846 Causes and Course of Organic Evolution 



ceded that the latter ceremonial was an established custom 

 and belief with the earliest dynastic peoples, and so dates 

 back from 6000 to 8000 years. But the dependence for well- 

 being of the disembodied spirit on living descendants and 

 its personal connection with the embalmed body remained 

 almost continuously as an article of faith and practice. So, 

 though EgjT^t erected the most stupendous monuments the 

 world has ever seen to commemorate the spirits of the dead, 

 the highest thoughts associated with such were a combination 

 of personal giant-tombstone egotism, personal vanity, per- 

 sonal ignorance, and a desire to pry into the future; only to 

 a small degree the more ennobled idea that "the spirit returns 

 to the God who gave it." 



In every respect the thought of Socrates that at death he 

 would "go away to the happiness of the blessed" is greatly 

 more elevated than anything Egyptian, and is quite equal 

 to Old Testament post-exilic hopes. The views of Plato and 

 Aristotle are equally elevated, and all stand in marked con- 

 trast to the Egyptian care of the dead body. This was almost 

 certainly owing to the powerful influence on western thought 

 of the Zarathushtrian faith which disregarded the dead body, 

 but venerated good deeds and pious life. 



In the religion of Christ and of Paul a strongly blended 

 combination of the immortality views of the Egyptians, and 

 the antithesis of good and evil in this world and the next, as 

 taught by Zarathushtra is met with, and this was perpetuated 

 with various embellishments down to the time of Aquinas. 

 But the highly noteworthy feature is that no exact and tangible 

 evolution has resulted either in our knowledge of inunortality, 

 or in the virtue of the belief in immortality to raise man to 

 higher levels of living. For in actual human life and i)ractice 

 the thought of again meeting departed friends — and enemies 

 alas also, for surely to be complete such logically must be 

 the view — and of living on in some quite unknown state have 

 only to a minor degree influenced human conduct. Had im- 

 mortality been an undoubted goal for all, surely many would 

 have changed their course of living here. 



