gauthier argues that what Hobbes says about suicide is an implausi-

ble attempt to salvage an obviously defective psychology, encapsulated by

Gauthier in the assertion "that men are necessarily self-maintaining engines,

that self-preservation is a necessary and basic motive of human action. "2Gauthier believes that there are flaws in Hobbes's premises, and furthermore

that there are genuinely inconsistent doctrines to be found in Hobbes. This is

no doubt true, but I shall argue that it is not true with respect to what Hobbes

says about self-preservation and suicide. On these matters what he says is at

least highly plausible, and certainly not contradictory. If anything is suspect

it is Gauthier's reading of Hobbes's psychology.

The Dialogue Treatment of Felo de se

In his A Dialogue of the Common Laws of England (written between 1662

and 1675 but not published until 1681) Hobbes devotes part of his section on

Crimes Capital to the consideration of felonies, one of which is voluntary

self-killing, suicide. What he has to say is brief enough to quote in full:

Lawyer. He is a Felon also that killeth himself voluntarily, and is called, not

only by Common Lawyers, but also in divers Statute-Laws, Felo de se.

Philosopher. And 'tis well so: for names imposed by Statutes are equivalent

to Definitions; but I conceive not how any Man can bear Animum felleum, or

so much Malice towards himself, as to hurt himself voluntarily, much less to

kill himself; for naturally, and necessarily the Intention of every Man aimeth-

at somewhat, which is good to himself, and tendeth to his preservation: and

therefore, methinks, if he kill himself, it is to be presumed that he is not

compos mentis, but by some inward Torment or Apprehension of somewhatworse than Death, Distracted.

Lawyer. Nay, unless he be compos mentis he is not Felo de se ... and there-

fore he cannot be Judged a Felo de se, unless it be first proved he was

compos mentis.

I Warrender, H., The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957,

pp. 217-218; Gauthier, D., The Logic of Leviathan: The Moral and Political Theory ofThomasHobbes, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969, pp. 22-24.2 Gauthier, D., op. cit., p. 23.


3/8

28

Philosopher. How can that be proved of a Man dead; especially if it cannot

be proved by any Witnesses, that a little before his death he spake as other

men used to do. This is a hard place; and before you take it for Common-Law

it had need to be clear'd.

Lawyer. I'le think on't. (D., 116-117)

It is always the central comments of the Philosopher that are quoted as

Hobbes's position on suicide, and what he says there is taken to fit in neatly

with what he says elsewhere about the self-preservatory mechanism in

human beings. Suicide is a rational impossibility for a Hobbesian man and

could only occur in a delusional state. That the passage so construed does fitwith much that Hobbes says elsewhere is easily shown.

Self-Preservation and Natural Necessity

There is ample evidence in Hobbes's texts to demonstrate that the avoidance

of death is a very powerful motive force in human beings; none better than

the following statement from De Cive:

For every man is desirous of what is good for him, and shuns what is evil, but chieflythe chiefest of natural evils, which is death; and this he doth by a certain impulsion of

nature, no less than that whereby a stone moves downward. (EW., II, 8)

Avoidance of death in human beings appears to have the same ontological

status as gravity. Our fear of death, "the terrible enemy of nature", (EL., 71)

is in part a fear of "the greatest of bodily pains in the losing"(ibid) of our

lives. That fear is natural enough, but Hobbes never suggests that it is always

justified. Indeed Hobbes's admission to his French physician Guy Patin, that

he would sooner die than experience the pains of passing kidney stones

again, tends to argue that some deaths need not be accompanied by excruci-

ating suffering whereas some bouts of illness followed by recovery are.3

Were one to put the above quote from De Cive in tandem with another from

the same work: "of two evils it is impossible not to choose the least", (EW.,

II, 26) then it would be safe to conclude that death would always be the least

choiceworthy of evils in a choice of evils situation that included death as an

option. Hence I take these two passages to constitute a logical core for theview that Hobbesian men are so constructed that they will always - when in

good operational order - shun death and seek preservation.

3 D'Israeli, I., Literary Miscellanies, London, 1840, p. 304.


4/8

29

Further support for this position is not hard to find either. Hobbes says that

"every man by natural necessity endeavours to defend his body, and the

things which hejudges necessary towards the protection of his body", (ibid.,

17) and he continually reminds his readers that the voluntary actions of menare guided by their conception of what is good. (EW., III, 120) Presumably

then, if natural necessity dictates that bodily protection is never neglected by

sane individuals, and the will is framed by conceptions of what is seen as

good, then only someone who was cognitively disordered could see their

bodily destruction or injury as good. There is an obvious connection be--

tween the way that the will is framed in this account - "we intend always our

own safety and preservation" as Hobbes puts it (EL., 74) - and the way

Hobbes describes the right of nature, and those residual elements of the rightwhich cannot be alienated.

For Gauthier, who takes Hobbes's materialism very seriously, the fact that

Hobbesian men are "necessarily self-maintaining engines"4 is a consequenceof the way Hobbes sets up his theory of the basic appetite/aversion mecha-

nism in sentients. As a result, Gauthier sees any departures from this central

materialist/egoist doctrine as indications that Hobbes's psychology is defec-

tive. In particular, he points to examples in Hobbes where it is clear that

people are said to choose death rather than live dishonoured, suffer slander,

or survive by less than honest means. (EW., II, 38 and 83) These are caseswhere sane people demonstrate that death is not always the greatest evil. If

these cases fall outside Hobbes's account of basic motivations, then his

account of basic motivations is too narrow and distortions of other cases are

likely as Hobbes tries to fit them within the procrustean bed of his psychol-

ogy. Gauthier argues that Hobbes's theory of suicide distorts the facts for

precisely this reason, resulting in an "empirically untenable position".55

Perhaps, but there are still greater problems for Hobbes that arise once we put

theDialogue passage alongside

some of the central tenets in hispsychology.

