39^ IMMORTALITV. 



micro-organisms that live upon the bodies of the 

 dead. And is there not a certain symboUc fitness 

 in the persistence for a season of the body in the 

 phenomenal world in which the spirit worked, and 

 which its action will affect as long as that world 

 remains ? It forms, as it were, a symbol of a spiritual 

 agency whose spiritual development has taken other 

 forms, and left this shell behind in its advance to 

 higher phases of existence. 



There is no reason, therefore, why we should take 

 the phenomenon of death as conclusive of the 

 matter, or regard it as inconsistent with the con- 

 ception of a spiritual process of purification by 

 means of the g^radatlons of existence. For if such 

 be the essential meaning of the world-process, it is 

 evident that no Indefinite stay can be made in any 

 one stage, and indeed none could permanently meet 

 the spiritual requirements. It Is, moreover, pretty 

 obvious In our case that long life is by no means an 

 unmixed blessing : for by an intelligent mind the 

 lessons of life are soon learnt, and while the social 

 environment remains what it is, the experience of a 

 protracted life is apt only to engender a conviction 

 that all Is humbug, a cynical disbelief in all ideals 

 and the possibility of realizing them. 



§ 9. Such considerations may tend to counteract 

 the overwhelming Impressiveness of the fact of 

 death, but they only demonstrate the possibility of 

 a future life. And moreover, thouo^h death makes 

 the strongest appeal to our feelings, the doctrine of 

 a future life involves a difhculty far more serious 

 in the eyes of reason. This dif^culty arises out of 

 the impossibility of fixing the point at which im- 

 mortality begins, either in the beginning of the 

 individual's life or in that of the race. It seems so 



