§12Narrantur uisa quaedam, quae huic disputationi non neglegendam uideantur inferre quaestionem.
Certain visions are narrated, which would seem to bring a not negligible question to this discussion.
feruntur quippe mortui nonnulli uel in somnis uel alio quocumque modo adparuisse uiuentibus atque ubi eorum corpora iacerent inhumata nescientibus locisque monstratis admonuisse, ut sibi sepultura quae defuerat praeberetur.
Indeed, it is said that some dead persons, either in dreams or in some other way, appeared to the living and, to those who did not know where their bodies lay unburied, showed the places and admonished them that the burial which had been lacking should be provided for them.
haec si falsa esse responderimus, contra quorundam scripta fidelium et contra eorum sensus, qui talia sibi accidisse confirmant, inpudenter uenire uidebimur.
If we answer that these things are false, we shall seem to go impudently against the writings of certain of the faithful and against the senses of those who confirm that such things have happened to them.
sed respondendum est non ideo putandum esse mortuos ista sentire, quia haec dicere uel indicare uel petere uidentur in somnis.
But we must answer that it is not for this reason to be thought that the dead feel these things, because they seem to say or indicate or ask these things in dreams.
nam et uiuentes adparent saepe uiuentibus dormientibus, dum se ipsi nesciant adparere, et ab eis haec quae somniauerint audiunt dicentibus, quod eos in somnis uiderint agentes aliquid uel loquentes.
For the living also often appear to the living while they sleep, while they themselves do not know that they appear, and they hear from those who tell them what they dreamed, that they saw them in their dreams doing or saying something.
si ergo me potest aliquis in somnis uidere sibi aliquid quod factum est indicantem uel etiam quod futurum est praenuntiantem, cum id ego prorsus ignorem et omnino non curem, non solum quid ille somniet, sed utrum dormiente me uigilet, an uigilante me dormiat, an uno eodemque tempore uigilemus ambo siue dormiamus, quando ille somnium uidet, in quo me uidet: quid mirum, si nescientes mortui nec ista sentientes tamen a uiuentibus uidentur in somnis et aliquid dicunt, quod euigilantes uerum esse cognoscant? angelicis igitur operationibus fieri crediderim, siue permittatur desuper siue iubeatur, ut aliquid dicere de sepeliendis corporibus suis uideantur in somnis, cum id penitus nesciant, quorum illa sunt corpora.
If, therefore, anyone can see me in a dream indicating to him something that has been done, or even foretelling something that is to come, while I am entirely ignorant of it and do not care at all, not only what he dreams, but whether he is awake while I sleep, or sleeps while I am awake, or whether we are both awake or asleep at one and the same time when he sees the dream in which he sees me: what wonder is it if the dead, not knowing and not feeling these things, are nevertheless seen by the living in dreams and say something which, upon waking, the living find to be true? Therefore, I would believe that it happens by angelic operations, whether it is permitted from above or commanded, that they seem to say something in dreams about burying their bodies, when those to whom those bodies belong are entirely ignorant of it.
id autem aliquando utiliter fit siue ad uiuorum qualecumque solacium, ad quos pertinent illi mortui, quorum adparent imagines somniantibus, siue ut his admonitionibus generi humano sepulturae commendetur humanitas, quae, licet defunctis non opituletur, culpanda tamen inreligiositate neglegitur.
This, moreover, sometimes happens usefully, either for some kind of consolation of the living, to whom those dead belong whose images appear to those who dream, or so that by these admonitions humanity of burial may be commended to the human race, which, although it does not help the deceased, is neglected with blameable irreligion.
aliquando autem fallacibus uisis homines in magnos mittuntur errores, quos talia perpeti iustum est.
Sometimes, however, by deceitful visions men are cast into great errors, whom it is just to suffer such things.
uelut si quisquam uideat in somnis, quod Aeneas uidisse apud inferos poetica falsitate narratur, et ei cuiuspiam non sepulti adpareat imago loquaturque talia, qualia fertur locutus illi fuisse Palinurus, et cum euigilauerit, ibi corpus eius inueniat, ubi iacere inhumatum, cum somniaret, audiuit, admonitus et rogatus, ut sepeliret inuentum, et quia id uerum esse comperit, credat ideo mortuos sepeliri, ut eorum animae ad loca transeant, unde insepultorum animas inferna prohiberi lege somniauit: nonne ita credens plurimum a tramite ueritatis exorbitat?
