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 FROM THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 JACK SAMS 
 
 
 
 

 
“A book, through whose windows one looks out upon the 
 scenes of the Delectable Mountains’’ 
 
 
 
 Horizons of Immortality 
 
 By F. D. KERSHNER 
 Dean of Religion, Butler University 
 
 
 
 There has long been need of such a book as ‘‘Hori- 
 zons of Immortality,’’ a book that shows the methods 
 | and conclusions about immortality reached through 
 modern learning, together with a fresh view of Biblical 
 teaching, written in a way that would satisfy both the 
 scholar and the everyday practical reader. Dr. 
 Kershner has achieved this difficult literary feat be- 
 cause of his training and scholarship and because of 
 the close touch he has ever had with all the people. 
 He writes with ease and mastery, and the reader is 
 borne along as on the bosom of a strong, calm river, 
 with the sense of power in the book, and kept eager by 
 the lights which burn beyond life’s far and near 
 horizons. 
 
 | - 
 BF BETHANY PRESS - - - - ~~ <St. Louis 
 

 
 a ae 
 ee 
 La : ' 
 
HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2022 with funding from 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
 https://archive.org/details/horizonsofimmort0Okers_0 
 
HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY IN THE 
 LIGHT OF MODERN THOUGHT 
 
 a 
 
 Pe 
 iS 
 
 BY 
 FREDERICK D. KERSHNER 
 
 Dean of Religion, Butler College 
 cAuthor, “The Christian Union Overture,” “Christian Baptism,” 
 “Sermons for Special “Days,” etc., ete. 
 
 THE BETHANY PRESS 
 ST. LOUIS, MO, 
 
Copyright, 1926 
 The Bethany Press 
 St. Louis, Mo. 
 
cAd Majorem Christi Gloriam 
 et 
 
 In Memoriam 
 
 te Re LEON ce 
 
 Quae 
 In Spe “Uitae Aeternae 
 
 Dormivit 26 February, 1926 
 
‘pie 
 
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 4 X's. wie, Y. 
 4 ry 
 
 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 Dean Isershner has strengthened and enriched 
 the faith of the church with a number of books, 
 but Horizons of Immortality will take the first 
 place among them. It deals with the subject 
 deepest in the human heart. Man thinks he was 
 not made to die. He does not want to ‘‘he in the 
 grave even though he may have princes for bed- 
 fellows.’’ About him ever hovers the passion for 
 immortality no matter how completely he at times 
 may seem to lose this surest marking of his genuine 
 dignity and eternal worth. 
 
 This book traces that elemental conviction of 
 humanity through dream, history, philosophy, 
 science, literature, and reaches a convincing climax 
 in divine revelation as it shines forth in the teach- 
 ings of Jesus and his apostles. 
 
 It is a book of optimism. For I suppose Chris- 
 tian belief in immortality to be the essence of hope. 
 It is the expectation of life growing from the idea 
 that human personality is indestructible and that 
 the goal of all good longings will be finally reached 
 by those who seek them even though through rough 
 and devious paths. 
 
 The book is scholarly and in that sense a book 
 for the classroom and for the deepest thinker, but 
 it is written with the ease and charm of simplicity 
 that will take hold of the plainest reader and be 
 
 ~ 
 
 i 
 
§ INTRODUCTION 
 
 a source of comfort and instruction to those who 
 seek to glimpse the stars through cypress trees. 
 It has many Pisgah sights and ‘‘little flights of 
 song’’ that lift the soul to the gates ajar. 
 
 But it is not a book of rapture, even though it 
 has warmth and glow. It is based on fact, forged 
 out with logic and has the weight and power that 
 make it of permanent worth. 
 
 It is a valuable contribution to the growing 
 volume of literature on immortality, the glow of 
 the after life burning along the horizons of time 
 to keep us from wasting all the precious energies 
 of the soul in the drab and sordid business of 
 plying the muck rake instead of standing up with 
 radiant face to receive the crown. 
 
 B. A. ABBOTT. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART I—HISTORICAL SURVEY 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 PAGE 
 . Immortality and the Teaching of Jesus 13 
 . Immortality and the Teaching of Paul 27 
 . The Greek Conception of Immortality 36 
 . Greek Thought and Immortality______ 46 
 . Immortality and the Creeds_________-_ 56 
 . Modern Philosophy and Immortality__ 66 
 
 . Modern Science and Immortality_____ 78 
 
 . The Proofs from Psychical Research__ 87 
 . Theosophy and the Doctrine of Karma 97 
 . Evolution and Immortality__________- 107 
 . The Surrender of Immortality_______- 117 
 . Summary. and Conclusion-L--- 126 
 
 PART II—CONSTRUCTIVE SUGGESTIONS 
 
 XITTI. 
 XIV. 
 XV. 
 XVI. 
 XVII. 
 
 Riayat SOT te eed eee = Pee 137 
 LCGEWG A Eee BT AG C8 Robe a a sae ea feN Wont asia c eek 151 
 The Testimony of the Seers__-------- 159 
 The Testimony of the Saints__------- 185 
 The Gospel of the Resurrection__-~-- 196 
 
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HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 PART J. PROBLEMS 
 
 To die,—to sleep,— 
 To sleep! perchance to dream! 
 
TE HE immortality of the soul is a thing 
 so important that only those who have 
 lost all feeling can rest indifferent to it, can 
 be content to know if it is not, or if it is. 
 —Pascal 
 
CHAPTER 1 
 
 IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF 
 JESUS 
 
 YOF TOLSTOI, whose enthusiasm for the 
 ethical message of Jesus stands unrivalled in 
 
 our modern age, refuses to accept the orthodox 
 Christian doctrine of immortality. From his point 
 of view, to possess eternal life can only mean the 
 complete surrender of individuality in the univer- 
 
 sal life of God. He says: 
 
 As opposed to the personal life, Christ taught us, not of a life 
 beyond the grave, but of a universal life united with the life of 
 humanity, past, present, and to come, the life of the Son of Man. 
 
 A little later in the book from which the above 
 quotation is taken, he appears to hedge somewhat 
 with regard to personal immortality. Whether we 
 live as conscious individuals after physical dissolu- 
 tion, or whether we do not makes no difference, 
 in his opinion, with regard to the true meaning and 
 value of Christ’s teaching. To quote further: 
 
 But let us grant that Christ’s words concerning the last judg- 
 ment and the consummation of the age, and other words reported 
 in the Gospel of John, are a promise of a life beyond the grave for 
 the souls of mortal men,—it is none the less true that His teaching 
 in regard to the light of life and the Kingdom of God have the 
 same meaning for us that they had for his hearers eighteen cen- 
 
 13 
 
14 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 turies ago, that is, that the only real life is the life of the Son of 
 Man according to the Father’s will. 
 
 It is easier to admit this than to admit that the doctrine of the 
 true life contains the conception of immortality and a life beyond 
 the grave. 
 
