In vain do the materialists quote some of the fathers of the Church who did not express themselves with precision. St. Irenæus says (liv. v. chaps. vi and vii) that the soul is only the breath of life, that it is incorporeal only by comparison with the mortal body, and that it preserves the form of man so that it may be recognized.
In vain does Tertullian express himself like this--"The corporeality of the soul shines bright in the Gospel." (_Corporalitas animæ in ipso Evangelio relucescit_, DE ANIMA, cap. vii.) For if the soul did not have a body, the image of the soul would not have the image of the body.
In vain does he record the vision of a holy woman who had seen a very shining soul, of the colour of air.
In vain does Tatien say expressly (_Oratio ad Græcos_, c. xxiii.)--"The soul of man is composed of many parts."
In vain is St. Hilarius quoted as saying in later times (St. Hilarius on St. Matthew)--"There is nothing created which is not corporeal, either in heaven, or on earth, or among the visible, or among the invisible: everything is formed of elements; and souls, whether they inhabit a body, or issue from it, have always a corporeal substance."
In vain does St. Ambrose, in the sixth century, say (On Abraham, liv. ii., ch. viii.)--"We recognize nothing but the material, except the venerable Trinity alone."
The body of the entire Church has decided that the soul is immaterial. These saints fell into an error at that time universal; they were men; but they were not mistaken over immortality, because that is clearly announced in the Gospels.
We have so evident a need of the decision of the infallible Church on these points of philosophy, that we have not indeed by ourselves any sufficient notion of what is called "pure spirit," and of what is named "matter." Pure spirit is an expression which gives us no idea; and we know matter only by a few phenomena. We know it so little that we call it "substance"; well, the word substance means "that which is under"; but what is under will be eternally hidden from us. What is _under_ is the Creator's secret; and this secret of the Creator is everywhere. We do not know either how we receive life, or how we give it, or how we grow, or how we digest, or how we sleep, or how we think, or how we feel.