126 THE PORTAL OF EVOLUTION 



his consideration and review new ideals and thoughts, and 

 must leave him to decide upon their merits. Moreover, be- 

 cause under the light of my hypothesis they appear to me to 

 fit in better with the whole of the scheme of creation from 

 the standpoint of that hypothesis and also from modern 

 scientific investigation. All past theories of rebirth strive 

 to blend together a destructible body with an indestructible 

 soul, and to create an infinite soul within a finite individuality 

 surrounded by a finite body, or an immortal soul within 

 finite limits and with the qualities of infinity. This appears 

 to be somewhat illogical and disregards the fact that the 

 soul, being in the likeness of God, must be a pure and invis- 

 ible spirit, and being so must logically be beyond the reach 

 of death ; while the body, not being in the likeness of 

 God, must become perfectly free from crime before it can be 

 an immortal abode for a perfect and immortal soul, which must 

 be influenced from without as well as from within the body. 



Now it appears to me that the only logical deduction 

 must be that the soul cannot die, and therefore that when 

 the body dies the vitality of the soul can only live in the 

 souls it has created just as the vitality of a plant can only 

 live in the seeds it has produced. This is why I have placed 

 before the reader in Chapter XII., entitled " Mind and Soul," 

 what appears to me to be the form of immortality most in 

 accord with this hypothesis and with evolution, and conse- 

 quently the most reasonable view of the matter, namely, that 

 the soul is the united possession of the family to which it be- 

 longs and is being slowly evolved to a perfect comprehension 

 of the limits of good and evil and will after death participate 

 in the further development of the acts, objects, aims and 

 abilities of the family to which it belongs, and which have 

 been the source of joy and pleasure of their life which will 

 be reproduced in the lives of their children, but devoid 

 of the pains and sufferings which they experienced 

 during their own individual lifetime. Such a conception 

 appears to my mind to offer the greatest inducement to virtue, 

 and also to coincide with the whole scheme of evolution, and 

 to be the fittest reward of virtue and the most rational means 

 of attaining immortality and perfection. But all ideas that 

 the souls of the dead should pass into any other existence 

 than that of the family that gave them birth do not appear 



