Against those who say that souls exist before their bodies, or on the contrary that bodies are formed before souls, wherein there is a certain fabulous opinion concerning souls. For I think it beside our purpose to inquire into what is disputed in the churches concerning the constitution of the soul or of the body. For it has seemed good to certain men, who before us, disputing about first principles, brought forth, as it were, a certain pestilence—namely, that souls subsist beforehand in a conversation proper to themselves. And let there be there set forth examples both of malice and of virtue: and the soul that perseveres in good things feels no experience of bodily conjunction; but if it lapse from the participation of the good, then it withdraws to this life, and dwells in a body.
But others, regarding the order handed down by Moses concerning the condition of man, affirm that the soul is in the second place—that is, after the body—in respect of time, since God first, taking clay from the earth, formed man, and so thereafter by inbreathing gave him a soul. And by this reasoning they show the body to be more excellent than the soul which is knit to it, in that it was formed before. For they say that the soul was made for the sake of the body, lest the formation should remain immobile without a spirit. But everything that is made for the sake of another is surely baser than that for the sake of which it is made—as the Gospels declare, since the soul is more than food, and the body more than raiment, because these latter were granted for the sake of the former;
for the soul was not made for the sake of food, nor are bodies established as formed for the sake of garments; but when these existed, the latter were provided as necessary for use. Since therefore the assertion of either opinion is not free from reproach—both of those who suppose that souls live beforehand in a certain state and order of their own, and of those who think them created after the bodies—I deem it necessary to examine to some extent the things which are asserted in their doctrines.
For if we wish to investigate more diligently the arguments of both, and to lay open all the absurdities which are proved to be annexed to their opinions, we have need of a long space of time; and therefore, looking briefly, as far as is possible, at the things said by them, we shall not delay to refute them. Those who lend patronage to the first profession, and assert an earlier conversation of souls for the sake of this life of the body, do not seem to me to be free from the errors of the Gentile doctrines, who feigned many fabulous things concerning the transformation of souls into bodies. And if anyone examine these men diligently, he will find that by very necessity their assertions are brought to this point.
But that someone, who among them was reckoned to be wise, related that he had been both man and woman, and then had flown away into birds; and likewise that the same had at times bloomed as a plant, and at last had obtained his life as moisture—this is not far from the truth, indeed according to the judgment of him who was not ashamed to put forth such things. For truly these doctrines of theirs are proved worthy of the chattering of frogs and crows, and of the irrationality of fishes, and the insensibility of trees, which affirm that one soul passes through so many things. The cause of this absurdity is that they suppose souls to subsist beforehand. For consequently the principle of their doctrine, tending and pressing toward the earlier hour, slides down even to these monstrosities.
For if, on account of some malice, the soul falling from a more sublime state becomes, as they assert, a man—and the bodily conversation is surely more vicious than that intellectual one—every necessity is that the soul, placed in such a life, in which the many occasions of sinning cannot be lacking, should be enticed to greater malices, and be declared more vicious than before. But the viciousness of the human soul is a likeness of an irrational thing, to which, familiarly joined, it in a manner falls back into the nature of beasts of burden. For having once hastened through malice, even when it has been made irrational, it desists, as it were, from the purpose of the greater things. For the standing of evil is the beginning of virtue; but to irrational things there is no virtue.
Therefore by very necessity it will always be changed for the worse, completing itself into that which is more degraded and more abject, and stretching on by continual change to that which is the extreme. And as the rational nature transcends the sensible, so from this there is a descent to the insensible. But their discourse, proceeding thus far, though it be carried beyond the truth, nevertheless by a certain consequence is driven on from absurdities. Hence also, through incongruous and impossible things, there is generated for them a fabulous doctrine, which would consequently demonstrate the utter perishing of the soul.
For that which has once flowed down from the sublime conversation will no longer be able to stand at any measure of malice, but, entangled by the affections of the passions, passes from the rational to the irrational, and from this too is transferred into insensible shrubs. But the insensible and the lifeless are by a certain reasoning near to one another, and the lifeless follows upon that which is not. Thus altogether, by this consequence of theirs, the soul will be dissolved into that which is not, since by necessity passage to better things was impossible for it. But indeed they lead the soul back from the thickets to man; therefore by these things they demonstrate the life that is in the thickets to be a more excellent manner of bodiless conversation.
