Nevertheless the bodies of the dead are not to be despised and left unburied on this account; least of all the bodies of the righteous and faithful, which have been used by the Holy Spirit as His organs and instruments for all good works. For if the dress of a father, or his ring, or anything he wore, is precious to his children, in proportion to the love they bore him, how much more reason we have to care for the bodies of those we love, which they wore far more closely and intimately than any clothing! For the body is not an extraneous ornament or aid, but a part of man's very nature. And therefore the last offices were piously performed for the righteous of ancient times, and sepulchres provided for them, and funeral rites celebrated; and they themselves, while still alive, gave their sons instructions about their burial, and, on occasion, even about the removal of their bodies to some favorite place. And Tobit, according to the angel's testimony, is commended, and is said to have pleased God by burying the dead.⁠a Our Lord Himself, too, though He was to rise again on the third day, applauds, and commends to our applause, the good work of the religious woman who poured precious ointment over His limbs, and did it in preparation for His burial. Matthew 26:10-13 And the Gospel speaks with praise of those who took care to take down His body from the cross, and wrap it lovingly in costly burial cloths, and see to its burial. John 19:38 These instances certainly do not prove that corpses have any feeling; but they show that God's providence extends even to the bodies of the dead, and that such pious offices are pleasing to Him, because they nourish faith in the resurrection. And we may also draw from them this wholesome lesson, that if God does not forget even any kindness that loving care shows to the unconscious dead, much more will He reward the love we show toward the living. Other things, indeed, that the holy patriarchs said of the burial and removal of their bodies, they meant to be taken in a prophetic sense; but we need not speak of these at length here, since what we have already said is sufficient. But if the lack of the things that are necessary for the support of the living, such as food and clothing, though painful and trying, does not break down the fortitude and virtuous endurance of good men, nor eradicate piety from their souls, but rather makes it more fruitful, how much less can the absence of the funeral, and of the other customary attentions paid to the dead, make those wretched who are already resting in the hidden dwellings of the blessed! Consequently, though in the sack of Rome and of other towns the dead bodies of the Christians were deprived of these last offices, this is neither the fault of the living, for they could not perform them; nor a harm inflicted on the dead, for they cannot feel the loss.