[a. Gr. εὐθανασία, f. εὐ- (see EU-) + θάνατ-ος death.]
1. A gentle and easy death.
1646. Bp. Hall, Balme of Gilead, 337. But let me prescribe, and commend to thee, my sonne, this true spirituall meanes of thine happy Euthanasia.
1709. Tatler, No. 44, ¶ 3. Give me but gentle Death: Euthanasia, Euthanasia, that is all I implore.
1768. Burke, Corr. (1844), I. 155. At her age, no friend could have hoped for your mother any thing but the Euthanasia.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. V. v. Not a torture death, but a quiet euthanasia.
1875. H. C. Wood, Therap. (1879), 239. It has been very largely employed to induce euthanasia in advanced stages of phthisis.
fig. 1813. T. Jefferson, Writ. (1830), IV. 224. We must leave, therefore, to others … to prepare this euthanasia for Platonic Christianity.
1844. Disraeli, Coningsby, VII. iii. This euthanasia of the day exercises a strange influence on the hearts of those who love.
2. The means of bringing about a gentle and easy death. Also transf. and fig.
1742. Hume, Essays (1875), I. 120. Death is unavoidable to the political as well as to the animal body. Absolute monarchy … is the easiest death, the true Euthanasia of the British constitution.
1792. A. Young, Trav. France, 409. If they [great cities] conduct easily to the grave, they become the best euthanasia of too much populousness.
1797. Hist. Europe, in Ann. Reg., 257/1. Sir Francis Burdett … said, that without a reform of Parliament corruption would become the euthanasia of the constitution.
1829. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), I. 12. The true Euthanasia of religious dissension … is in the Thousand-and-One sects, whereof none shall be before or greater than another.
1862. Merivale, Rom. Emp. (1865), III. xxviii. 335. The true euthanasia she [Cleopatra] discovered, it is said, in the bite of the asp.
3. In recent use: The action of inducing a gentle and easy death.
Used esp. with reference to a proposal that the law should sanction the putting painlessly to death of those suffering from incurable and extremely painful diseases.
1869. Lecky, Europ. Morals, I. xi. 233. An euthanasia, an abridgment of the pangs of disease.
1873. L. A. Tollemache, in Fortn. Rev., Feb., 218. All persons who feel a lively interest in the mitigation of human suffering, should rejoice that the very interesting essay on Euthanasia … has been published in a separate form. Ibid. (1873), in Spectator, 22 Feb., 240. Euthanasia would be … no more demoralising than capital punishment.
Hence (rare or nonce-wds.) Euthanasian a., of or pertaining to euthanasia. Euthanasiast, one who advocates euthanasia. (See EUTHANASIA 3.)
1873. Contemp. Rev., XXI. 706. Mankind at different stages of culture differ utterly as to the morality of suicide and ‘euthanasian’ homicide.
1884. L. A. Tollemache, Stones of Stumbling, 5. The Euthanasiasts must be admitted to have gained the day.
