Chapter 32.—The Case of Certain Idiots and Simpletons.

Now a good deal may be said of men’s strange vocations,—either such as we have read about, or have experienced ourselves,—which go to overthrow the opinion of those persons who think that, previous to the possession of their bodies, men’s souls passed through certain lives peculiar to themselves, in which they must come to this, and experience in the present life either good or evil, according to the difference of their individual deserts. My anxiety, however, to bring this work to an end does not permit me to dwell longer on these topics. But on one point, which among many I have found to be a very strange one, I will not be silent. If we follow those persons who suppose that souls are oppressed with earthly bodies in a greater or a less degree of grossness, according to the deserts of the life which had been passed in celestial bodies previous to the assumption of the present one, who would not affirm that those had sinned previous to this life with an especial amount of enormity, who deserve so to lose all mental light, that they are born with faculties akin to brute animals,—who are (I will not say most slow in intellect, for this is very commonly said of others also, but) so silly as to make a show of their fatuity for the amusement of clever people, even with idiotic gestures,99    We here follow the reading cerriti; other readings are,—curati (with studied folly), cirrati (with effeminate foppery), and citrati (decking themselves with citrus leaves). and whom the vulgar call, by a name, derived from the Greek, Moriones?100    That is, “fools,” from the Greek μωρόςAnd yet there was once a certain person of this class, who was so Christian, that although he was patient to the degree of strange folly with any amount of injury to himself, he was yet so impatient of any insult to the name of Christ, or, in his own person, to the religion with which he was imbued, that he could never refrain, whenever his gay and clever audience proceeded to blaspheme the sacred name, as they sometimes would in order to provoke his patience, from pelting them with stones; and on these occasions he would show no favour even to persons of rank. Well, now, such persons are predestinated and brought into being, as I suppose, in order that those who are able should understand that God’s grace and the Spirit, “which bloweth where it listeth,”101    John iii. 8. does not pass over any kind of capacity in the sons of mercy, nor in like manner does it pass over any kind of capacity in the children of Gehenna, so that “he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”102    1 Cor. i. 31. They, however, who affirm that souls severally receive different earthly bodies, more or less gross according to the merits of their former life, and that their abilities as men vary according to the self-same merits, so that some minds are sharper and others more obtuse, and that the grace of God is also dispensed for the liberation of men from their sins according to the deserts of their former existence:—what will they have to say about this man? How will they be able to attribute to him a previous life of so disgraceful a character that he deserved to be born an idiot, and at the same time of so highly meritorious a character as to entitle him to a preference in the award of the grace of Christ over many men of the acutest intellect?

32. Multa enim dici possunt de miris vocationibus hominum, sive quas legimus, sive quas experti sumus, quibus eorum opinio subvertatur, qui credunt ante ista corpora sua, quasdam proprias vitas gessisse animas hominum, quibus ad haec venirent, pro diversitate meritorum diversa hic experturae vel bona vel mala. Sed terminandi hujus operis cura non sinit in his diutius immorari. Unum tamen, quod inter multa mirabile comperi, non tacebo. Quis non secundum istos, qui ex meritis prioris vitae ante hoc corpus in coelestibus gestae animas terrenis corporibus magis minusve gravari opinantur, affirmet eos ante istam vitam sceleratius immaniusque peccasse, qui mentis lumen sic amittere meruerunt, ut sensu vicino pecoribus nascerentur; non dico tardissimi ingenio, nam hoc de aliis dici solet; sed ita excordes, ut etiam cirrati ad movendum risum exhibeant cordatis delicias fatuitatis, quorum nomen ex graeco derivatum moriones vulgus appellat? Talium tamen quidam fuit ita christianus, ut cum esset omnium injuriarum suarum mira fatuitate patientissimus, injuriam tamen Christi nominis vel in se ipso religionis qua imbutus erat, sic ferre non posset, ut blasphemantes videlicet cordatos, a quibus haec ut provocaretur audiebat, insectari lapidibus non desisteret, nec in ea causa vel dominis parceret. Tales ergo praedestinari et creari arbitror, ut qui possunt, intelligant, Dei gratiam et Spiritum qui ubi vult spirat (Joan. III, 8), ob hoc omne ingenii genus in filiis misericordiae non praeterire, itemque omne ingenii genus in gehennae filiis praeterire, ut qui gloriatur in Domino glorietur (I Cor. I, 31). Illi autem qui pro meritis vitae superioris accipere quasque animas diversa terrena corpora affirmant, quibus aliae magis, 0128 aliae minus graventur, et pro eisdem meritis humana ingenia variari, ut acutiora sint quaedam, et alia obtusiora, proque ipsius vitae superioris meritis divinam quoque gratiam liberandis hominibus dispensari; quid de isto poterunt respondere? Quomodo ei tribuent et teterrimam vitam superiorem, ut ex hoc fatuus nasceretur; et tam bene meritam, ut ex hoc in Christi gratia multis acutissimis praeferretur?