 Perhaps it is fairer to presuppose that man, after this terrestrial 
 life passed in the satisfaction of personal desires, will enter upon 
 the possession of an eternal personal life in paradise, with all imag- 
 inable enjoyments; perhaps this is fairer, but to believe that this is 
 so, to endeavor to persuade ourselves that for our good actions we 
 shall be recompensed with eternal felicity, and for our bad actions 
 punished with eternal torments,—to believe this, does not aid us in 
 understanding Christ’s teaching, but, on the contrary, deprives 
 Christ’s teaching of its chief foundation. 
 
 In Tolstoi’s abbreviation of the New Testament 
 story of Christ entitled The Gospel in Brief, 
 he omits all reference to the Resurrection and as 
 far as possible to any idea of individual immortal- 
 ity. Likewise, in his brief essay entitled Life, 
 he emphasizes his doctrine of the absorption of in- 
 dividual consciousness in the divine Personality. 
 We do not have space to quote the numerous pas- 
 sages in this work bearing upon the subject, but 
 anyone who will take the trouble to consult it can- 
 not fail to be impressed by the thoroughgoing 
 manner in which the author accepts and defends 
 his hypothesis. 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson is apparently dubious 
 concerning Jesus’ advocacy of personal survival. 
 In a well-known passage he says: | 
 
 It is strange that Jesus is esteemed by mankind the bringer of 
 the doctrine of immortality. He is never weak or sentimental, He 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 1d 
 
 is very abstemious of explanation. He never preaches the personal 
 immortality. 
 
 It would be easy to add the names of other au- 
 thorities who deprecate the idea that Jesus em- 
 phasized the continuance of conscious personal life 
 beyond the grave. There is a tendency nowadays 
 to draw a rather sharp line of cleavage between 
 the social and eschatological aspects of the New 
 Testament and to claim the authority of Jesus only 
 for the former of the two. Paul and the later 
 apocalyptie writers, we are told, were responsible 
 for the development of the doctrine of immortality 
 with its consequent emphasis upon other-world- 
 liness, while Jesus himself was concerned solely 
 with the social content of his message concerning 
 the Kingdom. ‘That there is a certain degree of 
 truth in this point of view will hardly be denied 
 by any careful student of the New Testament. 
 Nevertheless, there is much in the theory which 
 runs counter not only to the plain teachings of the 
 gospel writers themselves, but also to the obvious 
 implications of Christian history and development. 
 Beyond any question, the teaching of Jesus has 
 often received a mistaken interpretation because 
 of undue emphasis upon its eschatological and 
 other-worldly features. Moreover, there can be no 
 doubt but that the social message of the Nazarene 
 for many centuries was neglected. And yet one 
 ean searcely believe that the universal testimony 
 
16 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 of orthodox Christendom with regard to the im- 
 mortality of the soul was based upon a delusion. 
 Doubtless the Church has frequently misunder- 
 stood and misinterpreted her Founder’s teaching, 
 but it seems inconceivable that she should have 
 gone so far astray as the supposition in question 
 would involve. Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant 
 authorities alike agree that personal immortality 
 is a presupposition of the Christian faith. The 
 Tolstoian interpretation is Buddhistic or Brah- 
 manistic, but is not Christian. There are, in fact, 
 a good many points of affinity between the views 
 of the great Russian and the religion of Gautama. 
 It is not without significance that Gandhi, the 
 prophet of modern India, avows himself a disciple 
 of Tolstoi. Nor is it difficult to enumerate points 
 of resemblance between Buddhism and Christian- 
 ity. The essential difference lies precisely in the 
 Western emphasis upon immortality and the East- 
 ern rejection of the doctrine. There are of course 
 certain divergences between the Christian and the 
 Buddhist systems of ethics, but they are insignif- 
 icant when compared with the cleavage we have 
 just indicated. 
 
 When we turn to the New Testament itself in 
 order to discover what Jesus taught concerning 
 the life beyond the grave, we are confronted with 
 a somewhat anomalous situation. Scarcely any- 
 one can read the gospels without being conscious 
 of the atmosphere of immortality which pervades 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 17 
 
 them. The tremendous emphasis upon the signif- 
 icance and value of the individual soul leads one 
 to believe that a being of such worth cannot pass 
 into nothingness after a few short years upon 
 earth. One feels irresistibly that the whole mis- 
 sion of Jesus presupposes the continuance of per- 
 sonal existence beyond the grave. Robert Brown- 
 ing, when he draws the distinction between the 
 spirit of pagan art and the new art of Christianity, 
 rightly places the emphasis upon the Christian 
 doctrine of immortality. Perhaps his most famous 
 art poem, Old Pictures in Florence, contains this 
 idea as its kernel: 
 
 Growth came when, looking your last on them all, 
 You turned your eyes inwardly one fine day 
 
 And cried with a start—What if we so small 
 Be greater and grander the while than they! 
 
 Are they perfect of lineament, perfect of stature? 
 In both, of such lower types are we 
 
 Precisely because of our wider nature; 
 
 For time, theirs—ours for eternity. 
 
 In fact, one can with difficulty imagine what 
 modern Christianity would become with the doc- 
 trine of personal immortality left out. There is 
 no other belief so completely interwoven with the 
 whole fabric of Christian history and experience. 
 The most significant dogmas of the faith such as 
 the doctrines of the Incarnation, the Atonement, 
 the Trinity and others of like importance are 
 scarcely so universal in the acceptance which they 
 
18 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 have received on the part of men and women who 
 have claimed to be Christians throughout the cen- 
 turies as is the doctrine of immortality. If Chris- 
 tendom went astray at this particular point, the 
 divergence was assuredly complete and universal. 
 
 The synoptic writings contain much evidence 
 which leads to the orthodox interpretation. Aside 
 from the accounts of the Resurrection, which 
 Tolstoi of course rejects, there are numerous pas- 
 sages in the narrative which can scarcely be inter- 
 preted in any other way than as involving the ac- 
 ceptance of personal immortality. Such passages, 
 among others, are the parable of the Judgment as 
 found in the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew, the 
 numerous references to future consequences of 
 present acts which obviously cannot be limited to 
 the round of earthly experience and the straight- 
 out affirmation of the doctrine in the reply of Jesus 
 to the question of the Sadducees concerning the 
 Resurrection. There is moreover the parable of 
 the Rich Man and Lazarus, which even Tolstoi ac- 
 cepts, and sundry passages scattered through the 
 Sermon on the Mount and in other unexpected 
 places which require much explaining away in 
 order to escape the implication of survival. It 
 would be tedious to recapitulate these references 
 inasmuch as they have become household words 
 to all of us. Doubtless in some instances, perhaps 
 in most of them, we have read into the text the 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 19 
 
 theological coloring of many centuries of Christian 
 history, and yet when every allowance is made 
 there remains a residuum which ean only be elimi- 
 nated by the frank rejection of the text itself. 
 
 While the above considerations must be taken 
 into account in any fair estimate of the situation, 
 it is only just to say that some arguments can be 
 made for the Tolstoian theory. Personal im- 
 mortality is stressed in the teaching of Jesus, but 
 certainly far less than was true later in the history 
 of the church. Paul says much more about it than 
 does Jesus himself, and the theologians of the 
 second and third centuries were more emphatic and 
 pronounced in its advocacy than were any of the 
 apostohe order. It seems strange at first sight 
 that this later development should have proceeded 
 from the foundation which we discover in the di- 
 rect teachings of Jesus. Obviously, we must seek 
 an explanation for the evolution of the doctrine 
 outside of the gospel sources themselves. We be- 
 lieve, however, that it is quite possible to discover 
 the reason or reasons for the resultant situation 
 from a simple analysis of the facts. 
 
