The Jews say that Queen Cleopatra, who no doubt believed in the resurrection like all the ladies of that day, asked a Pharisee if we were to rise again quite naked? The doctor answered that we shall be very well dressed, for the same reason that the corn that has been sown and perished under ground rises again in ear with a robe and a beard. This rabbin was an excellent theologian; he reasoned like Dom Calmet.
SECTION III.
Resurrection of the Ancients.
It has been asserted that the dogma of resurrection was much in vogue with the Egyptians, and was the origin of their embalmings and their pyramids. This I myself formerly believed. Some said that the resurrection was to take place at the end of a thousand years; others at the end of three thousand. This difference in their theological opinions seems to prove that they were not very sure about the matter.
Besides, in the history of Egypt, we find no man raised again; but among the Greeks we find several. Among the latter, then, we must look for this invention of rising again.
But the Greeks often burned their bodies, and the Egyptians embalmed them, that when the soul, which was a small, aerial figure, returned to its habitation, it might find it quite ready. This had been good if its organs had also been ready; but the embalmer began by taking out the brain and clearing the entrails. How were men to rise again without intestines, and without the medullary part by means of which they think? Where were they to find again the blood, the lymph, and other humors?
You will tell me that it was still more difficult to rise again among the Greeks, where there was not left of you more than a pound of ashes at the utmost—mingled, too, with the ashes of wood, stuffs and spices.
Your objection is forcible, and I hold with you, that resurrection is a very extraordinary thing; but the son of Mercury did not the less die and rise again several times. The gods restored Pelops to life, although he had been served up as a ragout, and Ceres had eaten one of his shoulders. You know that Æsculapius brought Hippolytus to life again; this was a verified fact, of which even the most incredulous had no doubt; the name of "Virbius," given to Hippolytus, was a convincing proof. Hercules had resuscitated Alceste and Pirithous. Heres did, it is true—according to Plato—come to life again for fifteen days only; still it was a resurrection; the time does not alter the fact.
Many grave schoolmen clearly see purgatory and resurrection in Virgil. As for purgatory, I am obliged to acknowledge that it is expressly in the sixth book. This may displease the Protestants, but I have no alternative:
Non tamen omne malum miseris, nec funditus omnes
Corporea excedunt pestes,...
Not death itself can wholly wash their stains;
But long contracted filth even in the soul remains.
The relics of inveterate vice they wear,
And spots of sin obscene in every face appear,...