Wherefore, again, again, souls must be thought Nor void of birth, nor free from law of death;Nor, if, from outward, in they wound their way, Could they be thought as able so to cleave To these our frames, nor, since so interwove, Appears it that they're able to go forth Unhurt and whole and loose themselves unscathed From all the thews, articulations, bones.
But, if perchance thou thinkest that the soul, From outward winding in its way, is wont To seep and soak along these members ours, Then all the more 'twill perish, being thus With body fused- for what will seep and soak Will be dissolved and will therefore die.
For just as food, dispersed through all the pores Of body, and passed through limbs and all the frame, Perishes, supplying from itself the stuff For other nature, thus the soul and mind, Though whole and new into a body going, Are yet, by seeping in, dissolved away, Whilst, as through pores, to all the frame there pass Those particles from which created is This nature of mind, now ruler of our body, Born from that soul which perished, when divided Along the frame. Wherefore it seems that soul Hath both a natal and funeral hour.
Besides are seeds of soul there left behind In the breathless body, or not? If there they are, It cannot justly be immortal deemed, Since, shorn of some parts lost, 'thas gone away:
But if, borne off with members uncorrupt, 'Thas fled so absolutely all away It leaves not one remainder of itself Behind in body, whence do cadavers, then, From out their putrid flesh exhale the worms, And whence does such a mass of living things, Boneless and bloodless, o'er the bloated frame Bubble and swarm? But if perchance thou thinkest That souls from outward into worms can wind, And each into a separate body come, And reckonest not why many thousand souls Collect where only one has gone away, Here is a point, in sooth, that seems to need Inquiry and a putting to the test:
Whether the souls go on a hunt for seeds Of worms wherewith to build their dwelling places, Or enter bodies ready-made, as 'twere.
But why themselves they thus should do and toil 'Tis hard to say, since, being free of body, They flit around, harassed by no disease, Nor cold nor famine; for the body labours By more of kinship to these flaws of life, And mind by contact with that body suffers So many ills. But grant it be for them However useful to construct a body To which to enter in, 'tis plain they can't.
Then, souls for self no frames nor bodies make, Nor is there how they once might enter in To bodies ready-made- for they cannot Be nicely interwoven with the same, And there'll be formed no interplay of sense Common to each.
Again, why is't there goes Impetuous rage with lion's breed morose, And cunning with foxes, and to deer why given The ancestral fear and tendency to flee, And why in short do all the rest of traits Engender from the very start of life In the members and mentality, if not Because one certain power of mind that came From its own seed and breed waxes the same Along with all the body? But were mind Immortal, were it wont to change its bodies, How topsy-turvy would earth's creatures act!
The Hyrcan hound would flee the onset oft Of antlered stag, the scurrying hawk would quake Along the winds of air at the coming dove, And men would dote, and savage beasts be wise;For false the reasoning of those that say Immortal mind is changed by change of body-For what is changed dissolves, and therefore dies.
For parts are re-disposed and leave their order;Wherefore they must be also capable Of dissolution through the frame at last, That they along with body perish all.
But should some say that always souls of men Go into human bodies, I will ask:
How can a wise become a dullard soul?
And why is never a child's a prudent soul?
And the mare's filly why not trained so well As sturdy strength of steed? We may be sure They'll take their refuge in the thought that mind Becomes a weakling in a weakling frame.
Yet be this so, 'tis needful to confess The soul but mortal, since, so altered now Throughout the frame, it loses the life and sense It had before. Or how can mind wax strong Coequally with body and attain The craved flower of life, unless it be The body's colleague in its origins?
Or what's the purport of its going forth From aged limbs?- fears it, perhaps, to stay, Pent in a crumbled body? Or lest its house, Outworn by venerable length of days, May topple down upon it? But indeed For an immortal perils are there none.
Again, at parturitions of the wild And at the rites of Love, that souls should stand Ready hard by seems ludicrous enough-Immortals waiting for their mortal limbs In numbers innumerable, contending madly Which shall be first and chief to enter in!-Unless perchance among the souls there be Such treaties stablished that the first to come Flying along, shall enter in the first, And that they make no rivalries of strength!
Again, in ether can't exist a tree, Nor clouds in ocean deeps, nor in the fields Can fishes live, nor blood in timber be, Nor sap in boulders: fixed and arranged Where everything may grow and have its place.
Thus nature of mind cannot arise alone Without the body, nor exist afar From thews and blood. But if 'twere possible, Much rather might this very power of mind Be in the head, the shoulders or the heels, And, born in any part soever, yet In the same man, in the same vessel abide.
But since within this body even of ours Stands fixed and appears arranged sure Where soul and mind can each exist and grow, Deny we must the more that they can have Duration and birth, wholly outside the frame.
For, verily, the mortal to conjoin With the eternal, and to feign they feel Together, and can function each with each, Is but to dote: for what can be conceived Of more unlike, discrepant, ill-assorted, Than something mortal in a union joined With an immortal and a secular To bear the outrageous tempests?