Tertullian — On the Soul 56
WHETHER SOULS REMAIN HERE AFTER DEATH. A dispute meets us: whether this happens at once from departure, or some reason detains certain souls here for a time, or even those received may afterward intervene from the lower places by choice or by command. Nor are persuasive points for these opinions lacking. It has been believed the unburied are not brought down to the lower places until they receive due rites, according to Homer's Patroclus begging funeral from Achilles in dreams, because he could not otherwise approach the gates of the lower world, the souls of the buried keeping him far off. But how vain that the soul should sustain the body's dues, as if it carried something of them to the lower places — and much vainer if delay of burial is counted an injury to the soul, which it ought to embrace as a favor if it preferred to be dragged below more slowly.
They also say those forestalled by untimely death wander here until the remainder of the ages is completed with which they would have lived out if they had not died out of season. But either times are fixed for each — and I will not believe fixed times can be snatched — or if fixed they are yet cut short by God's will, they are cut short in vain if they are still waited to be filled — or if not fixed, there will be no remainder of times not fixed. See: an infant dies at the breast, or a boy who would have lived eighty years. That his soul should pass those snatched years here after death — what is that? For it cannot take age without a body, because ages work through bodies. And let ours also recall that souls will receive in the resurrection the same bodies in which they departed. Therefore the same measures of bodies and the same ages that make the measures of bodies will be hoped. So how can an infant's soul pass snatched times here, to be returned eighty years old into an infant body? What then forbids those things to be filled among the lower places, where there is likewise no use of them? So we say every soul, at whatever age it departed, stands in that until the day when that perfect thing promised is tempered to the measure of angelic fullness. Likewise those thought seized by violence will not be held exiles of the lower places — especially by atrocities of punishments — nor are those exits violent which justice decrees, the avenger of violence. And so, you will say, every wicked soul is exiled from the lower places. Compel yourself to set the other: either good or bad lower places. If bad please, even the worst souls ought to be cast there; if good, why do you judge immature and unwed and, by age's condition, pure and harmless souls for a time unworthy of the lower places?
Latin
AN COMMORENTVR HIC ANIMAE POST MORTEM. [1] Occurrit disceptatio, an hoc ab excessu statim fiat, an quasdam animas aliqua ratio detineat hic interim, an etiam receptas liceat postea ab inferis ex arbitrio uel ex imperio interuenire. [2] Nec harum enim opinionum suasoriae desunt. Creditum est insepultos non ad inferos redigi quam iusta perceperint, secundum Homericum Patroclum funus in somniis de Achille flagitantem, quod non alias adire portas inferum posset arcentibus eum longe animabus sepultorum. Nouimus autem praeter poeticae iura pietatis quoque Homericae industriam. Tanto magis enim curam sepulturae collocauit, quanto etiam moram eius iniuriosam animabus incusauit, simul et ne quis defunctum domi detinens ipse amplius cum illo maceretur enormitate solacii dolore nutriti. Ita querellas animae insepultae ad utrumque confinxit, ut instantia funeris et honor corporum seruetur et memoria affectuum temperetur. [3] Ceterum quam uanum, ut anima corporis iusta sustineat, quasi aliquid ex illis ad inferos auehat? Multo uanius, si iniuria deputabitur animae cessatio sepulturae, quam pro gratia deberet amplecti. Vtique enim tardius ad inferos abstrahi malet, quae nec mori uoluit: amabit impium heredem, per quem adhuc pascitur luce. Aut si qua pro certo iniuria est tardius sub terram detrudi, titulus autem iniuriae cessatio est sepulturae, perquam iniquum eam iniuria affici, cui non imputabitur cessatio sepulturae ad proximos scilicet pertinens. [4] Aiunt et immatura morte praeuentas eo usque uagari istic, donec reliquatio compleatur aetatum, quacum peruixissent, si non intempestiue obissent. Porro aut constituta sunt tempora unicuique, et constituta praeripi posse non credam, aut si constituta sunt quidem, dei tamen uoluntate uel aliqua potestate mutilantur, frustra mutilantur, si iam impleri sustinentur, aut si non sunt constituta, nulla erit reliquatio temporum non constitutorum.
[5] Adhuc addam: ecce obiit uerbi gratia infans sub uberum fontibus, puta nunc puer inuestis, puta uesticeps, qui tamen octoginta annos uicturus fuisset. Hos praereptos ut anima eius hic post mortem transigat, quale est? Aetatem enim non potest capere sine corpore, quia per corpora operantur aetates. Nostri autem illud quoque recogitent, corpora eadem recepturas in resurrectione animas in quibus discesserunt. [6] Idem ergo sperabuntur et corporum modi et eaedem aetates, quae corporum modos faciunt. Quo ergo pacto potest infantis anima hic transigere praerepta tempora, ut octogenaria resurgat in corpore mensis unius? Aut si hic necesse erit ea tempora impleri quae fuerant destinata, num et ordinem uitae, quem sortita sunt tempora pariter cum illis hic destinatum, pariter hic anima decurret, ut et studeat ab infantia pueritiae delegata et militet ab adulescentia iuuentae excitata et censeat a iuuenta senectae ponderata, et fenus exprimat et agrum urgeat, nauiget litiget nubat laboret aegritudines obeat et quaecumque illam cum temporibus manebant tristia ac laeta? [7] Sed haec sine corpore quomodo transigentur? Vita sine uita? Sed uacua erunt tempora solo decursu adimplenda. Quid ergo prohibet apud inferos ea impleri, ubi perinde nullus est usus illorum? Ita dicimus omnem animam quaqua aetate decesserit, in ea stare ad eum diem usque, quo perfectum illud repromittitur ad angelicae plenitudinis mensuram temperatum. [8] Proinde extorres inferum habebuntur quas ui ereptas arbitrantur, praecipue per atrocitates suppliciorum, crucis dico et securis et gladii et ferae; nec isti porro exitus uiolenti quos iustitia decernit, uiolentiae uindex. Et ideo, inquies, scelestae quaeque animae inferis exulant. Alteram ergo constituas, compello, aut bonos aut malos inferos: si malos placet, etiam praecipitari illuc animae pessimae debent; si bonos, cur idem animas immaturas et innuptas et pro condicione aetatis puras et innocuas interim indignas inferis iudicas?