Those who have exercised their human faculties are re-born as men.
Those who have made use of their senses only, pass into the bodies of
brutes, and particularly into the bodies of wild animals, if they have
yielded themselves to the transports of anger; so that, even in this
case, the difference of the bodies they animate is proportioned to the
difference of their inclinations. Those whose only effort it was to
satisfy their desires and appetites pass into the bodies of lascivious
and gluttonous animals.[318] Last, those who instead of following
their desires or their anger, have rather degraded their senses by
their inertia, are reduced to vegetate in plants; for in their former
existence they exercised nothing but their vegetative power, and they
worked at nothing but to make trees of themselves.[319] Those who
have loved too much the enjoyments of music, and who otherwise lived
purely, pass into the bodies of melodious birds. Those who have reigned
tyrannically, become eagles, if they have no other vice.[320] Last,
those who spoke lightly of celestial things, having kept their glance
directed upwards, are changed into birds which usually fly towards the
high regions of the air.[321] He who has acquired civil virtues again
becomes a man; but if he does not possess them to a sufficient degree,
he is transformed into a sociable animal, such as the bee, or other
animal of the kind.