For it has been shown that the progress of the soul straining toward evil consequently rolls down to feeble things, and that the lifeless nature is lower than the insensible, to which extremity the principle of their doctrine consequently leads the soul. But because they are unwilling for this, either they must confine the soul within sensible things, or, if from this they again lead it back to the human—a better state—it must, as has been said, be shown that the woody life was of that first institution, seeing that thereafter the fall into malice took place; whence afterward there is granted an ascent toward virtue. Therefore this assertion is convicted of being without head and without end, which maintains that souls live beforehand by themselves apart from the life of the flesh, and are bound to bodies on account of malice.
But the inconstancy of those who contend that the soul is younger than the body shall be overthrown by the things which are set forth in what follows. Wherefore the reasoning which is brought forward by both sides must be rejected; and through the middle of the opinions I judge that our doctrine ought to be directed in the truth. And this is it: that neither, after the manner of the Gentile seduction, do we suppose souls to be pressed down by some malice—which souls they declare, because they cannot keep pace, through weakness, with the rotation of the whole pole that is borne with exceeding swiftness, on this account to fall back to the earth; nor again do we say that the soul is lent to man as to one who forms it beforehand, as it were, by some present reasoning;
otherwise the intelligible nature would be shown to be inferior to the clay-made institution. CHAPTER XXX. The assertion that one and the same cause is seen to subsist for both the soul and the body. But since man is one, who consists of soul and body, it behoves to give to him one and common beginning of his institution, lest he seem to himself prior and posterior, so that the condition of the body should stand first in him, and second that of the other. And in respect of the divine power indeed, according to the reasoning a little before set forth, we profess that the whole fulness of the human condition subsists beforehand, the prophet testifying to us in this, who says that the Lord knows all things before they come to be.
But in the conformation of individuals we do not prefer the one to the other, neither the soul before the body, nor the contrary do we say, lest the man, divided according to a difference of time, should fall apart within himself. For since our nature is understood to be twofold, according to the teaching of the Apostle—namely, of the visible man and of the hidden—if indeed one subsist before, and the other supervene after, the power of the Creator would seem imperfect, as not sufficing to both at once, but, the work being divided, occupied separately in the halves of the individuals.
But just as in wheat, or in any other seed whatsoever, we behold the whole species of the ear comprehended by a certain power—that is, the haulm, the joints, the internodes, and likewise the fruit and the awns—and we do not say that any of these subsists beforehand in nature by reason, nor that it comes upon afterward; but that the implanted force is declared in the seed by a certain natural token, and that no other nature is brought in upon it: according to this reasoning we suppose that the cause of the human seed also exists; which, on the first occasion of its constitution, is indeed sown all at once, according to the power of nature, but is stretched out and declared by a certain natural consequence, advancing toward that which is perfect, and assuming nothing from without for the occasion of its perfection.
For it consequently extends itself toward that which is perfect, so that it can be truly affirmed neither that the soul subsists before the body, nor that the body subsists for the sake of the soul; but rather that whichever be the beginning of the other is, according to the higher reasoning, disposed in the first will of God, while according to the other it is established in the occasions of generation. For as the distinction of members cannot be discerned before the formation in that which is cast for the conception of the body, so neither is it possible for the contemplated properties of the soul to be discerned in it before they come forth into the effects of operation;
and just as no one doubts that, in the differences of the members and the inward parts, that which is deposited is shaped not by some other power entering in, but by that which, implanted in nature, brings itself by its own force to this operation, so also concerning the proportion of the soul they reason in like manner concerning the rational element, that although it is not yet recognized through any visible operations, nevertheless nothing of any single thing is perceived to exist in it deficiently.
For just as the species of the future man is in the seed by a certain force and potency, but lies hidden for this reason, that it cannot appear before the necessary consequence allow and permit it, so also the soul is indeed in that seed, although it does not yet appear, but it will appear, making its own and natural effect of operation advance together with the bodily increase. For since the power in conception is wrought not by a dead body, but by a living and breathing one, therefore we say it is in accordance with reason that what is directed by a living thing toward the occasion of life should not be reckoned dead and lifeless. For flesh that is lifeless is surely dead. For death comes about by the privation of the soul.