 As we shall see later, the influence of Platonism 
 and of Greek philosophy in general meant much 
 in the development of the Christian dogma of im- 
 mortality. The measure of this influence in the 
 course of Christian development is difficult to de- 
 termine, but it was unquestionably both extensive 
 
20 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 and profound. No analysis of Christian doctrine 
 would be adequate without due allowance for the 
 Greek thread which runs through the entire his- 
 tory of theology. Nevertheless, when this allow- 
 ance has been made, it appears impossible to derive 
 the remaining content of the Christian concept of 
 immortality from the slender foundation which 
 writers like Tolstoi and Emerson would afford us. 
 It is inconceivable that Origen and Athanasius and 
 Augustine and Anselm and all the rest of the 
 galaxy of Christian theologians derived their con- 
 viction of the future life from Plato alone. As- 
 suredly they believed the doctrine to be taught and 
 taught unreservedly in the New Testament. It was 
 to them an essential part of the Gospel. They 
 never doubted that Jesus himself taught it, be- 
 lieved it, lived it. Of course they may have been 
 mistaken about this as about other things, but the 
 universal and unanimous testimony of their Chris- 
 tian experience must, we think, be allowed to pos- 
 sess evidential value. 
 
 The explanation of the entire matter, as we see 
 it, is based upon the definition of eternal life as the 
 term is used in the New Testament. Jesus con- 
 stantly refers to the fact that He is the bearer 
 of hfe and that His mission is to reveal life and 
 immortality through the gospel. Perhaps this 
 point of view is brought out more fully in the 
 Gospel of John than it is in the Synopties, but it is 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 21 
 
 present in all of the biographies of the Nazarene. 
 John uses the expression, ‘‘eternal life’’ about 
 seventeen times in the gospel and some six times 
 in the epistles. It is worth recalling some of the 
 passages in which this expression occurs. In the 
 discourse upon the Bread of Life, Jesus says, ‘‘He 
 that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath 
 eternal life.’’ Again, in the account of the resur- 
 rection of Lazarus, we have this statement: 
 ‘‘ Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and 
 the life: he that believeth on me, though he were 
 dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and 
 believeth in me shall never die.’’ In the great In- 
 tercessory Prayer, we have the term defined: 
 ‘*This is life eternal, that they should know thee 
 the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou 
 hast sent.’’ At the conclusion of the parable of 
 the Good Shepherd, Jesus sums up his mission in 
 the famous passage: ‘‘I am come that they might 
 have life, and that they might have it more 
 abundantly.’’ 
 
 The meaning involved in all these passages is 
 quite obviously that eternal life is not simply some- 
 thing which comes after death, but that it is an im- 
 mediate and present possession of those who be- 
 come the followers of Jesus. As Harnack puts it, 
 the gospel means in its essence, ‘‘eternal life in 
 the midst of time by the strength and under the 
 eyes of God.’’ Jesus does not say much about the 
 
2? HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 future life because to him it is identical with the 
 present life. As Pringle-Pattison expresses it, 
 
 Eternal life is not a state of existence to follow upon physical 
 death, but an all-satisfying present experience of the love of God 
 in Christ. It is, as the theologians say, participation in the being 
 of the spiritual Christ! This is the eternal life in the midst of 
 time which is claimed by the saints as an immediate experience, 
 one to which considerations of time are, in fact, indifferent, because 
 we are at rest in the present. 
 
 It may be said that the Buddhistic interpretation 
 of absorption in Nirvana accepted by Tolstoi can 
 still be made to fit into the above passages. Tolstoi 
 himself quotes some of them in support of his 
 theory, and yet to the writer at least, it seems 1m- 
 possible to draw such a meaning from any fair 
 exegesis of the language, considered as a whole. 
 Certainly those who heard these words did not 
 understand them in a Buddhistic sense any more 
 than the later church theologians so understood 
 them. When Jesus spoke of the more abundant 
 life, it is inconceivable that his hearers should 
 have understood him to mean the extinction of 
 their own conscious personalities. Had they so 
 understood him, they could never later have 
 preached the gospel of the resurrection. Jt must 
 always be remembered that the New Testament 
 writers themselves accepted the orthodox exegesis 
 of their Master’s words; there appears to be no 
 exception to this statement. It was left for much 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 23 
 
 later interpreters to derive the gospel of Nirvana 
 from the words of Jesus. 
 
 It is obvious that any doctrine of unity with 
 Christ and of consequent unity with God carries 
 with it the possibility of misinterpretation at this 
 point. Doubtless no minister of our modern age 
 accepted the orthodox view of immortality more 
 thoroughly than George Matheson, and yet it is 
 quite possible to read the Tolstoian view into 
 Matheson’s most famous poetical production, ‘‘O 
 Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go.’’ When the poet 
 Says: 
 
 I give thee back the life I owe, 
 
 That in thine ocean depths its flow 
 May richer, fuller be, 
 
 it is quite easy to draw the conclusion that he 
 meant absorption in Nirvana or in the one univer- 
 sal Life of the world. [ven the concluding verse 
 with its splendid reference to immortality may with 
 little effort yield a similar meaning: 
 
 O Cross that liftest up my head, 
 I dare not ask to fly from Thee; 
 
 I lay in dust life’s glory dead, 
 
 And from the ground there blossoms red 
 Life that shall endless be! 
 
 Now it is quite conceivable that if the facts con- 
 cerning the author’s belief in personal immortality 
 were unknown, the above words might be inter- 
 preted in harmony with the Buddhistice philosophy. 
 
24 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 The life which is endless and which blossoms red 
 from the ground to an Oriental mind might easily 
 refer to the universal Being who occupies the first 
 place in the Pantheistic interpretation of reality. 
 How thoroughly incorrect such an exegesis is, may 
 be discovered by referring to the authoritative 
 biography of the Scotch minister written by his 
 friend, D. Macmillan. The latter says: 
 
 If there was one subject more than another in which Matheson 
 was deeply interested, it was immortality. It is the theme of his 
 earliest and of his latest writings. There is hardly a book or an 
 article written by him in which there is not some reference to it. 
 It was with him a subject of perennial interest. Nor was there any 
 question to which he had given a more definite answer. He had no 
 doubt concerning it. He believed as strongly in the immortality of 
 the soul as he did in his own personality. Some may think that the 
 reason of his absorbing interest in this subject was the fact of his 
 being blind. It was natural that he should look forward to another 
 world in which the film would be taken from his eyes and he could 
 see the ‘‘King in his beauty.’’ Matheson had formed to himself 
 a very vivid conception of what the hereafter was to be like. He 
 had created a ‘‘new heaven and a new earth,’’ and in moments of 
 frank communication he gave his friends a glimpse of what he him- 
 self saw; but his hope of immortality arose from another cause. 
 As a spiritually minded man, as a Christian theologian, as one who 
 had pondered the problems which face all serious men, he felt that 
 there could be no escape from a belief in this great doctrine. The 
 very idea of God made it necessary to his thinking, and the Chris- 
 tian religion would fall to pieces were the doctrine of immortality 
 to be blotted out. 
 
