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Show Tmen live as individuals DO Mtw AFTER DEATH? 1 Whether wo live again after death Hi ia not deferml'lid by our present be- frf on this subject. If wo live again wfl'll change our minds, should wo Hi Iw believe death ends all. The soul Hi nf the Infidel who scoffs Immortality H It such there be will live after H Ith just as If ho never scoffed, if Hi individual Immortality exists. Wo sane man believes In annlhlla- H Hon nothing Is destroyed, nor can ,f Things change their form but HJ not their essence. Coal soot is car- bon and so is the diamond. The dla- m0nd is only carbon that has had HJ a peculiar experience that is all. And Hi t can bo turned back Into gaseous Hi form and then Into soot very quickly. Hi The second is the idea that wo are HJj each and all manifestations of a Su- Hl prerao Life. In other words that there is only one Life and we are all par- tides and parts of It. When wo die our spirits like our bodies return to their original elements and live again in the mass. HJ The third is a poetic form of Iin- HJ mortality, and is that our influence H lives, and as we have influenced peo- H pie, bo do they again influence others, and so do we Bee how the influence of Socrates, Jesus and Emerson can HJ never die. HJ Everybody in tho world believes In HJ ono of these forms of Immortality. HJ The so-called scoffer docs not scoff HJ at Immortality ho only scoffs at your HJ particular conception of it. HI Marllla believes in the scoffer, and HI points out that he has scoffed super- HI stltlon out of many minds, and there- Hl fore has done much good. The thing HI that is too frail to stand scorn, should HJ go down and does. HJ Marllla declares that she has more HJ faith in Kellar than she has in Mrs. HJ Pepper. And while she fully realizes HJ that we are surrounded by phenom- HJ ena too subtle for our crude senses HJ to fully comprehend, sho thinks it an HJ absurdity to attribute such phenomena to disembodied spirits this being qulto after tho old idea of accounting for thunder by saying that it was a manifestation of God's wrath. The proposition, "If it is'nt spirits, what Is It?" is very bad reasoning. Dr. Richard Maurico Bucko, of tho London asylum for the insane, onco f said that up to 1880, fully forty per Hi cent of all alienation arose from re-j re-j Uglous mania. Slnco 1880, there has HJ been In all asylums a marked decrease I In religious mania owing to tho spread HJ of free-thought and tho lessened era-MJ era-MJ Phasls on eternal punishment. But tho Hi dea ot ,ieH and damnation Is qulto as H Jpglcal as tho dogma of everlasting HJ 1,fe fr It Is all a bare assumption, anyway. I And just so long as man Is taught that ho has an "Immortal soul" that can never die, ho is going to fear tho future and speculate on his destiny In another world. Wo can adjust ouusolvos to tho Known and copo with any difficulty wo can see, oven to going heroically and gloriously down before It in fair fight, but thought ilxed upon a fog that conceals con-ceals tho unknown is a perpetual source of misery and diro unrest. If lovo Is tho finest thing In tho world, fear is tho worst. Apprehension paralyzes man's best efforts, and makes of a doml-god a cringing cur. Good work can only bo dono by people who have abolished fear sub-"mo sub-"mo thoughts come only as wo put fear behind. r0!a.r ls tho Porcursor of all over-reaching over-reaching grabbing and clutching for P'ace, pelf and power. tn,t?ar ls tl10 Precursor of all over-irutn, over-irutn, duplicity, and is tho very base ana essence of Jealousy, wm uBma of Personal Immortality tn v 8 concomItant uncertainty as your future, has floodod spaco with quaking fear, filled the sky with nieht mares Inexpressible, and horrors that are beyond speech. And ep0CtaHy with black despair. innocence But tho worst feature of i imiir i mmortality is that It ha given millions mil-lions of rogues a lever by which thev have worked upon both the fears and loves of mankind. All good snh-lt uallsts agree that fully one half of" all so-called mediums aro frauds and they also admit that most genuine mediums do not hesitate to amend and supplement their peculiar physic powers with trickery 'and untrK-giving untrK-giving their clients their money's Sh;TVhat,,,they wlsh t0 ar and what they will pay for. The entire dogma of endless punish-ment punish-ment that was preached for nearly two thousand years has become so repugnant to humanity, that even tho orthodox of the