But no one would say, concerning this, that the privation is older than the possession, if at least anyone should assert that the lifeless, which is dead, is older than the soul. But if anyone require a more evident argument that that portion lives which becomes the beginning of the forming animate being, it is possible, even from other signs by which the animate is distinguished and separated from the dead, to perceive concerning this part. For we take the argument of a vital thing from men, namely that someone is warm, that he is moved, that he operates; but the cold and immobile in bodies is nothing other than mortality itself. Since therefore we have seen that the warm, which also operates, is that of which we speak, hence too we gather arguments that it is not lifeless.
But just as, in respect of the bodily portion, we do not call that flesh and bones or hairs, or whatever we behold in man, but say that these are each by force and potency, not yet however appearing visibly; so also in respect of the portion of the soul, we record that its rational and irascible part, and whatsoever things are considered concerning the soul, do not yet have place in it, but we say that the proportion of the formed body, and likewise the consummation of the effect of the soul, are wrought together, as we advance with the subject.
For thus the perfect man, among the greater operations of the soul, obtains the effect; at the outset of his constitution he displays in himself endeavours fit and suitable to the present use of the soul, so that through the infused matter he may form for himself a most fitting dwelling-place. For we do not believe it possible for the soul to be fitly inserted into alien buildings, just as the seal impressed upon wax cannot be fittingly fitted to a wholly alien carving. And as the body proceeds from the small to that which is perfect, so also the operations of the soul that is knit to it likewise grow together and advance.
It proceeds indeed in its first constitution, like a certain hidden root distributed only to the hollows which are allotted to nourishments and increases (for the smallness of that which takes it in receives no more); then when that which is implanted comes forth to the light and has put forth its germ, then in it the grace of the senses blossoms; and now coalescing and competently running out into magnitudes, the rational power, like a certain fruit, begins to shine forth. For it does not all appear at once, but, carefully growing up together with the perfection of its instrument, ever bearing fruit so much as the potency of the subject is capable of.
But if, in this formation of the body, you perchance inquire after the operations of the soul, attend to yourself, as Moses says, and as in a book, so will you read through, as in a history, the operation of the soul; for nature itself will in a manner recount to you, more effectually than all use of speech, the various occupations of the soul in the body, whether in the soul, or in the universal, or in the particular condition. But concerning ourselves I think it superfluous to treat in discourses, and to narrate the accustomed marvels as it were to certain persons placed far off and beyond the bounds. For who, beholding himself, would have need of words by which to learn the laws of nature?
For it is most easy that anyone, considering the manner of his own life, and how he bears a body opportune for every effect of vital operation, weighing it, should observe with what the primordial—or rather germinal—activity of the soul is occupied. And that which is drawn from the living body is laid down to the working of nature; for even the inward parts of fruits and the sproutings of roots, not yet deprived of the most lively vigour which is implanted in them by nature, when they are committed to the earth, preserve, though a hidden, yet a pure quality; but such force and potency the earth which contains them does not confer, as though the earth were bestowing it from itself extrinsically; otherwise it would make even dead wood to germinate.
But that which is implanted brings itself forth to the light by its own love, after the manner of a nurse, perfecting that which is planted in the root, into the pith and bark and branches: which could not have come about, unless some natural potency had been knit in, which, drawing the kindred and suitable nourishment from the things lying near, produced the shrub or tree or ear of corn or something of such kinds. CHAPTER XXXI. A certain medical contemplation, or rather concerning the construction of bodies, is completed in few words.
But although, by the most certain formation of our body, each person is taught by his very self—learning from those things by which he understands and lives and feels, having his own nature as his instructor—nevertheless it is also proper to learn diligently from the books of the wise, who have investigated these matters more studiously. For some have observed, through what physicians call anatomy (that is, the cutting-open of the several joints and veins), in what arrangement each of the things within us is disposed, and thereby they have contemplated the workings throughout the whole of the body's members, inwardly and outwardly, and have reported them to others, so that a knowledge sufficient for this study of human constitution might more diligently be available.
