Vitae philosophorum

Next, keeping in view our perceptions and feelings (for so shall we have the surest grounds for belief), we must recognize generally that the soul is a corporeal thing, composed of fine particles, dispersed all over the frame,[*](Cf. Lucr. iii. 161-176, 177-230.) most nearly resembling wind with an admixture of heat,[*](Cf. Lucr. iii. 231-257, 425-430; Epic. Fr. (Us.) 315, 314. These authorities assume four component elements, while in this epistle one of these (ἀερῶδές τι) is omitted.) in some respects like wind, in others like heat. But, again, there is the third part which exceeds the other two in the fineness of

Still, it would not have had sensation, had it not been somehow confined within the rest of the frame. But the rest of the frame, though it provides this indispensable condition[*](The body, by keeping soul-atoms together without much dispersion, allows them to vibrate with the motions that generate sentience and sensation.) for the soul, itself also has a share, derived from the soul, of the said quality; and yet does not possess all the qualities of soul. Hence on the departure of the soul it loses sentience. For it had not this power in itself; but something else, congenital with the body, supplied it to body: which other thing, through the potentiality actualized in it by means of motion, at once acquired for itself a quality of sentience, and, in virtue of the neighbourhood and interconnexion between them, imparted it (as I said) to the body also.

Hence, so long as the soul is in the body, it never loses sentience through the removal of some other part. The containing sheath[*](Since the participle στεγάζον is also found in the plural (στεγάζοντα), it seems best to assume with Bignone that the whole frame is regarded as the sum of parts, each of which serves as the envelope, sheath, or container of some part of the soul. Thus the loss of a limb is not fatal to life, because the rest of the frame has served in its capacity of envelope to preserve a sufficient number of soul-atoms in working order.) may be dislocated in whole or in part, and portions of the soul may thereby be lost; yet in spite of this the soul, if it manage to survive, will have sentience. But the rest of the frame, whether the whole of it survives or only a part, no longer has sensation, when once those atoms

For we cannot think of it[*](It = the soul, the logical subject, the neuter replacing the more appropriate feminine pronoun.) as sentient, except it be in this composite whole and moving with these movements; nor can we so think of it when the sheaths which enclose and surround it are not the same as those in which the soul is now located and in which it performs these movements. [He says elsewhere that the soul is composed of the smoothest and roundest of atoms, far superior in both respects to those of fire; that part of it is irrational, this being scattered over the rest of the frame, while the rational part resides in the chest, as is manifest from our fears and our joy; that sleep occurs when the parts of the soul which have been scattered all over the composite organism are held fast in it or dispersed, and afterwards collide with one another by their impacts. The semen is derived from the whole of the body.]

There is the further point to be considered, what the incorporeal can be, if, I mean, according to current usage the term is applied to what can be conceived as self-existent.[*](Or, if ὅτι τὸ ἀσώματον λέγομεν be read, that according to current usage we apply the term incorporeal to that which can be conceived as self-existent.) But it is impossible to conceive anything that is incorporeal as self-existent except empty space. And empty space cannot itself either act or be acted upon, but simply allows body to move through it. Hence those who call soul incorporeal

If, then, we bring all these arguments concerning soul to the criterion of our feelings and perceptions, and if we keep in mind the proposition stated at the outset, we shall see that the subject has been adequately comprehended in outline: which will enable us to determine the details with accuracy and confidence.

Moreover, shapes and colours, magnitudes and weights, and in short all those qualities which are predicated of body, in so far as they are perpetual properties either of all bodies or of visible bodies, are knowable by sensation of these very properties: these, I say, must not be supposed to exist independently by themselves[*](Cf. Lucr. i. 449 f.; Sext. Emp. Adv. math.x.§§ 221-223.) (for that is inconceivable),