 Matheson’s interpretation of the subject appears 
 to the writer to be singularly in harmony with the 
 facts. Grounding as he does the whole matter in 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF JESUS 25 
 
 the mystical union of the believer with Christ, he 
 nevertheless interprets this union in terms of con- 
 scious personal immortality. As Macmillan puts 
 it, 
 
 The believer who is mystically united with Christ, who is a mem- 
 ber of His divine body, is bound to be a sharer in that life which 
 Christ brought to light. The power of Christ in the believing soul 
 
 will make it eternal, and the glorified body of Christ will also be 
 shared in by the Christian. 
 
 ‘‘When Jesus uses such figures as the Vine 
 and the Branches, the Door, the Resurrection and 
 the Life, above all when He attaches such mystical 
 and vital significance to partaking of His body and 
 His blood, we can readily understand the meaning 
 of His teaching concerning immortality. Since 
 He is the Life, death has no power over Him, and 
 those who are His followers because they are par- 
 takers of His life must also be delivered from the 
 fear and power of death. The true teaching of 
 Jesus concerning immortality is mystical and vital 
 rather than mechanical. This does not mean, how- 
 ever, that it involves the loss of individual con- 
 sciousness. Rather does it mean the perfection 
 and enriching of our undeveloped earthly per- 
 sonalities. The future will not mean less of per- 
 sonal self-knowledge to each one of us, but rather 
 more. Here we know our own selves only in part, 
 there we shall know even as we are known. In 
 the Father’s house, there are many rooms and it 
 
26 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 shall be our privilege and joy to explore these 
 rooms throughout eternity. 
 
 The teaching of Jesus concerning personal sur- 
 vival after the experience we call death is there- 
 fore simple and clear. He looked upon the dis- 
 solution of the material body as a matter of such 
 slight consequence as to demand only the most 
 casual treatment. Those who have entered into 
 the true life, the life of the spirit, in the very 
 nature of things cannot be subject to the power 
 of death. It was a true instinct which led the 
 church theologians from the beginning to stress 
 the gospel of personal immortality as an essential 
 feature of the Master’s teaching. Unfortunately, 
 they sometimes interpreted his words in mechan- 
 ical and legalistic fashion instead of giving them 
 the vital connotation which they deserve. Never- 
 theless, their persistent witness to the core of 
 Christ’s teaching upon the subject rings truer to 
 the facts than the modern attempts to Orientalize 
 the message of Jesus in the interest of a new 
 philosophical fashion. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 . L. Tolstoi, My Religion. Chapter VITI. 
 
 . L. Tolstoi, The Gospel in Brief. Chapter XI. 
 
 . R. W. Emerson. Works. Vol. viii, p. 330. 
 
 . Robert Browning, Old Pictures in Florence. 
 
 . A. Harnack, What Is Christianity? Chapter IT. 
 
 . A. Seth Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality. Lecture 
 
 oO cre whe 
 
 X. 
 7. D. Maemillan, The Life of George Matheson. Chapter VI. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF 
 PAUL 
 
 AUL is usually regarded as the great protago- 
 nist of the orthodox Christian view of im- 
 mortality. Perhaps a good deal of this feeling is 
 derived from the prominence given to the fifteenth 
 chapter of First Corinthians in the burial service 
 of practically all Christian communions. ‘The 
 language here is so clear and emphatic that there 
 is no possibility of misunderstanding it. Even 
 Tolsto1 does not try to make out Paul to be a 
 Pantheist. Nowhere else in literature is the doc- 
 trine of conscious personal survival after death 
 asserted more fully and completely than it is in 
 this famous passage. 
 
 In view of the considerations noted above, it 
 seems rather strange that an authority so eminent 
 as Professor George B. Stevens should say con- 
 cerning the Pauline theology, ‘‘No part of the 
 apostle’s teaching is developed with so little of 
 systematic fulness as the doctrine of the future 
 life.’’ Professor Stevens concedes, however, that 
 upon the subject of individual immortality there 
 is no possibility of misunderstanding Paul’s posi- 
 tion. He believed in it, preached it, taught it, and 
 
 27 
 
28 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 transmitted it to his successors and followers. 
 There is some question as to whether his conception 
 of the resurrection included the wicked as well as 
 the righteous, as we shall see later, but of the fact 
 that he taught a personal resurrection of the indi- 
 vidual Christian there can be no doubt. Paul stakes 
 the whole case for Christianity upon the fact of 
 Christ’s conquest of death, carrying with it as it 
 does the certainty of future life for Christ’s fol- 
 lowers. No language could be stronger than words 
 like these: ‘‘ But if there is no resurrection of the 
 dead, neither hath Christ been raised, and if Christ 
 hath not been raised, then is our preaching vain, 
 your faith also is vain,’’ or these words of still 
 more emphatic import: ‘‘For if the dead are not 
 raised, neither hath Christ been raised: and if 
 Christ hath not been raised, your faith is vain, ye 
 are yet in your sins. Then they also that are fallen 
 asleep in Christ have perished. If we have only 
 hoped in Christ in this life, we are of all men most 
 pitiable.’’ 
 
 The Pauline eschatology, like the Pauline theol- 
 ogy in general, can best be understood by giving 
 due allowance to the educational and philosophical 
 background of the apostle. Paul, it should always 
 be remembered, was a Pharisee. He had received 
 his education under the most eminent teacher of 
 this school and the impression produced by his 
 early training remained indelibly stamped upon 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF PAUL 29 
 
 his mind. Of course his later Christian experience 
 took precedence over the instructions of Gamaliel, 
 but there can be little doubt that the latter’s views, 
 perhaps for the most part unconsciously, were of 
 great significance in the evolution of the Pauline 
 theology. To many interpreters, the rigid pre- 
 destinarian sections to be found in certain of Paul’s 
 epistles are best explained by the fatalistic back- 
 ground which his thinking received from his Phari- 
 see teachers. In like manner, his views of the 
 future life were undoubtedly colored by the in- 
 struction he had received in his youth. It was one 
 of the cardinal tenets of the Pharisees that the soul 
 is immortal, their teaching upon the subject har- 
 monizing in no slight degree with the Platonic 
 school of Greek philosophy. According to this 
 view, the soul is inherently indestructible and must 
 therefore survive the experience of death. The 
 Sadducees rejected this view entirely, believing in 
 neither angels nor the resurrection. Paul’s ad- 
 herence to the current Pharisaical teaching is 
 clearly brought out in the twenty-third chapter of 
 Acts where, upon the occasion of his trial before 
 Ananias, the apostle cried out in the council, 
 ‘‘Brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees: 
 touching the hope and resurrection of the dead I 
 am called in question.’’ It is inconceivable that 
 Paul should have misrepresented his actual views 
 upon this occasion simply in order to make a point. 
 
