Thantos: The Death Instinct in Dickens' Later Novels

Fevers upon wilful distemper of drinks, and surfets, Consumptions upon intemperances, and licentiousness, Madnes upon misplacing, or overbending our natural faculties, proceed from our selves, and so, as that our selves are in the plot, and we are not only passive, but active too, to our own destruction…. There are too many Examples of men, that have been their own executioners, and that have made hard shrift to bee so; some have always had poysen about them, in a hollow ring upon their finger, and some in their Pen that they have used to write with; some have beat out their braines at the wal of their prison, and some have eate the fire out of their chimneys: and one is said to have come neerer our case than so, to have strangled himself, though his hands were bound, by crushing his throat between his knees; but I doe nothing upon my selfe, and yet am mine owne Executioner.

John Donne: Devotions (XII)