Gesta Romanorum (1905)/Of the Soul's Immortality

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Gesta Romanorum (1905)
Anonymous, translated by Charles Swan
Of the Soul's Immortality
Anonymous2274669Gesta Romanorum — Of the Soul's Immortality1905Charles Swan

TALE CLVIII.

OF THE SOUL'S IMMORTALITY.

There was once discovered at Rome an uncorrupted body, taller than the wall of the city, on which the following words were inscribed:—"Pallas, the son of Evander. whom the lance of a crooked soldier slew, is interred here." A candle burned at his head, which neither water nor wind could extinguish, until air was admitted through a hole made with the point of a needle beneath the flame. The wound of which this giant had died was four feet and a half long. Having been killed after the overthrow of Troy, he had remained in his tomb two thousand two hundred and forty years.

APPLICATION.

My beloved, the giant is Adam, who was formed free from all corruption. The wound of which he died is transgression of the divine command. The burning candle is eternal punishment, extinguished by means of a needle—that is, by the passion of Christ.