But if anyone makes inquiry of us concerning these things, the Church will surely furnish him with instruction. For this is the law of the spiritual sheep, as the Lord says, that they should not hear the voice of strangers. Therefore let us bring forward our discourse briefly. We have perceived that three things are to be understood concerning the nature of the body, for the sake of which the several things within us are seen to have been established. For some have been suitably formed for life, some for a good life, and some for the succession of posterity. Whatsoever things, then, are given us of such a kind that without them human life cannot subsist—these we likewise perceive to reside in three distinct parts, that is, in the brain and the heart and the liver;
but those things which, by the bounty of nature, have been bestowed upon man for an increase of goods, for living well, are shown to be the instruments of the senses. For things of this sort do not indeed sustain our life, since even when some of them are wanting—as often happens—man nonetheless still subsists; yet it is impossible that a most pleasant life should be maintained without these functions. The third aim of the division accordingly has regard to the offices of succession.
There are, moreover, certain other things besides these, which, for the continuance of the body, are commonly subject to all the members, bringing forth operations of their own that befit them—such as the belly and the lung: the latter indeed by the breath which it takes and renders back to the heart, blowing through it as a seal; the former by receiving food into the inward parts for the common benefit.
Since, therefore, our formation is thus divided, it must be more diligently considered that the force which pertains to our life is not carried on simply through some single member, but that nature distributes to us, through very many parts, the occasions for our preservation, things necessary to the whole body; so that whatever the same nature has contrived for the safeguard and the beauty of life, these appear to be very many, having altogether a great difference among themselves. But I think it proper first to divide briefly the first principles which are shown to pertain to the constitution of our life;
while the matter of the whole body, which commonly underlies each of the members, must for now be passed over in silence by us, since the discussion concerning the universal nature, in respect to a particular contemplation, seems to have nothing to do with our present purpose. Since, then, all confess that there exists in us a portion of all the elements which are in this world—namely of the hot and the cold, and also of the other pairing, which consists in moisture and dryness—we must by all means treat of each. We perceive, therefore, that there are three powers that administer life, of which one indeed warms the whole world with its own heat; another, made moist by humour, tempers what has been wrought by heat, so that with an even balance the soul
be preserved in the midst, by the contrary quality, so that neither does an abundance of heat dry up the moisture, nor a plenty of moisture extinguish the heat. But the third power, of itself, according to a certain fittingness and modulation, holds together the members which have been made distinct, fitting them with their own bonds, and conferring upon them all of itself a mobile and spontaneous force—which, if it be lacking, the body stands loosened and immovable, deprived of the unbidden vivacity and efficiency of the spirit. And rather is the prior craftsmanship and contrivance of our nature, in the very fashioning of the body, worthy to be gazed upon.
For since everything that is hard does not at all receive sensible operations—as we see in our bones and in shrubs and trees, in which indeed a certain species of life is discerned, in that they are nourished and grow, yet the hardness of the subject admits no sense whatever—on account of this it was necessary that a certain formation, after the manner of soft wax, be supplied for the operation of the senses, which might both be impressed by the forms that meet it, and not be dissolved by excessive moisture. For that which is impressed cannot endure in what is moist, nor in a hardness too rigid (because that which knows not how to yield cannot receive an image by impression).
But there stood a certain mean between these, between the flaccid and the rigid, lest the animal should be bereft of the best motions of the power—I mean the sensible ones. Since, therefore, that which is soft and yielding, unless it be made firm by the co-operation of solid things, is assuredly immovable and undistinguished—like those which they call sea-lungs—therefore nature mingled the strength of bones into the body, which, coupling them mutually by a concordant modulation, bound fast their frameworks and junctures deep within by the bindings of the sinews, and thus mingled into them a measure of sensible vigour, wrapping the surface that should bear the passions with somewhat harder flesh.
Upon this most solid nature of the bones, then, as upon certain pillars sustaining the mass, He laid the burden of the whole body. Nor did He frame the bones everywhere undivided or undistinguished and the same; otherwise the body would have remained immovable and without operation, and if man had been so fashioned, like some tree standing fast in one place, since he would neither advance forward by the alternating motion of the legs, nor would the convenience of his life appear through the service of the hands. But now the instrument of steps and of actions has been fashioned by this provision, so that by the spontaneous spirit which is inserted into the sinews, the unbidden bodily motions might be conferred. Hence the management of the hands, various and manifold,
and most suited to every office whatsoever of the contriving mind; hence the bending of the neck, and the inclination and raising of the head, and a certain efficiency about the chin, also the closing of the eyelids, occurring together with the intellect of the rest. Since, too, the very motion of the members works by the sinews stretching and relaxing—as it were by certain engines driving the impulses—while the power, straining through these by its own force, exercises a spontaneous command, and by the voluntary spirit, according to a certain dispensation of nature, displays its proper effect in each part. It has been made most clear, therefore, that the root and principle of all the motions which are believed to be effected through the sinews is that membrane by which the brain is held compacted with sinews.