orthodox have abandoned aban-doned It, and are quite willing to say wo do not know." And if pursued with tho question what has become ot all those millions of children, not a span long, which they and their predecessors pre-decessors consigned to sell, tho admit ad-mit they were possibly mistaken, and say that hell was only a theological necessity devised to make bad men good and also to make them pay. The mystery of death, codified by centuries of priests Into a belief in an individual immortality has been tho greatest single force of the Christian religion; It is still, in its finally drawn forms, tho most vital bit of life pos-sesed pos-sesed by the church. Examined In tho light of results and of essential Influence, Influ-ence, there will bo found on the credit cred-it side of this belief not one beneficent benefi-cent item, excepting the doubtful relief re-lief of tho dying man who hopes for glory, and tho questionable solace of the bereaved who hope to meet loved ones again In person. On the debit side there Is every form of evil Inflicted In-flicted by churchmen from Constantino's Constan-tino's time to our own. The dubious credit account is utterly ut-terly wiped out by the fact that there is a higher and more unselfish ideal of immortality, which demands no perpetuation of tho individual as such and requires no administration by church or priest. In this Ideal, personality person-ality has no place. Instead there is the demonstrable certainty of the Immortality Im-mortality and the high purpose of tho human race, of the immortality and ever-growing Influence of good deeds and good lives, and of the living liv-ing Immortality of worthy and beautiful beauti-ful parenthood. In this ideal thero is something positive, natural, noble, worthy of the sternest battle of life. Beside it, tho mysticism of a personal, individual spirit life clutching for comfort com-fort and dodging pain, is weak and lifeless, fitted in every respect to bo placed among tho discarded beliefs and ideals which originated in times crude and savage. It Is true, of course, that somo gifted gift-ed men like Dr. I. K. Funk and Alfred Russel Wallace, seem to find evidence of tho existenco of disembodied spirits. spir-its. But granted that they aro on tho high road to Imporant enlightenment, enlighten-ment, still nothing whatever can do-tract do-tract from tho satisfaction obtainable from tho purely unselfish Ideal of a practical and demonstrable Immortality. Immortal-ity. Could tho preachers hold up this idea for a hundred years, as they havo hold up tho dogmas of personal Immortality Im-mortality for nineteen hundred years, what strides tho world would make-what make-what building for the future genera-tlons genera-tlons might bo planned! Mnrilla says, wo want a religion that will W debts'; that will pract M hon-esty hon-esty in business life; that will treat a'0,"' regeneration by faith, baptism nl. t cr monkey business; a rollg-on rollg-on t ha promises a heaven of idleness Si L 80 wlu? agrco wlth us' nnd a hell for those who do not, Marllla re- Snwo?tgarIC' dCgradlng' abSUrd lovlUion?'n 1)rosPrlty. Power, life, ovo, land and immortality just as long as you can hold on to them and X ,mBei, Mnn is 0Illv a Protozoan wiggling through a fluid called atmosphere: at-mosphere: ho ls hero but for a day and knows neither where ho camo trom nor whore ho is going. Wo are just as immortal as anyone can be today. What boots it how much food thero is If wo cannot eat! What will it matter to us about Immortality Im-mortality If wo havo no sensation to teel pain at its loss? Wo have, every moment, all of tho immortality wo can use. success ts tho most hygenic thing of which we know tho glowing, glorious glo-rious sense of success! Hard work does not kill any ono unless it is accompanied ac-companied with a feeling of failure. To work and bcllovo that all your toll Is for naught, that you aro losing ground, slipping back, means depressiondeath. depres-siondeath. And tho belief In personal per-sonal immortality, witn its accompany, tng threats has forced upon men tho thought that this llfo is a failure the world a desert drear. When your attention is taken from this world and directed to another, tho sense of success vanishes, tho body droops; exhtllratlon gives way to depression and animation either disappears or resolves itself into a feverish hysteria. Correct thinking Is largely a matter of bodily condition. And the summing sum-ming up is that wo will never produco a great and