Chapter XVIII.—Proof of immortality and the resurrection.

For reflect upon the end of each of the preceding kings, how they died the death common to all, which, if it issued in insensibility, would be a godsend36    ἓρμαιον, a piece of unlooked-for luck, Hermes being the reputed giver of such gifts: vid. Liddell and Scott’s Lex.; see also the Scholiast, quoted by Stallbaum in Plato’s Phæd., p. 107, on a passage singularly analogous to this. to all the wicked. But since sensation remains to all who have ever lived, and eternal punishment is laid up (i.e., for the wicked), see that ye neglect not to be convinced, and to hold as your belief, that these things are true. For let even necromancy, and the divinations you practise by immaculate children,37    Boys and girls, or even children prematurely taken from the womb, were slaughtered, and their entrails inspected, in the belief that the souls of the victims (being still conscious, as Justin is arguing) would reveal things hidden and future. Instances are abundantly cited by Otto and Trollope. and the evoking of departed human souls,38    This form of spirit-rapping was familiar to the ancients, and Justin again (Dial. c. Tryph., c. 105) uses the invocation of Samuel by the witch of Endor as a proof of the immortality of the soul. and those who are called among the magi, Dream-senders and Assistant-spirits (Familiars),39    Valesius (on Euseb. H. E., iv. 7) states that the magi had two kinds of familiars: the first, who were sent to inspire men with dreams which might give them intimations of things future; and the second, who were sent to watch over men, and protect them from diseases and misfortunes. The first, he says, they called (as here) ὀνειροπομπούς, and the second παρέδρους. and all that is done by those who are skilled in such matters —let these persuade you that even after death souls are in a state of sensation; and those who are seized and cast about by the spirits of the dead, whom all call dæmoniacs or madmen;40    Justin is not the only author in ancient or recent times who has classed dæmoniacs and maniacs together; neither does he stand alone among the ancients in the opinion that dæmoniacs were possessed by the spirits of departed men. References will be found in Trollope’s note. [See this matter more fully illustrated in Kaye’s Justin Martyr, pp. 105–111.] and what you repute as oracles, both of Amphilochus, Dodana, Pytho, and as many other such as exist; and the opinions of your authors, Empedocles and Pythagoras, Plato and Socrates, and the pit of Homer,41    See the Odyssey, book xi. line 25, where Ulysses is described as digging a pit or trench with his sword, and pouring libations, in order to collect around him the souls of the dead. and the descent of Ulysses to inspect these things, and all that has been uttered of a like kind. Such favour as you grant to these, grant also to us, who not less but more firmly than they believe in God; since we expect to receive again our own bodies, though they be dead and cast into the earth, for we maintain that with God nothing is impossible.

[18] Ἀποβλέψατε γὰρ πρὸς τὸ τέλος ἑκάστου τῶν γενομένων βασιλέων, ὅτι τὸν κοινὸν πᾶσι θάνατον ἀπέθανον: ὅπερ εἰ εἰς ἀναισθησίαν ἐχώρει, ἕρμαιον ἂν ἦν τοῖς ἀδίκοις πᾶσιν. ἀλλ' ἐπεὶ καὶ αἴσθησις πᾶσι γενομένοις μένει καὶ κόλασις αἰωνία ἀπόκειται, μὴ ἀμελήσητε πεισθῆναί τε καὶ πιστεῦσαι ὅτι ἀληθῆ ταῦτά ἐστι. νεκυομαντεῖαι μὲν γὰρ καὶ αἱ ἀδιαφθόρων παίδων ἐποπτεύσεις καὶ ψυχῶν ἀνθρωπίνων κλήσεις καὶ οἱ λεγόμενοι παρὰ τοῖς μάγοις ὀνειροπομποὶ καὶ πάρεδροι καὶ τὰ γινόμενα ὑπὸ τῶν ταῦτα εἰδότων πεισάτωσαν ὑμᾶς, ὅτι καὶ μετὰ θάνατον ἐν αἰσθήσει εἰσὶν αἱ ψυχαί, καὶ οἱ ψυχαῖς ἀποθανόντων λαμβανόμενοι καὶ ῥιπτούμενοι ἄνθρωποι, οὓς δαιμονιολήπτους καὶ μαινομένους καλοῦσι πάντες, καὶ τὰ παρ' ὑμῖν λεγόμενα μαντεῖα Ἀμφιλόχου καὶ Δωδώνης καὶ Πυθοῦς, καὶ ὅσα ἄλλα τοιαῦτά ἐστι, καὶ τὰ τῶν συγγραφέων διδάγματα, Ἐμπεδοκλέους καὶ Πυθαγόρου, Πλάτωνός τε καὶ Σωκράτους, καὶ ὁ παρ' Ὁμήρῳ βόθρος καὶ ἡ κάθοδος Ὀδυσσέως εἰς τὴν τούτων ἐπίσκεψιν, καὶ τῶν τὰ αὐτὰ τούτοις εἰπόντων: οἷς κἂν ὁμοίως ἡμᾶς ἀποδέξασθε, οὐχ ἧττον ἐκείνων θεῷ πιστεύοντας ἀλλὰ μᾶλλον, οἳ καὶ τὰ νεκρούμενα καὶ εἰς γῆν βαλλόμενα πάλιν ἀπολήψεσθαι ἑαυτῶν σώματα προσδοκῶμεν, ἀδύνατον μηδὲν εἶναι θεῷ λέγοντες.