Augustine, Saint, De Cura pro Mortuis Gerenda ad Paulinum Episcopum

Narrantur uisa quaedam, quae huic disputationi non neglegendam uideantur inferre quaestionem. 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. haec si falsa esse responderimus, contra quorundam scripta fidelium et contra eorum sensus, qui talia sibi accidisse confirmant, inpudenter uenire uidebimur. sed respondendum est non ideo putandum esse mortuos ista sentire, quia haec dicere uel indicare uel petere uidentur in somnis. 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. 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. 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. aliquando autem fallacibus uisis homines in magnos mittuntur errores, quos talia perpeti iustum est. 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?

Certain visions are reported which seem to bring into this discussion a question not to be neglected. For it is said that some of the dead have appeared, either in dreams or in some other way, to living people who did not know where their bodies lay unburied, and, showing them the places, have urged that the burial they had lacked be provided for them. If we reply that these things are false, we shall seem to go shamelessly against the writings of certain of the faithful and against the perceptions of those who affirm that such things have happened to them. But the answer must be that we are not to think the dead are aware of these things just because they seem in dreams to say or indicate or ask for them. For the living, too, often appear to the living as they sleep, while they themselves do not know that they appear; and they hear from them what they dreamed, as they say that they saw them in their dreams doing or saying something. If, then, someone can see me in a dream showing him something that has happened, or even foretelling something that is to come, while I am wholly ignorant of it and care not at all, not only about what he dreams, but whether he is awake while I sleep, or asleep while I am awake, or whether at one and the same time we are both awake or both asleep, when he sees the dream in which he sees me: what wonder is it if the dead, without knowing or perceiving these things, are nevertheless seen by the living in dreams and say something which, on waking, they find to be true? I would believe, then, that it is by the workings of angels, whether permitted or commanded from above, that they seem in dreams to say something about the burial of their bodies, when those whose bodies they are know nothing of it at all. And this sometimes happens usefully, either for some sort of comfort to the living, to whom those dead belong whose images appear to the dreamers, or so that by these admonitions the humane duty of burial may be commended to the human race, a duty which, though it does not help the departed, is nonetheless neglected only through blameworthy irreligion. Sometimes, however, men are thrown into great errors by deceptive visions, men whom it is just should suffer such things. As, for instance, if someone were to see in a dream what Aeneas, by poetic falsehood, is said to have seen in the underworld, and the image of some unburied person were to appear to him and say such things as Palinurus is said to have said to Aeneas; and when he woke he were to find the body in the place where, in his dream, he heard that it lay unburied, having been warned and asked to bury it when found; and, because he found this to be true, he were to believe that the dead are buried so that their souls may pass to the places from which, as he dreamed, the souls of the unburied are barred by a law of the underworld: does he not, believing this, stray very far from the path of truth?