magnificent race of men and women until wo cease all thought of another world and dovoto ourselves our-selves to this. imerson, who never preached personal per-sonal Immortality, In his "Over-Soul" had something to say very much to tho point. Tho passage ls this: "Revelation is tho disclosure of tho soul. Tho popular notion of a revelation revela-tion ls, that it ls a tolling of fortunes. In past oracles of tho soul, tho understanding under-standing seeks to find answers to sensual sen-sual questions, and undertakes to tell from God how long men shall exist, what their hands shall do, and who shall bo their company, adding even names, and dates, and places. But wo must pick no locks. Wo must check this low curiosity. An answor In words Is delusive; it Is really no answer to tho questions you ask. Do not demand a description of tho countries coun-tries toward which you sail. Men ask of tho immortality of tho soul, and the employments of heaven, and the state of tho sinner and so forth. They even dream that Jesus has left ronlles to precisely these In terrogatories. Never a moment did that subllmo spirit speak in their patois. pa-tois. To truth, justice, lovo, and the attributes of tho soul, tho Idea of im-mutableness im-mutableness is essentially associated, Jesus, living In these moral sentiments, senti-ments, heedless of sensual fortunes, heeding only tho manifestations of these, never mado tho separation of tho Idea of duration from tho essence of these attributes; never uttered a syllable concerning tho duration of tho soul. It was left to his disciples to sever duration from tho moral elements, ele-ments, and to teach tho immortality of tho soul as a doctrine, and maintain main-tain It by evidences. Tho moment tho doctrine of tho Immortality Im-mortality of tho soul is separately taught, man ls already fallen. In tho flowing of lovo, in the adoration of humility, hu-mility, thore Is no question of continuance. continu-ance. No inspired man over asks this question, or condescends to these evidences. evi-dences. For tho soul is true to itself and tho man in whom it is shed, abroad, cannot wander from tho pros- i ont, which is infinite, to a futuro which would bo finite. ' Those questions which wo lust to ask about tho future, aro a confession confes-sion of sin. God has no answor for them. No answer In words can reply I, to a question of things. It ls not In an arbitrary "decree of God" but In tho naturo of man that n veil shuts down on tho facts of tomorrow; for the soul will not havo us road any other ciphor but causo arid effect. By ; this veil, which curtains events, It Instructs In-structs tho children of men to livo in today. Tho only modo of obtaining an answer to theso questions of tho senses sens-es is to forego nil low curiosity, and accepting tho tldo of being which floats us Into tho secret of naturo, work nnd live, and all unawares, tho 1 advancing soul has built and forged for Itself n now condition, and tho ; question and tho answor aro ono." Marllla also quotes Dr. J. II. Tilden who says: "'I hero Isn't anything Immortal except ex-cept the elements, and they aro In such a constant stato of chango that typo succeeds typo, world succeeds world, and necessity succeeds necessity. neces-sity. Thero Is no such thing as Immortality Im-mortality of form except to Ignornnco and that is optional a reward offered of-fered for being good and being good, ; according to tho general and accept- ' tod standard, ls to mummify tho In-' A tellcct and rcfuso to ovolvo becomo j Immortal in typo. j ; In everything thero ls constant ' j strlfo to force chnngo get rid of tho I old and take on tho now. Tho growing man is tho best proof i that Immortality is not what tho world ' needs. Tho curse of existence ls tho belief In Immortality. Tho Catholic i church is Immortal; orthodoxy of all kinds means Immortality of opinion; , tho ignoramus ls an Immortal man; those who havo no time to read or f think, and those who have no incllna- i tion for anything except to , strugglo for money, aro 1m- ; i mortal beings. Everything that makes no growth is immortal, i and continues Immortal until ovolu- ; tion rolls It into forgctfulncss. Mor- ! ! tality is what wo need most; and tho quicker wo get rid ot tho present Individuality In-dividuality tho sooner wo will como Into possession of a bettor. Today is tho best of all days; yesterday ls ' gone, and no ono but an idler caros a , to havo it return perpetuated Im- j mortallzed. Tho Philistine. I n K ! |