Chapter 29 [XIX.]—Does the Soul Take the Body’s Clothes Also Away with It?

If, indeed, the soul were body, and the form were also a corporeal figure in which it sees itself in dreams, on the ground that it received its expression from the body in which it is enclosed: not a human being, if he lost a limb, would in dreams see himself bereft of the amputated member, although actually deprived of it. On the contrary, he would always appear to himself entire and unmutilated, from the circumstance that no part has been cut away from the soul itself. But since persons sometimes see themselves whole and sometimes mutilated in limb, when this happens to be their actual plight, what else does this fact show than that the soul, both in respect of other things seen by it in dreams and in reference to the body, bears about, hither and thither, not their reality, but only their resemblance? The soul’s joy, however, or sadness, its pleasure or pain, are severally real emotions, whether experienced in actual or in apparent bodies. Have you not yourself said (and with perfect truth): “Aliments and vestments are not wanted by the soul, but only by the body”? Why, then, did the rich man in hell crave for the drop of water?157    Luke xvi. 24. Why did holy Samuel appear after his death (as you have yourself noticed) clothed in his usual garments?158    1 Sam. xxviii. 14. Did the one wish to repair the ruins of the soul, as of the flesh, by the aliment of water? Did the other quit life with his clothes on him? Now in the former case there was a real suffering, which tormented the soul; but not a real body, such as required food. While the latter might have seemed to be clothed, not as being a veritable body, but a soul only, having the semblance of a body with a dress. For although the soul extends and contracts itself to suit the members of the body, it does not similarly adapt itself to the clothes, so as to fit its form to them.

CAPUT XIX.

29. Proinde si anima corpus esset, et corporea esset figura in qua se videt in somnis, eo quod de corpore ejus fuisset expressa; nullus hominum membro corporis amputato, sicut eo caret, ita sine illo se videret in somnis, sed potius semper integrum, eo quod animae ipsius nihil fuerit amputatum. Cum vero aliquando se integros videant, aliquando autem sicut sunt, ex quacumque parte truncatos; quid aliud ista res docet, nisi animam, sicut aliarum rerum quas sensit in somnis, ita et corporis, modo sic, modo sic, non veritatem, sed similitudinem gerere? Gaudium vero ejus sive tristitia, delectatio vel offensio, sive sit in corporibus, sive in corporum similitudinibus, vera est. Tu ipse nonne dixisti, vereque dixisti, «Alimenta et vestimenta non esse animae, sed corpori necessaria?» Cur ergo aquae stillam desideravit apud inferos dives? Cur Samuel sanctus post mortem, ut ipse quoque commemorasti, solito indumento vestitus apparuit (I Reg. XXVIII, 14)? Numquid 0542 ille ruinas animae, sicut carnis, per humoris alimentum reficere cupiebat? Numquid iste de corpore vestitus exierat? Sed in illo vera erat molestia, qua cruciabatur anima; non tamen verum corpus, cui quaereret alimenta. Et iste sic potuit apparere vestitus, ut non corpus esset, sed similitudinem corporis haberet et anima et habitus. Neque enim se anima sicut in membra corporis, ita et in vestimenta porrigit et coarctat, ut etiam inde formetur.