256 WHAT IS LIFE ? 



Just in proportion to the increase of class interest the 

 interest of the privileged classes does the average 

 probability of regeneration in the world of wretched- 

 ness become greater. Who is there amongst us who 

 would elect to be born in many of the wretched condi- 

 tions of life we find existing in this world ? Think of 

 it, your Majesties and your Royal Highnesses. Think 

 of it, Right Reverend Father in God Bishop of 

 Vanity Fair. Think of it, Right Honourable Earl 

 of so and so. Think of it, noble Admirals. Think 

 of it, Commander-in-Chiefs. Think of it, ye clergy, 

 parasites of an effete system, and know that you 

 Avithout one exception were created from the same 

 infinitesimal atom, from the little egg-cell primarily 

 derived probably from the air, subject to the same 

 laws of development, breathing the same air, living 

 and thinking by the same means, by the same mole- 

 cular regeneration, as the most degenerated, wretched, 

 hopelessly miserable of beings, and that you also are 

 liable to regenerate under such hopeless conditions. 



mncli beloved by the dying mother. The daughter lived to be a 

 decrepit woman. In the resurrection, would not the mother refuse 

 to recognize the spiritual decrepit woman ? 



And again : 



A man married, while he was young, a beautiful woman. She died 

 soon after her marriage. In process of time the man married again, 

 and the second wife died ten years after her marriage. At the death 

 of the second wife the man was in the prime of life. He lived to be 

 old and very infirm, " sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans every- 

 thing." Now, in the resurrection, will either of these wives recog- 

 nize the husband ? Would they not both exclaim, " This is not the 

 man we knew in our time ? " 



And if there is not the visual resurrection, the whole of the 

 fundamental conception falls to the ground ; it is impossible, 

 unthinkable. 



