28. And yet, that we may not
be as ignorant when we leave you as before, let us hear from
you3581
| 3581
The ms. reads ne videamu-s,
changed in both Roman edd. into -amur—“that we may
not be seen by you (as ignorant), how say you,” etc.
Gelenius proposed the reading of the text, audiamus, which has
been received by Canterus and Orelli. It is clear from the next
words—quemadmodum dicitis—that in this case the verb
must be treated as a kind of interjection, “How say you, let us
hear.” LB. reads, to much the same purpose, scire
avemus, “we desire to know.” |
how you say
that the
soul, on being enwrapt in an earthly body, has no recollection
of the past; while, after being actually placed in the body itself, and
rendered almost senseless by union with it, it holds tenaciously and
faithfully the things which many years before, eighty if you choose to
say
so, or even more, it either did, or
suffered, or said, or
heard. For if, through being hampered by the body, it does not
remember those things which it knew long ago, and before it came into
this
world,
3582
there is more
reason that it should
forget those things which it has done from time
to time since being shut up in the body, than those which
it did
before entering it,
3583
| 3583
Lit., “placed outside.” |
while not yet connected with
men. For the same body which
3584
deprives of memory the
soul which
enters it,
3585
should cause
what is done within itself also to be wholly forgotten; for one cause
cannot bring about two results, and
these opposed to each other,
so as to make some things to be forgotten,
and allow others to
be remembered by him who did them. But if
souls, as you call
them, are prevented and
hindered by their
fleshly members from
recalling their former
knowledge,
3586
| 3586 So
read by Orelli, artes suas antiquas, omitting
atque, which he says, follows in the ms. It is read after suas,
however, in the first ed., and those of Gelenius, Canterus, Hildebrand;
and according to Oehler, it is so given in the ms., “its own and ancient.” Oberthür
would supply res—“its own arts and ancient
things.” |
how do they remember what has been
arranged
3587
| 3587
So the ms., reading
constitut-a, followed by all edd. except those of Ursinus,
Hildebrand, and Oehler, who read -æ, “how do they
remember when established in the bodies,” which is certainly more
in accordance with the context. |
in
these very bodies, and know that they are spirits, and have
no bodily substance, being exalted by their condition as
immortal
beings?
3588
| 3588
Lit., “of immortality.” |
how do
they know what rank they hold in the universe, in what order they
have been set apart
from other beings? how they have come to
these, the lowest parts of the universe? what properties they acquired,
and from what circles,
3589
in gliding along towards these
regions? How, I say, do they know that they were very learned,
and have lost their knowledge by the hindrance which their bodies
afford them? For of this very thing also they should have been
ignorant, whether their union with the body had brought any stain upon
them; for to know what you were, and what to-day you are not, is no
sign that you have lost your memory,
3590
| 3590 Lit.,
“of a lost memory.” |
but a proof and evidence that it is quite
sound.
3591
| 3591 Lit.,
“of (a memory) preserved.” |
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