2i6 Natural Salvation. 



prolonging human life indefinitely would be solved when 

 we could ward off cell dangers in our bodies. With the 

 somatic cell potentially immortal, death was due to organic 

 errata. Oar lives rested on a fixed and sure basis of 

 immortality which was in plain view ; the neurons of the 

 brain were so many units of eternal life, if only we could 

 guard and protect them. 



True, Professor Weissmann took the ground that man- 

 kind continued to die periodically because prolonged 

 human life was not useful to the human species ; in a 

 word, that the individual existed solely for the good of 

 the species ; that we die after we produce offspring be- 

 cause there is no longer any reason for us to live ; and 

 that this must be accepted as the law of human life. 



It required but a normal' exercise of common sense, 

 however, to discern a palpable fallacy in this corollarj'- of 

 the Weissmann theory. Hence, those who hoped for 

 greatly prolonged life, from the growth of knowledge, 

 were, not disheartened ; for they recognized the fact that 

 the highest interests of the species will be conserved far 

 better by a. race of perfected individual organisms which 

 were deathless, than by constant generations of diseased 

 mortals. It was perceived that the only possible reason 

 for thus exalting the species and sacrificing the individual 

 on its altars, must lie in the expectation that ultimately 

 there would be developed from the species a race of more 

 perfect individuals. 



