Chapter LVIII.—Conclusion. Points Postponed. All Souls are Kept in Hades Until the Resurrection, Anticipating Their Ultimate Misery or Bliss.

All souls, therefore, are shut up within Hades: do you admit this? (It is true, whether) you say yes or no: moreover, there are already experienced there punishments and consolations; and there you have a poor man and a rich. And now, having postponed some stray questions346    Nescio quid. for this part of my work, I will notice them in this suitable place, and then come to a close. Why, then, cannot you suppose that the soul undergoes punishment and consolation in Hades in the interval, while it awaits its alternative of judgment, in a certain anticipation either of gloom or of glory?  You reply: Because in the judgment of God its matter ought to be sure and safe, nor should there be any inkling beforehand of the award of His sentence; and also because (the soul) ought to be covered first by its vestment347    “Operienda” is Oehler’s text; another reading gives “opperienda,” q.d., “the soul must wait for the restored body.” of the restored flesh, which, as the partner of its actions, should be also a sharer in its recompense. What, then, is to take place in that interval? Shall we sleep? But souls do not sleep even when men are alive: it is indeed the business of bodies to sleep, to which also belongs death itself, no less than its mirror and counterfeit sleep. Or will you have it, that nothing is there done whither the whole human race is attracted, and whither all man’s expectation is postponed for safe keeping? Do you think this state is a foretaste of judgment, or its actual commencement? a premature encroachment on it, or the first course in its full ministration? Now really, would it not be the highest possible injustice, even348    This “etiam” is “otium” in the Agobardine ms., a good reading; q.d. “a most iniquitous indifference to justice,” etc. in Hades, if all were to be still well with the guilty even there, and not well with the righteous even yet? What, would you have hope be still more confused after death? would you have it mock us still more with uncertain expectation? or shall it now become a review of past life, and an arranging of judgment, with the inevitable feeling of a trembling fear? But, again, must the soul always tarry for the body, in order to experience sorrow or joy? Is it not sufficient, even of itself, to suffer both one and the other of these sensations? How often, without any pain to the body, is the soul alone tortured by ill-temper, and anger, and fatigue, and very often unconsciously, even to itself? How often, too, on the other hand, amidst bodily suffering, does the soul seek out for itself some furtive joy, and withdraw for the moment from the body’s importunate society? I am mistaken if the soul is not in the habit, indeed, solitary and alone, of rejoicing and glorifying over the very tortures of the body.  Look for instance, at the soul of Mutius Scævola as he melts his right hand over the fire; look also at Zeno’s, as the torments of Dionysius pass over it.349    Comp. The Apology, last chapter. The bites of wild beasts are a glory to young heroes, as on Cyrus were the scars of the bear.350    Xen. Cyropæd. p. 6. Full well, then, does the soul even in Hades know how to joy and to sorrow even without the body; since when in the flesh it feels pain when it likes, though the body is unhurt; and when it likes it feels joy though the body is in pain. Now if such sensations occur at its will during life, how much rather may they not happen after death by the judicial appointment of God! Moreover, the soul executes not all its operations with the ministration of the flesh; for the judgment of God pursues even simple cogitations and the merest volitions. “Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.”351    Matt. v. 28. Therefore, even for this cause it is most fitting that the soul, without at all waiting for the flesh, should be punished for what it has done without the partnership of the flesh. So, on the same principle, in return for the pious and kindly thoughts in which it shared not the help of the flesh, shall it without the flesh receive its consolation.  Nay more,352    Quid nunc si. even in matters done through the flesh the soul is the first to conceive them, the first to arrange them, the first to authorize them, the first to precipitate them into acts. And even if it is sometimes unwilling to act, it is still the first to treat the object which it means to effect by help of the body.  In no case, indeed, can an accomplished fact be prior to the mental conception353    Conscientia. thereof. It is therefore quite in keeping with this order of things, that that part of our nature should be the first to have the recompense and reward to which they are due on account of its priority. In short, inasmuch as we understand “the prison” pointed out in the Gospel to be Hades,354    Matt. v. 25. and as we also interpret “the uttermost farthing”355    Ver. 26. to mean the very smallest offence which has to be recompensed there before the resurrection,356    Morâ resurrectionis. See above, on this opinion of Tertullian, in ch. xxxv. no one will hesitate to believe that the soul undergoes in Hades some compensatory discipline, without prejudice to the full process of the resurrection, when the recompense will be administered through the flesh besides. This point the Paraclete has also pressed home on our attention in most frequent admonitions, whenever any of us has admitted the force of His words from a knowledge of His promised spiritual disclosures.357    [A symptom of Montanism.] And now at last having, as I believe, encountered every human opinion concerning the soul, and tried its character by the teaching of (our holy faith,) we have satisfied the curiosity which is simply a reasonable and necessary one.  As for that which is extravagant and idle, there will evermore be as great a defect in its information, as there has been exaggeration and self-will in its researches.

