On the Soul and the Resurrection 11–37

When Basil, great among the saints, had departed from human life to God, and a common cause of mourning had come upon the churches, while his sister and my teacher was still living, I went in haste to share with her the misfortune of our brother. My soul was in deep pain, grieving excessively at such a loss, and I sought someone to share my tears who bore a burden of grief equal to mine. When we were in each other’s sight, the appearance of my teacher before my eyes stirred my grief again; for she too was already in the grip of the illness that led to her death. But she, like those skilled in horsemanship, gave way to me for a little while, letting me be carried along by the rush of my grief, and afterward tried to curb me with reason, guiding the disorder of my soul by her own reasoning as with a bridle; and she was …

… to be. Gregory: And I, my heart still boiling with grief, said: “How is it possible for this to be achieved among human beings, when there is in each a natural aversion to death, and those who see the dying do not easily bear the sight, while those whom death approaches flee it as far as they can? Even the rulers judge it the extreme law in crimes and the extreme penalty in punishments. What means is there to think the departure from life as nothing, even in the case of strangers, not to speak of friends, when their life ends? We see,” I said, “that all human effort looks to this, that we may remain alive. For this reason houses have been devised for us to live in, so that our bodies may not be distressed by the surrounding air through cold or heat. And what else is farming but a provision for living? And care for life arises entirely from the fear of death. Why is medicine honoured among men? Is it not because by its art it seems in some way to fight against death? Breastplates and shields, greaves and helmets, and the defensive weapons, the encircling walls, iron-bound gates, the safety of trenches and the like, what else are they made for but the fear of death? Since death is thus naturally fearful, how can one easily be persuaded by one who bids us remain without grief …

… over the departed, the survivors? Macrina: “What,” said my teacher, “seems to you most painful about death in itself? For the habit of the more irrational is not sufficient ground to condemn it.” Gregory: “What is there, then, not worthy of grief,” I said to her, “when we see one who until now was living and speaking suddenly become breathless, voiceless, and motionless, and all his natural senses quenched, no sight, no hearing working, nor any other of the things perceived by sense? Bring fire to him, or iron, cut his body with a sword, throw him to carnivorous beasts, hide him in earth: the one lying there is alike toward everything. When, then, such a change is seen in these things, and that life-giving cause, whatever it was, has suddenly become invisible and unknown, as when a lamp is put out and the flame that until then was burning by itself neither remains on the wick nor moves somewhere else but passes into complete disappearance, how could anyone bear such a change without grief, having nothing plain to lean on? For when we hear of the departure of the soul, we see what is left, but we do not know what has been separated, either what it is by nature or where it has gone, since neither earth nor air nor water nor any other of the elements shows in itself that power which has departed from the body, at whose withdrawal what is left is a corpse and already exposed to corruption.”

Gregory: While I was going through this, my teacher, motioning with her hand, said: Macrina: “Is it such a fear that disturbs and grips your mind, that the soul does not remain forever but ends together with the dissolution of the body?” Gregory: And I, for I had not yet recovered my reasoning from my grief, answered rather rashly, without considering what was said very carefully. I said that the divine words seem like commands, by which we are compelled to believe that the soul remains forever, but we have not been brought to such a belief by any reasoning; rather, it seems that our mind within slavishly accepts by fear what is commanded, not agreeing with what is said by any willing impulse. “That is why,” I said, “our griefs over the departed become sharper, since we do not know exactly whether this life-giving cause still exists by itself, and where and how, or whether it does not exist anywhere in any way. For uncertainty about what truly is makes the suppositions on either side equal. Many hold this, and many the opposite. And there are some among the Greeks of no small reputation in philosophy who have thought and declared these things.” Macrina: “Away,” she said, “with that outside nonsense, in which the inventor of falsehood, to the harm of the truth, plausibly constructs suppositions for those he has deceived. But look at this: to hold such a view of the soul is nothing else than to be estranged from virtue, to look only to present pleasure, and to despair of the life seen in the ages, in which virtue alone has the advantage.” Gregory: “And how,” I said, “could we come to have a firm and unchangeable belief in the soul’s remaining …?”

