ABSTRACT
An anonymous pamphlet, the letter Quaeris a me, from ca. 469, argued that the soul, like all other created things, was corporeal: this was the doctrine of the Fathers, as expressed most recently by Cassian, and the contrary view was not merely false but blasphemous. The testimonia about Claudianus' life present a plausible picture of his education and philosophical formation. To judge by his correspondence, if Sidonius studied philosophy, it made no lasting impression. Only nine of his correspondents receive any extended remarks about it: Anthemius, Consentius, Leo, Claudianus, Nymphidius, Faustus, Eutropius, Polemius, and Philagrius. Platonists had long argued against the Stoics that a corporeal or "materialist" conception of life and of the mind was incoherent; and within the western Christian tradition, Augustine had taken a similar position against Tertullian and his followers. Claudianus' response to Faustus combined detailed counter-arguments with a confusing exposition of a Platonist psychology.