When Death is Numbered among the Goods

In his De Homine (1658) - a work that I am not alone in believing to be

Hobbes's definitive account of his psychology - it is stated quite unequivo-

cally that while preservation is the greatest of goods and death the greatest of

all evils, circumstances will sometimes dictate that death be counted among

the goods:

4 Gauthier, D., op. cit.5 ibid.


5/8

30

[T]he greatest of goods for each is his own preservation. For nature is so arranged that

all desire good for themselves. Insofar as it is within their capacities, it is necessary to

desire life, health, and further, insofar as it can be done, security of future time. On the

other hand,though

death is thegreatest

of all evils(especially

whenaccompanied

with

torture), the pains of life can be so great that, unless their end is foreseen, they maylead men to number death among the goods. (DeH., 48-49)

There is nothing implausible about this position, but it is clearly incompat-

ible with the core doctrine described above. Once death is accepted as the

least worst of two evil outcomes, and indeed once different possible deaths

are arrayed together, it is obvious that men who are solicitous about their

wellbeing will sometimes make rational choices for suicide. So, irrespectiveof the fact that death remains the "greatest of all evils", Hobbes does not

treat this assertion as incompatible with some deaths being conceived of as

good in light of the circumstances. And of course Hobbes's work is replete

with examples of where it is prudent to choose death rather than risk

damnation, or to die rather than bend the knee to an incoming conqueror.

(EW., IV, 264) In fact the conflict between church and state is characterized

by Hobbes as one between the dual threats of "pain of death" on the one hand

and "pain of damnation" on the other. (EL., 159) Unless both threats are

melded into one threat then sovereign power will be incomplete.

Are we left with a blank contradiction? I think not, because I believe thatthe Dialogue passage has been misread: in part because it is considered in

isolation from the Dialogue treatment of felonies (its natural home), and in

part because only one passage in the remarks on suicide is consulted.

Felonious Intent

Hobbes's treatment of felonies in theDialogue

isshaped by

anassumptionand a question. The assumption is that the law is reasonable and that nothing

repugnant to reason should appear in it. The question is whether a felony "is

in its own Nature a Crime, or that only which is made a Crime by some

Statute?" (D., 110)

In addressing his question Hobbes begins by citing Sir Edward Coke's

derivation of the word "felony", "from the Latin word Fel, the Gall of a

living Creature, and accordingly [Coke] defines Felony to be an act done

Animo Felleo; that is to say, a Bitter [or] Cruel Act." (ibid) Hobbes rejects

both Coke's etymology and his proposed definition. In their place Hobbes

proposes another etymology which derives from the French Filou, which

"signifieth not the Man that hath committed such an Act, as they call Felony;but the Man that maketh it his Trade to maintain himself by the breaking and


6/8


7/8

32

and before you take it for Common-Law it had need to be cleared" and the

Lawyer responding with, "I'le think it on't".

Conclusion

There is then no contradiction between what Hobbes says in the Dialogue

passage on suicide, and what he writes about death as a good in the earlier

De Homine. What the latter asserts is that even what is usually the greatest of

evils will sometimes be sought as a good, or at least as something less evil

than the alternatives. Self-preservation is almost always a dominant motive,

but action is guided by our opinion of what is good and nothing is eithergood in itself or bad in itself. However, the Hobbesian motivational mecha-

nism rests on a basis of appetite and aversion which governs the behaviour of

all sentients and, malfunction to one side, is only geared to direct action to

what is conceived of as good under some description or other. If we conflate

this basic mechanism of sentience with the motivational role of opinions

about what is desirable we end up with Gathier's position on Hobbesian

psychology. If we keep them apart then a lot of what Hobbes says about

honour, damnation and suicide does not seem in any way aberrant at all.

But once Hobbes is freed from this conflation, what is he able to tell us

about suicide? Firstly, and taken from the Dialogue, one can assume that

self-hatred or self-directed viciousness are possible reasons for a suicide,

although reasons that argue a delusional state. Within the terms of Hobbes's

account of madness they are likely to arise through "great dejection of mind"

(EW., III, 62) or some "causeless fear". (ibid.) It is instructive that when

Hobbes is describing a fit of madness which took hold of the young women

in a Greek city - resulting in them hanging themselves - he refers to their

condition as "contempt of life". (ibid., 65) So Hobbes has a theory which cango somewhat deeper than mere rejection of the possibility that someone

might embrace the bad. And let me add that in invoking melancholy or great

dejection (sometimes vain dejection as in EL) as the precondition for suicide

Hobbes is no worse off than the bulk of modern psychiatrists who see a

depressive illness as the precondition. Secondly, Hobbes's construction of

the passage in the Dialogue is clearly intended to demonstrate that suicide

should not be classed as a felony: for both conceptual and pragmatic reasons.

Thus Hobbessupports

the decriminalization of suicide andattempted

suicide

by insinuating the presumption of insanity.

Flinders Medical Centre, Bedford Park, 5042, South-Australia


8/8

33

Works by Hobbes cited

The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, edited by Sir William

Molesworth, London, 1839-45. References to these volumes are as follows:

(EW).

The Elements of Law, edited by Ferdinand Tonnies, second edition, London,

1969. Referred to as (EL).

A Dialogue Between a Philosopher and a Student of the Common Laws of

England, edited by Joseph Cropsey, Chicago 1971. Referred to as (D).

De Homine, from Thomas Hobbes: Man and Citizen, edited with an intro-

duction by Bernard Gert, New York 1972. Referred to as (DeH).

b. stoffel - hobbes on self-preservation and suicide

Documents