On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (26 page)

Made its thin passage out and spread abroad;

The body, changed and crumbling in ruin, collapses.

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Why so? Because the body’s deep foundations

Have been moved and shaken, while through all its limbs

And winding passages and tiny pores

The spirit has seeped out. So you may learn

That in many ways the spirit was dispersed

When from the limbs it made its exit, and

While in the body had been torn apart

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Before it emerged outside, you see, and swam

Into the winds of air and so away.

Let’s take another case. Sometimes the spirit

While moving still within the bounds of life

Gets hurt by something (never mind the cause!)

And wants to leave the body and be free.

The face grows pale, as at the point of death,

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Blood leaves the limbs and all collapse and fall.

This we call fainting. Everyone’s distressed,

Wants to hold fast again the chains of life.

This happens because the mind and spirit are shaken

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And fail, within the fading body. It needs

Only a slightly stronger shock to kill them.

Why then do you doubt that, driven from the body,

Weak, in the open, out of doors, unclothed,

Not only not for ever could the spirit

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Endure, but not for the smallest length of time?

For it is evident that no one, dying,

Feels that the soul intact deserts the body

Nor that it rises first to the throat and then

Through the gullet. Instead he feels it fail

Seated in some fixed place, just as he feels

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His other senses, each in its part, to fail.

But if the mind were immortal, then in dying

It would not complain of being dispersed, but rather

Of going out and shedding its skin, like a snake.

The wisdom and intelligence of mind

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Never in head or feet or hands are born,

But in one fixed and certain region stay.

This is because fixed places are assigned

To everything that is, in which it must

Be born and grow and have its being. A man

Has legs and arms and head and all the rest

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And nothing’s ever upside down. So sure

One thing follows another. You’ll not find

Flames in a river, no, nor frost in fire.

Now, if the mind is immortal and can feel

When parted from the body, we must assume

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It has the five senses. Only in this way

Can we imagine the spirits of the dead

Go wandering in Hades. Painters and poets

Have always shown us spirits endowed with senses.

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But what do you think? Can a spirit without body

Have eyes or nose or hand or tongue, and can

The ears hear by themselves without a body?

And since we feel that vital sense inheres

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In the whole body and that it is the whole

That lives, if suddenly some force

With a swift blow shall cut the body through

So as to sever the two parts asunder,

No doubt the spirit too will be cleft apart,

Divided and cut together with the body.

But what is cut and divided into parts

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Surely can make no claim to be eternal.

They tell how chariots bearing scythes cut off

A man’s limb in the heat of battle. It falls

And quivers on the ground, shorn from the trunk,

But the man feels no pain—the blow’s too sudden.

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A man may lose his left arm and his shield

Torn off amidst the horses by the scythes

Of the chariot wheels and never notice it,

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Drunk with the fight; or losing his right arm

Press on regardless. Another has lost his leg

And the foot lies on the ground twitching its toes.

The head cut off from the hot and living trunk

Stares through its open eyes until what’s left

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Of the spirit is given up and passes away.

Now let’s consider a snake, with flickering tongue,

Long body, and menacing tail. Take your knife

And cut it up. You’ll see the separate parts

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All writhing while the wound is fresh,

Spattering the earth with gore. See how its head

Turns round and back and tries to gnaw its tail,

Wanting to bite away the burning pain.

Shall we then say that in each separate piece

There is a separate spirit? If we do,

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That means that in one single animal

There are many spirits spread throughout the body.

It follows that one single spirit has been

Divided, just as the body has, so each

Must be considered mortal, since they both

Have been alike cut into many parts.

Now also, if the spirit is immortal

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And creeps into the body when we are born,

Why can we not remember time that’s past,

Why do we keep no traces of things done?

For if the mind has been so greatly changed

As to lose all remembrance of past acts,

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That, I think, is not far removed from death.

Wherefore, you must admit, it follows that

The spirit that was before has perished and

The spirit which now is has now been born.

Moreover, if the body is complete

Before the quickened mind can enter it

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When we are born and tread the threshold of life,

It makes no sense that in our body and limbs

And in the blood itself it lives and grows;

Better by far to find a quiet hole

For itself, and let the body do the feeling.

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But all experience shows the contrary,

So interwoven is it with the body

Through veins, flesh, sinews, even bones, that teeth

Also have feeling like the rest. We get toothache,

A twinge from icy water, and grind on grit

That’s found in lumps of bread, all hard and rough.

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Wherefore again and yet again I say

It is unthinkable that spirits have

No beginning or are free from the law of death.

If they come into our bodies from outside

It is unthinkable that they could have

Such close connection with them; and since so close

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Is this connection, safe and unharmed they can’t

Extract themselves from sinews, bones, and joints.

But if by any chance you think that the spirit

Can get into our bodies from outside

And seep through our limbs, then all the more it must,

Fused with the body, perish. What permeates

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Must also dissolve, and therefore perishes.

Consider food: it goes into our bodies,

Into our limbs, dispersed through many channels,

And perishes; and in so doing supports

Another body. So spirit and mind

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May enter the body whole, yet permeating

Dissolve, their elements widely dispersed

Into the limbs through the channels of the body,

Those elements of which the mind consists

Which now, in our body born, is lord of it,

Born of that mind which perished when through our limbs

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It was distributed. Wherefore the spirit

Has both a birthday and a funeral.

Now here’s another question. When the body

Is dead do any seeds of spirit remain in it?

If any do, and stay with it, then clearly

The spirit can’t be immortal, since it has gone

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Away and left some parts of itself behind.

And if it has so completely fled away

That not one particle of itself is left,

How do you explain worms? The body rots

And worms appear. Where from? And the other things

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Boneless and bloodless that swarm through the limbs,

Where do they come from? Do you really think

That spirits creep into the worms from outside

One by one into a thousand worms—

A thousand spirits where only one has died?

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Do the spirits go hunting for seeds of the worms

To make a home of them? Or perhaps they creep

Into the bodies of worms already formed?

Why should they do this, why take all this trouble?

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It’s quite a question—worth considering.