return. We can test the reasonableness of this view for our- 
selves. We are witnesses of the temporary suspension of con- 
sciousness in some states of severe illness. In high fever, for 
example, the consciousness is confused, disturbed, and even 
suspended : but when the fever abates, consciousness returns, 
and the soul resumes its usual power and activity. These facts 
have a very definite value in their reference to the Christian 
doctrines of immortality and mail’s spiritual personality. The 
substance of the soul, like every real thing, being indestruc- 
tible (as science admits), it may exist after death takes place. 
Nay, if science teach the truth, it must exist unless destroyed 
by a higher power than any now known to science. And the 
soul will live on in a consciousness of personal identity, whether 
it be joined to the same particles of matter or not. The same 
identical physical body is not necessary to mental and moral 
life and personality here. It is a fact, as we see, that we live 
on for 20, 30, 40, 50, or more years, in very different bodies 
now, while knowing that we are still the same selves all the 
while. Therefore, science cannot object to, nay it must favour 
the idea, that man may live on in real self-conscious identity, 
in a very different body hereafter. 
It would be very interesting to take another line of thought, 
science being still our guide, and show that from all w r e see of 
physical change and development here, it is reasonable to expect 
new bodies for the self-knowing and continuing soul. Science 
assures us that every atom and every substance once set free 
from any union by any cause, instantly seeks union with other 
atoms and other substances to foi’m new unions and to play new 
parts. Even so, the soul may with confidence be expected to 
obey the same universal law: may be expected, at its separation 
from the body at death, to seek new associations or new 
surroundings. The soul, like every other reality, will not live 
in isolation. But live it will, if our greatest scientists speak the 
truth — on grounds, as I have shown — of pure human investi- 
gation and acquired knowledge. Need I remind you how all 
this harmonizes with the teachings of Christ and Christianity ? 
Our faith in the unseen things which are eternal — God, the soul, 
eternal life — does not stand in the “wisdom of men but in the 
power of God.” That divine Power which first caused the soul 
to be and placed it in the flesh, on earth and in time, can surely 
continue it out of the flesh, in heaven and throughout the 
future. The great elements of personal identity are not material 
but spiritual. Even here and now we recognize the wonderful 
and inexplicable changes which nature exhibits. The caterpillar 
becomes the chrysalis. Tlicvc a living creature is formed into 
