Probable Future Advances in Evolution 847 



All the evidence at our disposal then tends to show that 

 immortality as a doctrine, a possibility, or a state has wholly 

 originated as a proenvironal effort by man to think out and 

 picture a future life that should be free from most or all of 

 the sad, cruel, and fleeting events only too typical of many 

 millions of human careers in the past. But, while religious 

 evolution has progressed steadily and powerfully from strength 

 to strength, from glory to glory, the evolution of immortality 

 either as a doctrine or a realizable state has remained sta- 

 tionary or has run into grotesque vagaries. Man then seems 

 to have aimed at a goal, but has failed to reach it. The goal 

 so far as it has ever been described in the Iranian, the Greek, 

 the Egyptian, the Hebrew, the Cln-istian, or the post-Christian 

 writings has been an as yet unattained state where elevated 

 and regenerated humanity shall dwell together under the real- 

 ized presence of God, the guide, the energizing one, and the 

 father of the universe; where happy social companionships 

 will make duty a pleasure; where the activities of each will 

 be unhampered by envy, jealousy, and malice; where service 

 will be regarded as noblest endeavor; and where the environal 

 surrounding will be such that of them it could be said, "eye 

 hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the 

 heart of man to conceive." 



In aiming at this what has man truly been aiming to accom- 

 plish.'* In reply it should be pointed out that, under the old 

 competitive system which man has tried to laud and to adapt 

 to his surroundings, his aspiration never could remain satisfied. 

 If we try to build up the life-environment of a Lao-tsze, a Daniel, 

 a Socrates, an Isaiah, a Paul, a Gerhard Groot, a Wesley, or 

 even the environment of today compared with what thousands 

 long for, it can truly be said that the hydra-headed evils of 

 competition rise up and beat one down on every side. Tlie 

 names just given are prominent examples of many thousands 

 —millions we might safely say — who during the past 3000 

 years or more have pictured, hoped for, prayed for, and at 

 times almost lived into a state where such inequalities should 

 cease, and where peace and righteousness should prevail. 



