48 REMARKS on fome Pajfages of 



ther ; but found that the fhade, though vifible, eluded the 

 touch. 



After a fhort converfation, Eneas happening to fee, in a 

 grove through which a river was flowing, an innumerable 

 multitude of human beings flying about, afked his father who 

 they were, and what river it was. The river, faid he, is Lethe, 

 of which thofe fouls are taking a draught, being about to re- 

 turn to the upper world, in order to animate new bodies. Is 

 it to be imagined, exclaims Eneas, that fouls fhould ever leave 

 this happy place, and go back to the imprifonment of the bo- 

 dy, and all the wretchednefs of mortality ? I will explain the 

 whole matter to you, replies Anchises. 



Know, then, that all the parts of this vifible univerfe, the 

 heavens, and earth, and fky, the fun, moon, and ftars, are, like 

 one vaft body, animated by an univerfal fpirit, whereof the 

 fouls, or vital principles, of all animals, of men and beafts, of 

 fifties and fowl, are emanations. This vital principle is, in eve- 

 ry animal, the fource of fenfation and motion ; but, from the 

 influence that the body has over it, becomes fubject to inordi- 

 nate paflions, and forgetful of its heavenly original. The foul 

 of man, in particular, (for nothing further is faid of the other 

 animals) contracts, while fhut up in the dark prifon of the bo- 

 dy, a degree of debafement which does not leave it at death, 

 and from which the fufferings of a fubfequent ftate of purga- 

 tion are neceffary to purify it. Thefe are of different kinds 

 and degrees, according to the different degrees and kinds of 

 guilt or impurity which the foul has contracted. Some fouls 

 are expofed to the beating of winds, fome are warned in water, 

 and fome purified by fire. Every one of us (fays Anchises, 

 including himfelf ) fuffers his own peculiar pains of purifica- 

 tion. Then we are fent into this vaft Elyfium, and a few of 

 us remain in the eternal poffeflion of it *. The reft continue 



here, 



* I fuppofe the words Et pauci lata arva tenemus, to be a parenthefis ; which, in my 

 opinion, clears the text of all obfcurity. By the change of the perfon, in the four lalt 



lines 



