Question Seven
Toward what difference of position the soul departing from the body goes out
The doubt is toward what difference of position the soul departing from the body naturally goes out: upward or downward, toward the right or the left forward or backward?
To this it is answered that, although the soul of anyone who dies, as soon as it ceases to inform the body and is left to its own natural powers, would go rather to the highest part of heaven, since it naturally seeks the higher places of the universe, nevertheless, according as it is led or drawn by good or evil angels, the fully purified souls of those who are to be saved are drawn directly upward, and the souls of those who are to be damned directly downward. The souls of those who are to be saved but are not fully purified go out directly from the right toward purgatory, and those of the damned from the left into hell. These things are from the same author in the place cited above.