CAPUT LVIII.

«Omnes ergo animae penes inferos?» inquis. Velis ac nolis, et supplicia jam illic, et refrigeria. Habes pauperem et divitem. Et quia distuli nescio quid ad hanc partem, jam opportune in clausula reddam. Cur enim non putes animam, et puniri, et foveri 0750B in infernis interim sub expectatione utriusque judicii, in quadam usurpatione et candida ejus? «Quia salvum debet esse, inquis, judicio divino negotium suum, sine ulla praelibatione sententiae. Tum quia et carnis operienda est restitutio, ut consortis operarum atque mercedum.» Quid ergo fiet in tempore isto? dormiemus? Atenim animae nec in viventibus dormiunt: corporum enim est somnus, quorum et ipsa mors cum speculo suo somno. Aut nihil vis agi illic, quo universa humanitas trahitur, quo spes omnis sequestratur? Delibari putas judicium, an incipi? praecipitari, an praeministrari? Jam vero, quam iniquissimum etiam apud inferos, si et nocentibus adhuc illic bene est, et innocentibus nondum? Quid? ampliationem vis esse post mortem, confusa 0750C spe et incerta exspectatione ludentem, an vitae recensum jam et ordinationem judicii inhorrentem? Semper autem exspectat anima corpus, ut doleat, aut gaudeat? Nonne et de suo sufficit sibi ad utrumque titulum passionis? Quotiens, illaeso corpore, anima sola torquetur bile, ira, taedio, plerumque nec sibi noto! quotiens item corpore adflicto furtivum sibi anima gaudium exquirit, et a corporis importuna tunc societate secedit! Mentior, si 0751A non de ipsis cruciatibus corporis et gloriari et gaudere sola consuevit. Respice ad Mutii animam, cum dexteram suam ignibus solvit. Respice ad Zenonis, cum illam Dionysii tormenta praetereunt. Morsus ferarum ornamenta sunt juventutis, ut in Cyro ursi cicatrices. Adeo novit et apud inferos anima et dolere et gaudere sine carne; quia et in carne illaesa si velit dolet, et laesa si velit gaudet. Hoc si ex arbitrio suo in vita, quanto magis ex judicio Dei post mortem! Sed nec omnia opera cum carnis ministerio anima partitur; nam et solos cogitatus et nudas voluntates censura divina persequitur (Matth., V): Qui viderit ad concupiscendum, jam adulteravit in corde. Ergo propter hoc congruentissimum est animam, licet non exspectata carne, puniri, quod non 0751B sociata carne commisit. Sic et ob cogitatus pios et benevolos, in quibus carne non eguit, sine carne recreabitur. Quid nunc, si et in carnalibus prior est, 0752A quae concipit, quae disponit, quae mandat, quae impellit? Et, si quando invita, prior tamen tractat, quod per corpus actura est. Nunquam denique conscientia posterior erit facto. Ita huic quoque ordini competit, eam priorem pensare mercedes, cui priori debeantur. In summa, cum carcerem illum, quem Evangelium demonstrat, inferos intelligamus, et novissimum quadrantem modicum quodque delictum mora resurrectionis illic luendum interpretemur ; nemo dubitabit animam aliquid pensare penes inferos, salva resurrectionis plenitudine per carnem quoque. Hoc etiam Paracletus frequentissime commendavit, si quis sermones ejus ex agnitione promissorum charismatum admiserit. Ad omnem, ut arbitror, humanam super anima opinionem, ex doctrina fidei congressi, 0752B justae dumtaxat ac necessariae curiositati satisfecimus . Enormi autem et otiosae tantum deerit discere, quantum libuerit inquirere.