felo de se

See also: felo-de-se

English

Etymology

From Latin felō (“felon”) dē (“of”) sē (“himself”).

Noun

felo de se (uncountable)

1. A crime committed against oneself, in particular suicide

   Synonym: suicide

   • 1776, Thomas Paine, Common Sense - Chapter 1 - Page 7-8:

     How came the king by a power which the people are afraid to trust, and always obliged to check? Such a power could not be the gift of a wise people, neither can any power, which needs checking, be from God; yet the provision, which the constitution makes, supposes such a power to exist. But the provision is unequal to the task; the means either cannot or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a felo de se; for as the greater weight will always carry up the less, and as all the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it only remains to know which power in the constitution has the most weight, for that will govern; and though the others, or a part of them, may clog, or, as the phrase is, check the rapidity of its motion, yet so long as they cannot stop it, their endeavors will be ineffectual; the first moving power will at last have its way, and what it wants in speed is supplied by time.

   • 1779, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The Critic: or, A Tragedy Rehearsed:

     Sneer. And you bore all with patience, I make no doubt?
     Puff. Why, yes—tho’ I made ſome occaſional attempts at felo de ſe; but as I did not find thoſe raſh actions anſwer, I left off killing myſelf very ſoon.

   • 1822, Lord Byron, The Vision of Judgement, stanza 94:

     The Varlet was not an ill-favoured knave;
     A good deal like a Vulture in the face
     With a hook nose and a Hawk’s eye which gave
     A smart & sharper-looking sort of grace
     To his whole aspect, which though rather grave
     Was by no means so ugly as his case,
     But that indeed was hopeless as can be—
     Quite a poetic felony “de se.”—