Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics
Is facing death always courageous?
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Although Aristotle has already said that facing death in battle is perhaps the most courageous action imaginable, he cites one example in which facing death is not courageous but actually cowardly: namely, suicide. In this case, he remarks, “to die to escape from poverty or love or anything painful is not the mark of a brave man, but rather of a coward; for it is softness to fly from what is troublesome, and such a man endures death not because it is noble but to fly from evil.”
Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Book III