“People say different things about the soul after a man dies. Sometimes they think that men return to the same being that they were before they were born and there is no feeling of body and soul after death any more than before they were born. But the vanity in folly of men leads him to think that he will be something after death so that he flatters himself admits death itself and promises himself another life. Some attribute immortality to the soul, others say that it is transfigured, and there are those who think that ‘shades’ [shadows?] [ghosts?] can feel. That is why they revered them by establishing and making a god out of whatever could not remain man. As if the life-giving breath of man was different from that of beast or there were not things in this universe that lived much longer than man, to which, however, no one has ever attributed immortality.
But show me what a soul is made of. Where is it thought, its sight, its hearing? What does it do? What is it busy at? Or, if it has none of this, what is the use of having a soul? Verily. But where does it go? Oh, how crowded the world must be with all these souls; they must be as thick as shadows.
See, all these things are only daydreams of little children in inventions of men would never want to fade away. What a great folly to protect the body in hope of resurrection, as Democritus promised, who has not yet been resurrected himself.
But what folly to think that through death that we can enter into a second life! What rest could any man have after being born if he has feeling of his soul above or his shade in hell? certainly, the lure of words and the gullibility of folly of men destroy all the gentleness of the principle of good nature, which is death, making a double death for whoever cares about the future life. For, if it is a great good to exist, what satisfaction could do we have been thinking that we only existed? Oh, it is much easier and more certain for everyone to believe in himself and be assured from the experience of what we were before we were born.”