For I myself perceive that human life will be bereft of the finest thing in life, I mean virtue, unless an undoubting faith about this is established in us. For how can virtue have any place in those who suppose that the present life is the limit of their existence and hope for nothing more after it?” Macrina: “We must seek, then,” said my teacher, “where our discussion should properly begin on these things. And if you like, let the alliance of the opposing doctrines come from you; for I see that your mind is somewhat moved toward such a conclusion. Then the account of the truth will be sought after the objection.” Gregory: Since she commanded this, I begged her not to think that I was objecting in earnest, but that the objections to the doctrine might be raised so that the teaching about the soul might be firmly established. “Would not those,” I said, “who stand by the opposite account say this: that the body, being composite, is certainly dissolved into the things of which it is composed; and when the natural union of the elements in the body is dissolved, the inclination of the nature of the elements, as is likely, goes to what is proper to each, a necessary attraction giving back what is its own to what is of its own kind? For the heat in us will be united again with heat, and the earthy with the solid, and each of the rest passes to its kin. Where, then, is the soul after this? If one says that it is in the elements, he will necessarily agree that it is the same as they; for there could be no mixture of something of a different nature with what is foreign to it; and if this were so, it would certainly appear as something varied, mixed with opposite qualities; but what is varied is not simple, but is certainly seen in composition; and everything composite is necessarily dissoluble; and dissolution is the destruction of what was constituted; and what is destroyed …”

“… is not immortal; otherwise the flesh too would be called immortal, since it is dissolved into the things of which it is composed. But if the soul is something else besides these, where does reason suppose it to be, since it is not found in the elements, being of a different nature from them, and there is nothing else in the world in which the soul could live in a way suited to its own nature? But what is nowhere does not exist at all.” Macrina: And my teacher, sighing gently at what had been said, said: “Perhaps such things as these the Stoics and Epicureans brought forward when they gathered against the Apostle at Athens. For I hear that Epicurus was carried away chiefly to such suppositions, that the nature of things was thought to be accidental and spontaneous, with no providence passing through events. And for this reason, consistently, he thought human life too was like a bubble, our body being blown up by some breath, as long as the breath is held in by what encloses it, and that when the bulk collapses what was enclosed is quenched with it. For to him what appears was the limit of the nature of things, and he made sense the measure of his grasp of the universe, having wholly shut the senses of the soul and being unable to look at anything intelligible and incorporeal; like a man shut up in a little hut who remains without sight of the wonders of heaven, hindered by the walls and roof from seeing what is outside. For all the sensible things seen in the universe are simply earthen walls, which by themselves block the more small-minded from the contemplation of intelligible things …”

Such a man sees only earth and water and air and fire; but where each of these comes from, or in what it is, or by what it is held together, he cannot see through because of his narrowness of soul. Yet one who sees a garment reasons to the weaver, and through the ship thinks of the shipwright, and the hand of the builder comes into the mind of those who see the building together with the sight of the building. But those who look at the world are dim-sighted toward the one shown through it. Hence these clever and sharp arguments are put forward by those who teach the annihilation of the soul: body from elements, and elements from body, and that the soul cannot exist by itself if it is neither one of these nor in these. For if the objectors think that the soul is nowhere because it is not of the same nature as the elements, let them first teach that life in the flesh too is without soul; for the body is nothing else than a concurrence of the elements; let them not say, then, that the soul is in these either, giving life to the compound by itself, if, as they think, it is not possible for the soul to exist after these things while the elements exist; so that they show our life to be nothing else than dead. But if they do not doubt that the soul is now in the body, how do they teach its annihilation when the body is dissolved into the elements? Then let them dare the same against the divine nature itself. For how will they say that the intelligent, immaterial, and formless nature, penetrating into moist and soft and solid things, holds existing things together in being, neither being akin to the things in which it comes to be nor unable to be in them because it is of a different kind? Let the divine itself, then, by which existing things are held together, be removed altogether from their doctrine.” Gregory: “But this very thing,” I said, “how could it become undoubted for the objectors, that all things are from God and that existing things are held together in him, or even at all that there is something divine above the nature of existing things?”

Macrina: “It would be more fitting,” she said, “to keep silence on such matters and not to think foolish and impious propositions worthy of an answer, since one of the divine sayings forbids answering a fool according to his folly; and certainly, according to the Prophet, he is a fool who says there is no God. But since this too must be said, I will tell you,” she said, “an argument that is not mine, nor any other human being’s (for that would be small, whoever he was), but one which the creation of existing things itself goes through by the wonders in it, the eye becoming a hearer, as the wise and skilful word resounds in the heart through the things that appear. For creation openly cries out its Maker, the heavens themselves, as the Prophet says, declaring the glory of God with unspoken voices. For who, seeing the harmony of the universe, of the wonders in heaven and on earth, and how the elements, opposite to one another in nature, are all woven together to the same aim by some ineffable communion, each contributing its own power to the preservation of the whole; how things unmixable and incompatible in the property of their qualities are neither separated from one another nor destroyed when blended with one another by their opposite qualities; but even things whose nature is upward-tending are carried downward, as the sun’s heat flows down in its rays, while heavy bodies are lifted up, thinned out into vapours, so that water too becomes upward-tending against its nature, carried through the air on the winds, and the fire of the ether comes down to earth, so that even the depth has its share of heat; and the moisture from the rains poured on the earth, though one in nature, produces countless varieties of plants, growing in a manner suited to each subject; and the swiftest revolution of the pole and the contrary motion of the circles within …

