I 



PROPORTIONED TO MERIT. 401 



the lowest phases of spiritual existence will have 

 nothing to remember, and hardly any means of 

 remembering it. We cannot, therefore, ascribe to 

 them any vivid or enduring consciousness of their 

 past lives, and yet need not deny it altogether. 

 They have a future life, but it is rudimentary. 



This view will open up to us an alternative to 

 utter extinction or fully conscious Immortality, and 

 we shall no longer be haunted with that nightmare 

 of orthodoxy, the vision of *' little children, a span 

 long, crawling In hell." But by a self-acting ar- 

 rangement the condition of consciousness hereafter 

 will accurately correspond to its attainments here. 

 Just in proportion as we have developed our spiritual 

 powers here will be our spiritual future. Those 

 who have lived the life of beasts here, a dull and 

 brutish life that was redeemed by no effort to Il- 

 lumine the soul by spiritual enlightenment, will be 

 rewarded as "the beasts that perish." They will 

 retain little of what they were, their future life will 

 be brief and faint. On the other hand, we need 

 not hesitate to attribute to the faithful dog, whom 

 the strength of pure affection for his master has 

 lifted far above the spiritual level of his race, at 

 least as much immortality as to the brutal savage, 

 whose life has been ennobled by no high thoughts 

 and redeemed by no elevating feeling.^ Those, again, 



1 For, as Goethe well says {Faust, Pt. 2, Act 3 s.f.) : — 

 " Wer keinen Namen sich ervvarb noch Edles will 



Gehort den Elementen an : so fahret hin — 



Mit meiner Konigin zu sein verlangt mich heiss ; 



Nicht nur Verdienst, auch Treue wahrt uns die Person." 



[They that have won no name, nor willed the right, 



Dissolve into the elements — so pass away ! 



But / to follow on my queen do ardently desire ; 



Not merit only, but attachment, keeps our personality.] 

 R.ofS. D D 