30 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 That his hearers understood his meaning is clear 
 from the fact that a dissension at once arose be- 
 tween the Pharisees and the Sadducees who were 
 present, the former taking the apostle’s part de- 
 spite their antipathy to him as a Christian. A 
 little later when Paul defended himself before 
 Felix in opposition to the speech of Tertullus, he 
 makes it an essential part of hig apology that he 
 has ‘‘hope toward God, which these also them- 
 selves look for, that there shall be a resurrection 
 both of the just and the unjust.’’ Still later, in 
 his defense before King Agrippa, Paul asks the 
 question, ‘‘ Why is it judged incredible with you, if 
 God doth raise the dead?’’ In his speech on Mars 
 Hill, some years before, he had closed his discourse 
 by saying that God commands all men everywhere 
 to repent ‘‘inasmuch as he has appointed a day 
 in which he will judge the world in righteousness 
 by the man he has ordained, whereof he hath given 
 assurance unto all men, in that he has raised him 
 from the dead.’’ There is searcely one of the 
 Pauline letters which does not contain some refer- 
 ence to the general judgment. It is difficult to un- 
 derstand the significance of such a judgment un- 
 less there is the implication of a general resurrec- 
 tion, as the apostle himself said, ‘‘both of the just 
 and the unjust.’’ 
 
 Notwithstanding the facts above cited, there are 
 many modern theologians who hold to the view that 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF PAUL 3] 
 
 Paul nowhere teaches the resurrection of the un- |. 
 just but’ only of those who have become immortal , 
 through their mystical union with Christ. While 
 somewhat guarded in his statements, this in the 
 main is the position held by Professor Stevens. 
 He says: 
 
 In regard to the question whether Paul believed in a resurrection 
 of the godless, the following points must be remembered,—(a) that 
 he nowhere speaks in his epistles (cf., however, Acts 24:15) of a 
 general resurrection of all mankind, (b) that he twice (1 Thess. 
 4:16, 1 Cor. 15:23) speaks explicitly of a resurrection of Chris- 
 tians, as if he thought of it as a distinct event, (c) that his whole 
 argument for the fact of a resurrection is based upon Christ’s res- 
 urrection as its ground and guaranty, and (d) that the application 
 of this argument is made to Christians alone. It is certain that 
 Paul has said nothing—even in the most casual or indirect way— 
 of a resurrection of non-believers. Whether he held to such a res- 
 urrection notwithstanding the fact that he has not alluded to it, or 
 
 whether he has not alluded to it because he did not hold it, is a 
 matter for conjecture. 
 
 Elsewhere Stevens tries to break the force of the 
 Pauline references to a general judgment by say- 
 ing that while they create a certain presumption 
 in favor of a universal resurrection ‘‘they do not 
 conclusively prove a positive opinion on Paul’s 
 part.’’ Professor Simpson, in his recent work en- 
 titled, Man and the Attainment of Immortality, 
 argues for the same position. His language is much 
 stronger than that of Stevens: ‘‘In none of St. 
 Paul’s writings,’’ he says, ‘‘is there any sugges- 
 tion of a resurrection of the wicked.’’ It is true 
 
32 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 that he sees traces of the survival of the Pharisa- 
 ical eschatology in the Pauline epistles, but he re- 
 gards these as insignificant. To use his own lan- 
 guage, ‘‘St. Paul evidently kept some of the old 
 eschatological pictures of his early days in his 
 mind, but our duty in interpretation is to follow 
 the main line of his religious experience.’’ He 
 gets rid of the reference to the universal res- 
 urrection in Acts 24:15 by agreeing with Professor 
 Kennedy that in his report of Paul’s speech Luke 
 aimed to give as Judaistic a coloring as possible to 
 the apostle’s words. Other references to the judg- 
 ment are treated in similar fashion. Of course 
 Professor Simpson’s object, as we shall see later, 
 is to sustain his general theory of ‘‘immortability”’ 
 as opposed to the ordinary doctrine of immortality. 
 
 in whatever way we may account for the fact, 
 it will scarcely be disputed that Christian theology 
 as a whole has understood Paul’s teaching to be 
 clearly in favor of a universal resurrection. From 
 the days of Augustine onward, there was little 
 hesitancy with regard to the matter. Luther, Cal- 
 vin, Zwingli, and the Protestant theologians in gen- 
 eral were quite as emphatic in regard to the ques- 
 tion as were their Roman Catholic predecessors 
 and contemporaries. It does not appear to have 
 occurred to them that there could be any doubt 
 about the apostle’s convictions upon the subject. 
 Of course the influence of Greek thought proper 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF PAUL 33 
 
 and of other similar considerations may have had 
 something to do with their views. Whatever the 
 cause, the fact remains that the Pauline doctrine 
 of immortality in their minds coincided clearly 
 with the Greek view of the inherent immortality 
 of the human soul. 
 
 To the writer at least, the difficulty involved in 
 harmonizing the different threads in the Pauline 
 eschatology arises chiefly from the fact that the 
 apostle himself, as Professor Stevens says, does 
 not appear to have organized them into a con- 
 sistent system. We find decided traces of the old 
 Pharisaical theories along with the conception of 
 mystical unity with Christ so constantly empha- 
 sized in the gospels. The two things do not har- 
 monize precisely, and Paul does not appear to 
 have tried to work them up into an orderly system. 
 Like most men who are concerned primarily with 
 practical problems, he refused to allow his interest 
 in the main issues before him to be lessened by 
 apparent inconsistencies in certain strands of his 
 thinking. Beyond any doubt, the later mystical 
 and vital union with Christ to which he refers so 
 often in his writings took the place of his earlier 
 Pharisaical views without, however, entirely sup- 
 planting them. It is in this way, too, that we must 
 understand many of his references to predestina- 
 tion. It was the misfortune of the Middle Age 
 theologians and of most of their Protestant suc- 
 
34 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 cessors that they stressed the accidental and earlier 
 threads in the Pauline theology to the exclusion 
 of the later and more vital conceptions of the 
 Apostle. 
 
 Paul’s teaching concerning the resurrection and 
 its value as evidence of the reality of the future 
 life occupies a position midway between his earlier 
 and later points of view. In its logical and scien- 
 tific aspects, it bears affinity to the earlier Greek 
 and Hebrew viewpoint. On the other hand, it is 
 linked directly to the Johannine thought of eternal 
 life through direct and complete unity with Christ. 
 Because Christ has been raised from the dead, 
 those who are Christ’s followers shall also be 
 raised with him. The case throughout, as Pro- 
 fessor Stevens has taken pains to emphasize, is 
 based upon the mystical rather than the universal 
 concept of the resurrection. It ig indeed some- 
 what difficult to reconcile the argument with the 
 Greek theory of the inherent immortality of the 
 soul. On the basis of the latter hypothesis, it 
 would scarcely seem necessary to go to such ex- 
 tremes as Paul does in order to prove the resurrec- 
 tion from the dead. 
 
 In the light of present conditions, it seems some- 
 what unfortunate that theology as a whole should 
 have placed such exclusive emphasis upon the 
 Graeco-Pharisaic side of the Pauline eschatology. 
 The influences which led to this development, how- 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE TEACHING OF PAUL 30 
 
 ever, appear simple enough in the light of historic 
 investigation. In order to understand the prob- 
 lems which confront us today in this particular 
 field, it is necessary that we should next review 
 the circumstances which produced what is usually 
 termed the orthodox Christian view of immortality. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. G. B. Stevens, The Theology of the New Testament, Part 
 IV, Chapter XII. 
 