… the motion in the opposite direction, the retrogradations and conjunctions and harmonious distances of the stars: one who sees these with the discerning eye of the soul, is he not clearly taught by what appears that a divine power, skilful and wise, appearing in existing things and pervading all, fits the parts to the whole and fills up the whole in the parts, and that the universe is held together by one power, abiding in itself, never ceasing from motion, nor passing to any other place than that in which it is?” Gregory: “And how,” I said, “does faith in the existence of God also prove the existence of the human soul? For the soul is not the same as God, so that if the one is admitted to exist the other must certainly be admitted too.” Macrina: “It is said by the wise,” she said, “that man is a kind of little world, containing in himself the elements of which the universe is made up. If this account is true (and it seems to be), perhaps we shall need no other ally to confirm what we have supposed about the soul. And we have supposed that it exists by itself in a distinct and peculiar nature, apart from bodily coarseness. For as, recognizing the whole world through sense perception, we are led by the very activity of our senses to the thought of the reality and idea beyond sense, and the eye becomes for us an interpreter of the all-powerful wisdom which is seen in the universe and through itself reveals the one who holds the universe in his grasp, so too, looking at the world within us, we have no small grounds for guessing the hidden through what appears. And that is hidden which, being intelligible and formless in itself, escapes the perception of sense.” Gregory: And I said: “But it is possible to infer the wisdom that is above the universe from the wise and skilful principles seen in the nature of …”

“… existing things, in this harmony and order; but what knowledge of the soul could come, through what is shown in the body, to those who track the hidden from what appears?” Macrina: “Most of all,” said the virgin, “to those who desire to know themselves according to that wise precept; for the soul itself would be the teacher of what is to be supposed about the soul: that it is something immaterial and incorporeal, acting and moving in a way suited to its own nature, and showing its own movements through the bodily organs. For this instrumental construction of the body exists no less in those deadened by death, but it remains motionless and inactive, since the power of soul is not in it. It moves when sense is in the organs and the intelligible power passes through sense, moving the sense organs with its own impulses as it pleases.” Gregory: “What, then,” I said, “is the soul, if its nature can be sketched by some definition, so that through the sketch we may gain some understanding of the subject?” Macrina: My teacher said: “Different people have given different accounts of it, each defining it as seemed good to him; but our opinion of it is this. The soul is a created substance, a living substance, intellectual, which by itself gives to an organic and sentient body a power of life and of perceiving sensible things, as long as the nature capable of receiving these holds together.” And as she said this she pointed with her hand to the physician who was sitting by her to care for her body, and said: “The evidence for what has been said is near us. For how,” she said, “does this man, laying the touch of his fingers on the artery, in a way hear through the sense of touch nature crying out to him and telling its own sufferings: that the disease is intense in the body, that the illness started from these inward parts, and that the intensity of the fever extends so far? He is taught other such things by the eye too, looking at the posture in which the patient lies and at the wasting of the flesh; and the colour of the complexion, sallow and bilious, and the glance of the eyes turning of themselves toward what pains and hurts, show the inward state. Likewise hearing becomes a teacher of similar things, recognizing the suffering by the shortness of breath and the groan that comes out with the breathing. And one might say that not even the expert’s sense of smell is without insight into the suffering, but recognizes by the particular quality of the breath the illness hidden in the inward parts …”

Would this be so if there were not some intelligible power present to each of the senses? What would the hand have taught us by itself, if thought did not lead its touch to the knowledge of the subject? What would hearing, separated from understanding, or the eye, or the nostril, or any other sense organ have contributed to the recognition of what is sought, if each of them were by itself alone? But what is truest of all is what one of those educated outside the faith is remembered to have said well: that it is mind that sees and mind that hears. For if one did not grant this to be true, how is it, tell me, that when you look at the sun, as you were taught by your teacher to look, you say that it is not as large as it appears to most people in the size of its disc, but exceeds the whole earth many times in measure? Is it not because, having followed with your understanding, through what appears, its particular motion, the intervals of time and place, and the causes of eclipses, you confidently declare that it is so? And seeing the waning and waxing of the moon, you are taught other things through the appearance of the shapes of that luminary: that it is without light in its own nature and revolves in the circle near the earth, and shines from the sun’s rays, as happens naturally with mirrors, which, receiving the sun on themselves, give back not rays of their own but those of the sun’s light reflected back from the smooth and shining body. To those who look without examination the light seems to come from the moon itself. But it is shown not to have it because, when it stands diametrically opposite the sun, it is lit over the whole disc turned toward us; but going round more quickly in the smaller circle proper to it, it goes round its own circle more than twelve times before the sun has once completed its own course. So it happens that it is not always full …

