What exactly is Augustine saying here?

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Chapter 13.—Whether Abortions, If They are Numbered Among the Dead, Shall Not Also Have a Part in the Resurrection.

To these objections, then, of our adversaries which I have thus detailed, I will now reply, trusting that God will mercifully assist my endeavors. That abortions, which, even supposing they were alive in the womb, did also die there, shall rise again, I make bold neither to affirm nor to deny, although I fail to see why, if they are not excluded from the number of the dead, they should not attain to the resurrection of the dead. For either all the dead shall not rise, and there will be to all eternity some souls without bodies though they once had them,—only in their mother’s womb, indeed; or, if all human souls shall receive again the bodies which they had wherever they lived, and which they left when they died, then I do not see how I can say that even those who died in their mother’s womb shall have no resurrection. But whichever of these opinions any one may adopt concerning them, we must at least apply to them, if they rise again, all that we have to say of infants who have been born.

ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102.iv.XXII.13.html
 
He’s saying that all flesh, no matter in what stage of life, will be raised from the dead.
 
Augustine used the word abortion?

St. Augustine of Hippo (November 13, 354 – August 28, 430) - Bishop of Hippo Regius (present-day Annaba, Algeria).
 
Lat. acc. abortionem, from abortio.—Lat. abortus, pp. of aboriri, to fail.—Lat. ab, from, away; and oriri, to arise, grow. + Gk. ὄρνυμι, I excite (root ὀρ). + Skt. rinómi, I raise myself, I excite (root ar).—:heavy_check_mark:AR, to arise, grow.
 
Chapter 13.—Whether Abortions, If They are Numbered Among the Dead, Shall Not Also Have a Part in the Resurrection.

To these objections, then, of our adversaries which I have thus detailed, I will now reply, trusting that God will mercifully assist my endeavors. That abortions, which, even supposing they were alive in the womb, did also die there, shall rise again, I make bold neither to affirm nor to deny, although I fail to see why, if they are not excluded from the number of the dead, they should not attain to the resurrection of the dead. For either all the dead shall not rise, and there will be to all eternity some souls without bodies though they once had them,—only in their mother’s womb, indeed; or, if all human souls shall receive again the bodies which they had wherever they lived, and which they left when they died, then I do not see how I can say that even those who died in their mother’s womb shall have no resurrection. But whichever of these opinions any one may adopt concerning them, we must at least apply to them, if they rise again, all that we have to say of infants who have been born.

ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102.iv.XXII.13.html
Augustine, in dealing with objections from adversaries, offers an analogy beginning with “supposing”

Augustine I think, makes 4 points
  • acknowledges abortion is the death of a human being.
  • Human beings in the womb are body and soul. Not body alone, not soul alone.
  • if one says a child’s body who has been born will rise from the dead, then also the body of an aborted infant in the the womb will rise.
  • therefore, the born and the aborted, rise from the dead and are reunited with their souls at the resurrection.
 
I think you are right Steve, because in chapter 12 he states,

Chapter 12.—Against the Calumnies with Which Unbelievers Throw Ridicule Upon the Christian Faith in the Resurrection of the Flesh.

But their way is to feign a scrupulous anxiety in investigating this question, and to cast ridicule on our faith in the resurrection of the body, by asking, Whether abortions shall rise? And as the Lord says, “Verily I say unto you, not a hair of your head shall perish,”16281628 Luke xxi. 18. shall all bodies have an equal stature and strength, or shall there be differences in size? For if there is to be equality, where shall those abortions, supposing that they rise again, get that bulk which they had not here? Or if they shall not rise because they were not born but cast out, they raise the same question about children who have died in childhood, asking us whence they get the stature which we see they had not here; for we will not say that those who have been not only born, but born again, shall not rise again. Then, further, they ask of what size these equal bodies shall be. For if all shall be as tall and large as were the tallest and largest in this world, they ask us how it is that not only children but many full-grown persons
494 shall receive what they here did not possess, if each one is to receive what he had here.
ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf102.iv.XXII.12.html?highlight=abortion#highlight
 
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