 2. G. B. Stevens, The Pauline Theology, Chapter XIII. 
 
 3. J. Y. Simpson, Man and the Attainment of Immortality, 
 Chapter XITT. 
 
CHAPTER IIT 
 
 THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF 
 IMMORTALITY 
 
 HERE is a certain parallel between the early 
 
 Hebrew and the early Greek views of immor- 
 tality. Whether this fact arose as the result of a 
 common source or whether it represents merely a 
 natural coincidence need not at this time concern us. 
 There were points of contact between the Greeks 
 and the Hebrews, as the early Christian apologists 
 were fond of emphasizing, and it may well be that 
 a common tradition lay back of their concepts of 
 the future life. The Hebrew Sheol and the Greek 
 Hades as the latter term is used in Homer and 
 Hesiod are practically identical. In both instances, 
 there appears to have been a primitive and 
 shadowy belief in the survival of the soul. Over 
 this twilight territory, in early Jewish thinking, 
 Jehovah had no control. Hezekiah, for example, 
 in returning thanks for his recovery uses the ex- 
 pressive language, ‘‘Sheol cannot praise thee, 
 death cannot celebrate thee, they that go down in- 
 to the pit cannot hope for thy truth.’’ Such ref- 
 erences are rather numerous in the Old Testa- 
 ment writings. The uncertain and hazy picture of 
 
 36 
 
THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY 37 
 
 the future life which they give led naturally to 
 the dual development of Sadducaie and Pharisaic 
 theology. The one proceeded to a definite and con- 
 crete belief in personal immortality, while the other 
 denied the after life altogether. This develop- 
 ment, however, came rather late in the history of 
 the Hebrew people. 
 
 Among the Greeks, Hades, like Sheol, was at 
 first merely the land of shades. Homer draws a 
 vivid picture of this uncertain and undesirable 
 state in the eleventh book of the Odyssey: ‘‘ Rather 
 would I live on ground as the hireling of another, 
 than to bear sway among all the dead that are 
 departed.’’ The picture which we gather from 
 the Iliad is similarly depressing. The very open- 
 ing lines of the poem refer to ‘‘Pluto’s gloomy 
 reign’’ and this coloring is maintained throughout 
 the pages of the epic. In substance, we are given 
 to understand that we know very little about Hades 
 and what we do know is unattractive. 
 
 The development of the Greek idea of immor- 
 tality appears to have started from the post- 
 Homeric cult of Dionysus which inspired the 
 Greek mysteries and which was responsible for the 
 beginning of Greek tragedy as well as of all that 
 was vital in Greek theology. In the Dionysian 
 rites, the union of the worshiper with his Deity 
 is constantly emphasized. It is this union which 
 constituted the basic teaching of the Orphic reli- 
 
‘ 
 
 38 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 gious brotherhoods which became such tremendous 
 factors in Greek history and life. We do not of 
 course possess full information as to the mysteries 
 but there seems to be no doubt that the essential 
 principle involved in their multiform rites and 
 ceremonies was that of communion in the most 
 direct fashion with the Deity. They also taught 
 the idea of regeneration and cleansing from sin, 
 in part by means of ceremonial observances. 
 Gradually the Orphic teachers elaborated a scheme 
 of rewards and punishments in the other world 
 quite analogous to the eschatological system of 
 Mediaeval Christianity. Plato in the Republic 
 denounces in the strongest language the abuses of 
 the quacks and soothsayers of his day who crowd 
 around rich men’s doors and play upon their 
 superstitions by saying: 
 
 They have a divine power which enables them through sacrifices 
 and ineantations to atone for any sin whether committed by the 
 man himself or by his ancestors, and further that if he should de- 
 sire to work injury to anyone this can be arranged for at trifling 
 expense, whether the object of his hostility be a just or an unjust 
 man, for they profess that by certain spells and enchantments they 
 can prevail upon the gods to do their bidding. 
 
 Obviously such practices point to a very highly 
 elaborated eschatological system. They have a 
 certain modern ring about them in the light of 
 Martin Luther’s experiences at the time of the 
 Protestant Reformation. 
 
THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY 39 
 
 Just how far the Dionysiae cults paved the way 
 for the later Greek doctrine of immortality is 
 somewhat difficult to say. Doctor Farnell in his 
 volume entitled, Greek Hero Cults and Ideas of 
 Immortality advocates the view that their influ- 
 ence was basic and profound. He thinks that their 
 gospel of the salvation of the individual and their 
 dogmas of future retribution and sacramental re- 
 demption were of the most vital importance in the 
 later development of religion. There appears to 
 be no question that Pythagoras and his school were 
 related to the Orphic movement, although there 
 was a tendency at one time to cast some doubt up- 
 on their affinity. Later investigation tends to 
 make the relationship clearer. In hke manner, 
 Plato seems to have derived at least some of 
 his views from the Orphics. It is true that he 
 eriticizes the cults rather unsparingly and yet 
 many of his ideas are identical with their teach- 
 ings. In almost all of the passages in his Dia- 
 logues where he expounds the doctrine of immor- 
 tality, he uses Orphie formulations and imagery. 
 As a consequence not a few Platonic interpreters 
 derive his teachings concerning the future life from 
 the influence of the Mystery religions. 
 
 On the other hand, the central feature in Plato’s 
 doctrine of immortality is essentially opposed to 
 the Orphie viewpoint. The guarantee of future 
 existence afforded by the Mysteries consisted in the 
 
40 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 union of the worshiper with the Deity and with- 
 out such union no continued existence could be 
 predicated. In other words, the soul could become 
 immortal as the result of certain definite condi- 
 tions or processes, but possessed in itself no prom- 
 ise of eternal life. Now this is precisely the op- 
 posite of the Platonic doctrine. Immortality to 
 the great Greek philosopher was inherent in the 
 nature of the soul and could not be taken from 
 it or destroyed. He says in the Laws: 
 
 When we are dead, the bodies of the dead are justly said to be 
 our shades or images, for the true and immortal being of each one 
 of us, which is called the soul, goes on her way to other gods, that 
 before them she may give an account. 
 
 The Laws probably contains Plato’s final word 
 on the subject, but the statement we have quoted 
 is fairly representative of his thinking throughout 
 his life. The chief argument for immortality 
 which he advances in the Phaedo is that of the 
 simple substantiality of the soul by virtue of which 
 it is necessarily indestructible and on this account 
 must remain untouched by death. Jowett, who 
 ranks as the Greek philosopher’s most sympathetic 
 and penetrating interpreter, at least during mo- 
 dern times, sums up the situation in these words: 
 
 If we ask what is that truth or principle which, towards the end 
 of his life, seems to have absorbed Plato most, like the idea of good 
 in the Republic, or of beauty in the Symposiwm, or of the unity of 
 virtue in the Protagoras, we should answer, the priority of the soul 
 to the body. 
 
THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY 41 
 
 Plato, of course, believed in pre-existence and 
 in an intermediate state of rewards and purgatorial 
 punishments after death. In the Phaedrus, he 
 works out an eschatological scheme which provides 
 for the return of souls to earth somewhat along 
 the lines of the Hindu religions. Absolutely hope- 
 less individuals are cast down to Tartarus much 
 after the manner in which Mediaeval theology con- 
 demned those dying in mortal sin to the Inferno. 
 Those, however, who died without being com- 
 pletely purified were obliged to return to earth for 
 eycles of from three to ten thousand years. After 
 being purified as a result of repeated experiences 
 of good and evil in the material world, they passed 
 on to Elysium. As to the nature of the soul it- 
 self, he ‘says, ‘‘The soul is immortal because its 
 very idea and essence is the self-moved or self- 
 moving, that which is the fountain and beginning 
 of motion to all that moves besides. A body which 
 is moved from without is soulless, but that which 
 is moved from within has a soul.”’ 
 
 Plato’s teaching involved a distinct dualism be- 
 tween mind and matter which was productive of 
 the most important consequences in later think- 
 ing. Throughout his philosophy runs the contrast 
 between the real world, the world of Ideas and 
 the quasi-real world of everyday existence. The 
 human soul occupied a species of intermediate 
 position between these two worlds, having definite 
 
49 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 connections with both of them. The well-known 
 figure of the Charioteer illustrates the difficult re- 
 lationship involved in this situation. By virtue 
 of his higher kinship, man is a partaker of immor- 
 tality, but it is possible for him to be dragged 
 down to a lower level as a result of his material 
 environment. Hence it becomes necessary to mor- 
 tify the body in order that the soul may live ‘and 
 erow. Out of this fundamental dualism arose most 
 of the ascetic practices of the Christian and other 
 later religions. 
 
 The arguments by which Plato sustained his be- 
 lief in personal immortality are peculiarly unsatis- 
 fying to the modern mind. He places much re- 
 lianee upon the doctrine of pre-existence, a theory 
 which modern psychology has practically elimi- 
 nated. He also emphasizes the argument from the 
 necessity of opposites. In other words, if we have 
 death, we must have life, and vice versa. It is 
 quite easy to see that this argument proves too 
 much. As Pringle-Pattison says, ‘‘It would be 
 possible to prove on the same principles a per- 
 petual alternation between drunk and sober.’’ The 
 doctrine of the unity of the soul as a simple and 
 therefore indestructible substance has survived 
 longer than the other proofs and still holds its 
 place in the writings of a few philosophers. Never- 
 theless, like so many other proofs, it is of value 
 chiefly for those who already believe what is to 
 
THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY 433 
 
 be proved. If one is convineed for any reason that 
 the soul is simple and indivisible, of course it is 
 easy for him to accept the idea that it will persist 
 after death, but if he accepts the prevailing psy- 
 chological definition of the ego, no such conclusion 
 will result. There appears to be some question 
 as to whether Plato regarded immortality as a 
 characteristic of all souls alike or only as apper- 
 taining to the higher rational faculties. In other 
 words, through the higher reason we become 
 citizens of the world of Ideas and therefore enter 
 into its heritage of immortality. If, however, we 
 sacrifice our birthright by failing to maintain com- 
 munion with this higher reality it would seem that 
 our divine inheritance would disappear. At this 
 point, we come nearer to the Orphie view of con- 
 ditional immortality. As a matter of fact, in 
 Platonic as in Christian thinking, the two threads 
 are frequently interwoven and it is sometimes dif- 
 ficult to separate them. 
 
 Aristotle approached the subject under discus- 
 sion from the point of view of the scientist rather 
 than the philosopher. Starting with what he calls 
 the nutritive or vegetative soul, he adds, in an 
 ascending seale, the sensitive soul belonging to the 
 lower animals and, at the apex, the rational soul 
 which is the peculiar distinction of man. Each 
 of these stages develops from the one immediately 
 preceding it and retains the characteristics which 
 
44 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 it inherits. It is in this connection that the 
 philosopher emphasizes his fundamental distinc- 
 tion between the potential and the actual or be- 
 tween the formal and the material elements in 
 reality. The earlier stages of life contain the 
 higher stage potentially but not actually. The soul 
 thus evolves out of the body, or as Aristotle him- 
 self puts it, is ‘‘the functioning of the body at its 
 highest level.’? In this theory of progressive de- 
 velopment, Aristotle escapes from the dualism of 
 Plato and anticipates much of our modern think- 
 ing upon the subject. It does not require a great 
 deal of imagination to deduce the Bergsonian 
 theory of creative evolution from the Aristotelian 
 position. The soul evolves out of the body in- 
 stead of the body being the mere shadow of the 
 soul. 
 
 We have dealt in the most sketchy and outline 
 fashion with the profound questions involved in 
 this chapter. Nevertheless, we trust that the es- 
 sential contribution of Greek thought to the prob- 
 lem of immortality has been made sufficiently clear. 
 The immense significance of this contribution im 
 the development of Christian dogma deserves more 
 detailed treatment at our hands. In a very real 
 sense it is quite impossible to understand Chris- 
 tian theology without an adequate acquaintance 
 with its background of Greek philosophy. From 
 Athanasius and Augustine to Calvin and Ritschl 
 the leaders of Christian thought knew their Plato 
 
THE GREEK CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY 45 
 
 and knew it well. During the Middle Ages, espe- 
 cially, Plato and Aristotle were the chief inspirers 
 of theological speculation. The orthodox dogma 
 of immortality, while fundamentally derived from 
 the New Testament, received much coloring and 
 support from the thinkers of Hellas. We must 
 turn now to consider the nature and extent of this 
 influence. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality. Lectures II. 
 III, and IV. 
 
 2. Farnell, Greek Hero Cults and Ideas of Immortality. Chap- 
 ter XIT. 
 
 3. Homer, Iliad, Book I. 
 
 4, Homer, Odyssey, Book XI. 
 
 5. Plato, Dialogues (Jowett translation) Phaedo, Phaedrus, 
 Timaeus, Symposium. | 
 
 6. Plato, The Republic (Jowett) Introduction, Books VI and X. 
 
 7. Plato, The Laws (Jowett) Introduction, Books I and IV. 
 
 8. Aristotle, de Anima. Books I, II, and III. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 THE INFLUENCE OF GREEK THOUGHT 
 
 UPON THE CHRISTIAN DOGMA OF 
 IMMORTALITY 
 
 HERE is a famous passage in the eighteenth 
 
 book of The City of God in which St. Augustine 
 bears witness to his high regard and affection for 
 Plato. He says: 
 
 Some of us liking and loving Plato for a certain eloquent and 
 excellent kind of speaking and because his opinion has been true 
 in some things, say that he thought something like unto that which 
 we do, concerning the resurrection of the dead, which thing Tully 
 so touches in his De Republica that he affirms that he rather spake 
 in sport, than that he had any intent to relate it, as a matter of 
 truth. For he declares a man revived, and related some things 
 agreeable to Plato’s disputations. Labeo also says that there were 
 two which died both in one day, and that they met together in a 
 crossway, and that afterward they were commanded to return again 
 to their bodies, and then that they decreed to live in perpetual love 
 together, and that it was so until they died afterward. 
 
