. _On Transmigration of Souls, and how Souls are said to migrate into
brute beasts._

If the transmigration of a soul takes place into a rational being, it
simply becomes the soul of that body. But if the soul migrates into a
brute beast, it follows the body outside, as a guardian spirit follows a
man. For there could never be a rational soul in an irrational being.

The transmigration of souls can be proved from the congenital
afflictions of persons. For why are some born blind, others paralytic,
others with some sickness in the soul itself? Again, it is the natural
duty of Souls to do their work in the body; are we to suppose that when
once they leave the body they spend all eternity in idleness?

Again, if the souls did not again enter into bodies, they must either be
infinite in number or God must constantly be making new ones. But there
is nothing infinite in the world; for in a finite whole there cannot be
an infinite part. Neither can others be made; for everything in which
something new goes on being created, must be imperfect. And the World,
being made by a perfect author, ought naturally to be perfect.

XXI. _That the Good are happy, both living and dead._

Souls that have lived in virtue are in general happy,[224:2] and when
separated from the irrational part of their nature, and made clean from
all matter, have communion with the gods and join them in the governing
of the whole world. Yet even if none of this happiness fell to their
lot, virtue itself, and the joy and glory of virtue, and the life that
is subject to no grief and no master are enough to make happy those who
have set themselves to live according to virtue and have achieved it.

FOOTNOTES:

[200:1] I translate +kosmos+ generally as 'World', sometimes as
'Cosmos'. It always has the connotation of 'divine order'; +psyche+
always 'Soul', to keep it distinct from +zoe+, 'physical life', though
often 'Life' would be a more natural English equivalent; +empsychoun+
'to animate'; +ousia+ sometimes 'essence', sometimes 'being' (never
'substance' or 'nature'); +physis+ 'nature'; +soma+ sometimes 'body',
sometimes 'matter'.

[203:1] e. g. when we say 'The sun is coming in through the window', or
in Greek +exaiphnes hekon ek tou heliou+, Plat. _Rep._ 516 E. This
appears to mean that you can loosely apply the term 'Osiris' both to (i)
the real Osiris and (ii) the corn which comes from him, as you can apply
the name 'Sun' both to (i) the real orb