We do not think, therefore, that we ought now to inquire more curiously concerning the operation of the members of the animal, since a motion of this sort has been declared to lie in the formation of the brain. And that the greatest vigour for guarding our life is conferred upon us from the brain, is evidently recognized from the contrary accident. For if that membrane has sustained any wound or rupture, death immediately follows. Since indeed nature cannot withstand the suffering, with the wound inflicted, even for a point of time, but, as it were with some foundation undermined, the whole edifice at once falls together with the part—therefore manifest destruction of the whole body follows upon its suffering: that the cause of our proper life resides in this can by no means be denied.
But since, in the case of those who cease to live, nature's innate heat is curtailed, and thus what is dead grows cold, it must needs be that such a cause subsists for us also in heat, which, when it is wanting, death assuredly follows; and therefore by the presence of heat the animal is to be acknowledged to live. And the force and power of this heat we have perceived to be the heart, as it were a certain fountain and principle, out of which, after the manner of pipes, manifold veins diffuse the hot and seething spirit throughout the whole body.
And since it was needful that some nourishment also be ever supplied by nature to the heat—because it is not possible for fire to endure of itself unless it be fed with fitting aliment—therefore rivulets of blood, as from some fountain of the liver, are stirred up by the heat of the spirit, and run everywhere at once throughout the whole body, lest one part be left desolate by another and nature by such a beginning be corrupted. And let this very thing teach the abstinent, who are formed in the equability of that same matter, that a certain greed is a corrupting passion, and that the Divinity alone is without any want; for human poverty stands in need of those things which seem to maintain its substance.
Therefore, to these three powers by which we have said before that the whole body is governed, nature, with matter flowing in from without, dispenses by diverse channels, administering that which befits each. For to the fountain of blood, which is the liver, it has assigned the distribution of food. And whatever by such providence of hers it has ever cast in to the fountains of the liver, this likewise it makes ready to be derived from the liver.
Just as if snow upon the mountains should augment with its moisture the fountains lying below, and press down its own liquor through the deep to the lower veins. But the heart's ventilation is supplied by the operation of a neighbouring member, which indeed is called the lung, and is a receptacle of air through the implanted windpipe which reaches as far as the mouth, drawing the breath in from without; and the heart, set in the midst like a fire, which is engaged in motion and continual operation, is itself moved and operates without ceasing; and, as bellows of smiths do, it draws to itself from the adjacent spirit compressions, filling itself by expansions, and rekindling the fire that is within it by the adjacent arteries; and it does not cease to do this—drawing to itself what is without by a kind of rising-again and re-breathing, while that
which is about itself it inserts by compression into the arteries themselves—which seems to me to be also the cause why this kind of spontaneous breath subsists for us without ceasing. For often the mind is occupied in other things and altogether rests quiet, the body being relaxed into sleep; yet the breath which is drawn from the air cannot rest, not even a little, with the choice of spontaneous will co-operating in this very thing.
For I am of opinion that the heart, wrapped about and surrounded by the lung, moves that member in its hinder part by its respirations and compressions, and contrives for the lung itself the attraction and emission of air; which lung, being most rarefied and full of many cavities, keeps all its openings, as it were, laid open at the bottom and at the top of the windpipe, and being compressed, of necessity expels the spirit that resides within its bounds, but yielding and rarefying, and again drawing in air, is moved through the interval. And this is the cause of this involuntary respiration: that that which is fiery and seething within us cannot be at rest.
For since the proper operation of heat is motion, and we have perceived the principle of this to be in the heart, so that what is continually in agitation in this organ effects, through the office of the lung, the unceasing attraction and emission of air; therefore, if ever heat grows beyond nature, the breath of those who suffer fever becomes more frequent, as though the heart, hastening, were striving to curb the flame set upon it by the continuance of fresh breath.