Just as if anyone should see in dreams what Aeneas is narrated by poetical falsehood to have seen in the underworld, and the image of some unburied person should appear to him and say such things as Palinurus is said to have spoken to him, and when he has awakened, he should find his body there where he heard it lay unburied while he was dreaming, and, being admonished and asked to bury what he found, and because he found it to be true, should believe that the dead are buried for this reason, that their souls may pass to those places from which he dreamed that the souls of the unburied were prohibited by infernal law: does not he, believing thus, wander very far from the path of truth?
§13Sic autem infirmitas humana sese habet, ut, cum mortuum in somnis quisque uiderit, ipsius animam se uidere arbitretur, cum autem uiuum similiter somniauerit, non eius animam neque corpus, sed hominis similitudinem sibi adparuisse non dubitet.
But human weakness is such that when anyone has seen a dead person in dreams, he thinks he sees his soul itself; but when he has dreamed of a living person in like manner, he does not doubt that not his soul nor his body, but a likeness of the man appeared to him.
quasi non possint et mortuorum hominum eodem modo nescientium non animae, sed similitudines adparere dormientibus.
As if it were not possible that not the souls but the likenesses of dead men, who in the same way know nothing, could appear to those who sleep.
pro certo, cum Mediolani essemus, audiuimus, quod cum debitum repeteretur a quodam defuncti patris cautione prolata, quod filio nesciente a patre iam fuerat persolutum, contristari homo grauissime coepit atque mirari.
For a certainty, when we were in Milan, we heard that when a debt was demanded from a certain person, a security of his deceased father being produced, which had already been paid by the father without the son's knowledge, the man began to grieve very heavily and to wonder that his father, dying, had not told him what he owed, when he had even made a will.
quod ei pater moriens non dixerit, quid deberet, cum fecisset etiam testamentum. tunc ei nimis anxio adparuit idem pater eius in somnis et ubi esset recautum, quo illa cautio uacuata fuerat, indicauit.
Then, to him who was exceedingly anxious, his same father appeared in dreams and indicated where the receipt was by which that security had been made void.
quo inuento iuuenis atque monstrato non solum falsi debiti calumniam propulsauit, sed etiam paternum recepit chirographum, quod pater non receperat, quando est pecunia persoluta.
When this was found and shown, the young man not only repelled the calumny of the false debt, but also recovered his father's hand-written document, which the father had not recovered when the money was paid.
hic utique putatur anima hominis curam gessisse pro filio et ad eum uenisse dormientem, ut docens. quod ignorabat, magna molestia liberaret.
Here indeed the soul of the man is thought to have cared for his son and to have come to him while sleeping, so that by teaching what he did not know, he might free him from great trouble.
sed eodem ipso ferme tempore, quo id audiuimus, id est nobis apud Mediolanum constitutis Carthaginis rhetor Eulogius, qui meus in eadem arte discipulus fuit, sicut mihi ipse, posteaquam in Africam remeauimus, retulit, cum rhetoricos Ciceronis libros discipulis suis traderet, recensens lectionem, quam postridie fuerat traditurus, quendam locum offendit obscurum, quo non intellecto uix potuit dormire sollicitus.
But at almost the very same time when we heard this, that is, when we were established at Milan, Eulogius, the rhetorician of Carthage, who was my disciple in that same art, as he himself related to me after we returned to Africa, when he was delivering Cicero's rhetorical books to his disciples, reviewing the reading which he was to deliver the next day, met with an obscure passage, and, not understanding it, could scarcely sleep from anxiety.
qua nocte somnianti ego illi quod non intellegebat exposui, immo non ego, sed imago mea nesciente me et tam longe trans mare aliquid aliud siue agente siue somniante et nihil de illius curis omnino curante.
On that night, as he dreamed, I explained to him what he did not understand, or rather not I, but my image, without my knowing it and while I was so far across the sea doing or dreaming something else and caring nothing at all about his cares.
quomodo fiant ista nescio; sed quomodolibet fiant.
How these things happen I do not know; but in whatever way they happen, why do we not believe that it happens in the same way that anyone sees a dead person in dreams, as it happens that he sees also a living person?
cur non eodem modo fieri credimus, ut in somnis quisque uideat mortuum, quomodo fit, ut uideat et uiuum? ambobus utique nescientibus neque curantibus, quis uel ubi uel quando eorum imagines somniet.
Since both indeed do not know nor care who or where or when anyone dreams of their images.