Clemency of Marcus Aurelius, detail, Capitoline Museum
3,381 words
Part 4 of 5
Ricardo Duchesne
The Uniqueness of Western Civilization
Leiden: Brill, 2011
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Distributed Titles
The Right to One’s Own Life in East & West
Peter Paul Rubens, “The Death of Seneca,” c. 1615, Museo del Prado, Madrid
3,577 words
Translation anonymous, ed. Greg Johnson
In these short notes I shall not attempt to deal with the question of the right to life in general, but with the right to one’s own life, which corresponds to the ancient formula of jus vitae necisque; it is the right to accept human existence or to put an end to it voluntarily. I intend to compare certain characteristic points of view which have been formulated in this connection in the East and in the West. However, the problem will not be considered from a social point of view, but rather from an interior spiritual one, whence it appears in the shape of a problem of responsibility only to our own selves. Read more …