… of light; for its position opposite does not remain continually in the quickness of its revolution … made the whole part of the moon toward us lit by the sun’s rays; so when it comes to the side of the sun, the hemisphere of the moon always facing the sun being taken up by the embrace of the rays, the side toward us is necessarily shadowed, the brightness moving from the part unable to look at the sun to the part always facing it; until, passing directly beneath the sun’s circle, it receives the ray on its back, and so, the upper hemisphere being lit all round, it makes the part toward us invisible, since by its own nature it is wholly without light and dark; and this is called the complete waning of the luminary. But if it passes the sun again by the motion of its own course and comes to the side of the ray, what was just now without light begins to shine faintly, the ray passing from the lit part to what was until then invisible. Do you see how sight becomes your teacher? It would not give you such knowledge by itself, unless there were something looking through the eyes, which uses the things known by sense as guides and through what appears looks into what is not seen. What need is there to add the methods of geometry, which lead us by the hand through sensible figures to things beyond sense, and countless other things besides, by which it is established that the perception of the intellectual substance hidden in our nature comes about through what is bodily at work in us?” Gregory: “But what,” I said, “if, as the material is common in the sensible nature of the elements, while there is a great difference in what is peculiar to each form of matter (for their motion is opposite, one being upward-tending and the other weighing downward, and the form is not the same, and the quality differs in each), someone were to say that there is a power essentially bound up with these by their principle, which produces these intellectual images and movements from a natural property and power? As we see many things worked by mechanics, in which matter, skilfully …”

“… arranged, imitates nature, showing likeness not in shape only but also coming to be in motion, and it imitates a sound when the vocal part of the machine resounds; yet we see no intelligible power anywhere in what is happening that works the shape, the form, the sound, the motion in each case. If we say this also about this mechanical instrument of our nature, that it comes about with no particular intelligible substance mixed in, but by a moving power lying in the nature of the elements in us, and that such activity is the result of that power by itself, would that intelligible and incorporeal substance of the soul be shown to be anything at all, or not to exist at all?” Macrina: “The example,” she said, “is an ally of our argument too, and the whole construction of the objection you have put to us will contribute not a little to the confirmation of what we have thought.” Gregory: “How do you say that?” Macrina: “Because,” she said, “to know how to handle and arrange lifeless matter so that the art put into the machines almost takes the place of the soul in the matter, by which they imitate motion and sound and shapes and the like, would be a proof that there is something of this kind in man, by which he is naturally able, through his power of contemplation and invention, to conceive these things within himself and design the machines beforehand in his mind, and then bring them into operation by art and show his thought through matter. For first he understood that breath is needed for producing sound; then he examined beforehand by reasoning how breath might be contrived for the machine, considering the nature of the elements: that there is nothing empty in existing things, but what is light is thought empty by comparison with what is heavier, since air itself in its own existence is full and complete. A vessel is called empty by a misuse of the word; for when it is empty of liquid, one who has been taught says that it is no less full of air. A sign of this is that a jar brought down to a pool is not at once filled with water but floats at first, the air enclosed …

… holding the hollow up, until the jar, pressed down by the hand of the one drawing water, goes into the depth and takes in the water at its mouth. When this happens it is shown that it was not empty even before the water. For a kind of battle between the two elements is seen at the mouth: the water forced by its weight into the hollow and flowing in, the air enclosed in the hollow pressed out through the same mouth in the opposite direction against the water and flowing up, so that the water is checked by it and bubbles up, foaming around under the force of the air. He understood these things, then, and devised how breath might be put into the machine through the nature of the elements. Making a hollow of watertight material and enclosing the air in it on every side so that it could not escape, he brings water into the hollow through an opening, measuring the amount of water to the need; then he gives the air a passage into the pipe lying beside it, on the side opposite; and the air, forced out more violently by the water, becomes wind, which, rushing out through the construction of the pipe, makes the sound.