 Augustine then goes on to cite other instances 
 from pagan writers which prove the resurrection 
 of the body and refers them to the followers of 
 Plato and Porphyry as evidence that the Christian 
 position is true. The passage is only one out of 
 many in the works of the great Christian theologian 
 which show his thorough esteem for the writings 
 of the Athenian philosopher. Augustine in fact 
 
 46 
 
GREEK THOUGHT AND IMMORTALITY 47 
 
 owed his conversion to Christianity largely to 
 Plato. The connecting lnk between his Mani- 
 ehaean experience and his later orthodox Catholi- 
 cism was furnished by Plato and Plotinus. By 
 means of the neo-Platonic monism he was delivered 
 from the dualistic scheme of Manes and was pre- 
 pared intellectually for the acceptance of the Chris- 
 tian dogma. It was only natural that he should 
 have earried over into Christianity much of the 
 Platonic philosophy. In fact, Augustinianism 
 which exerted such profound influence upon later 
 theology is fundamentally a compound of Paulin- 
 ism and Platonism with sundry other subsidiary 
 features derived in part from the personal experi- 
 ence of the great thinker and from the historical 
 circumstances of the age in which he lived.” 
 
 Augustine did not of course entirely agree with 
 Plato. Wherever there appears to him to be a real 
 conflict between the Athenian teacher and the words 
 of Holy Writ, the latter have the right of way. 
 Even in such instances, however, he expresses his 
 regret and as far as possible tones down the con- 
 tradiction. The essential features of the Augus- 
 tinian doctrine of immortality, which later came 
 to be the accepted viewpoint of the church as a 
 whole, may be summarized after the following 
 fashion: First, God is the creator of all souls, 
 good and bad alike; second, dependent upon the 
 will of God, all souls are inherently immortal; 
 
48 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 third, there will be a resurrection of the bodies 
 which have perished as a result of death, these 
 bodies rejoining the souls which formerly inhabited 
 them and receiving after the general judgment 
 elther eternal bliss or eternal punishment in ac- 
 cordance with their deeds upon earth and with the 
 will of God. In support of these contentions, 
 Augustine cites certain proof-texts from the New 
 Testament and appeals to their infallibility in the 
 same way that the advocates of verbal inspiration 
 have always done throughout the centuries. He 
 refers to the Resurrection and to other miracles as 
 evidence of the future life, but his main line of argu- 
 ment is based upon his theory of the nature of God 
 and of the essential relations existing between God 
 and man. For example, his argument against the 
 Platonists’ position that it is impossible that a 
 material body can be taken up into heaven is based 
 entirely upon the omnipotence of God: 
 
 Why then cannot God that made this creature, transport an 
 earthly body into heaven, as well as he can bring a soul (a purer 
 essence than any celestial body) down from heaven and inclose it 
 in a form of earth? Can this little piece of earth include so excel- 
 lent a nature in it, and live by it, and cannot heaven entertain it, 
 
 nor keep it in it, seeing that it lives by an essence more excellent 
 than heaven itself! 
 
 From the Augustinian point of view, there is 
 literally nothing impossible to the Divine Nature. 
 Souls will live hereafter because God go wills it 
 and has so created human spirits. Moreover, our 
 
GREEK THOUGHT AND IMMORTALITY 49 
 
 material bodies will be resurrected and will live 
 in heaven. (Here Augustine disagrees with Plato 
 and with the Platonic school generally.) Further- 
 more, the fires of hell are of such a character that 
 they will consume these material bodies eternally 
 and in such fashion that they will never become 
 insensible: 
 
 Wherefore though our flesh now be such that it cannot suffer all 
 pain, without dying, yet then shall it become of another nature, as 
 death also then shall be of another nature for the death then shall 
 be eternal, and the soul that suffers it shall neither be able to live, 
 having lost her God, her only life, nor yet to avoid torment, having 
 lost all means of death. The first death forces her from the body 
 
 against her will, and the second holds her in the body against her 
 will. 
 
 He then goes on to cite the case of the salaman- 
 der which, ‘‘as the most exact naturalists record,’’ 
 lives in fire, and also of certain hills in Sicily that 
 have been on fire continually ‘‘from beyond the 
 memory of man, and yet remain whole and uncon- 
 sumed’’ as sufficient proofs that it is possible for 
 bodies to remain undiminished in fire. Further- 
 more, the incorporeal devils who do not have bodies 
 like human beings will also suffer the torments of 
 perdition throughout eternity. In Chapter Ten of 
 the seventeenth book of The City of God, he pre- 
 sents his argument for this position: 
 
 But that hell, that lake of fire and brimstone, shall be real, and 
 
 the fire corporeal, burning both men and devils, the one in flesh and 
 the other in air: the one in the body adherent to the spirit, and 
 
50 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the other in the spirit only adherent to the fire, and yet not infus- 
 ing life, but feeling torment, for one fire shall torment both men 
 and devils. Christ has spoken it. 
 
 It would be tedious, and we think unnecessary, 
 to quote further from Augustine with regard to 
 the question of immortality. It is obvious through- 
 out his writings that he believed his theology to be 
 derived entirely from the Scriptures and yet any 
 careful student of his life cannot but realize that 
 the unconscious influence of Platonism and of 
 Greek thought generally were the guiding prin- 
 ciples in his exegesis. The eternal substance of 
 the soul, the impossibility of dissolving or destroy- 
 ing it, the stern schedule of rewards and punish- 
 ments, these things all come fundamentally by way 
 of Hellas. Dante, who reflects Augustine, or at 
 least the Augustinian eschatology with extraor- 
 dinary fidelity, turns to the Greek Tartarus di- 
 rectly for material for his Inferno. Obviously, the 
 final teaching of the church during the Mediaeval 
 period was derived, as Loisy frankly admits, from 
 a synthesis of many divergent elements, but there 
 was no characteristic more important than the con- 
 tribution made by the great Greek philosophers. 
 
 The early Christian fathers beginning with 
 Clement of Alexandria did not agree with Augus- 
 tine at all points concerning the future life. 
 Origen, for example, accepted the doctrine of res- 
 titution and of ultimate universal restoration. 
 Jerome in all probability held similar views. Even 
 
GREEK THOUGHT AND IMMORTALITY 51 
 
 in these instances, however, the Platonic influence 
 is no less marked than it is in Augustine. Clement 
 of Alexandria in particular was a disciple and ad- 
 mirer of the Athenian philosopher and held that 
 he was in all essential respects a Christian. The 
 influence of neo-Platonism upon the Alexandrian 
 school has been frequently emphasized. As many 
 recent authorities have pointed out, there is much 
 in the system of Plotinus which passed over into 
 Christian theology. We are concerned here only 
 with the subject of immortality, but in this par- 
 ticular field no less than in others the indebtedness 
 of Christian dogma to both the earlier and the 
 later Greek thinkers is extensive and profound. 
 For many centuries after the period of the gen- 
 eral councils, as Canon Farrar puts it, ‘‘the dark 
 shadow of Augustine’’ was thrown so powerfully 
 over the current theology that there was little ques- 
 tion about the endlessness of torment or of any 
 of the other sombre eschatological features in the 
 writings of the great Bishop of Hippo. In process 
 of time, the stern rigidity of the Augustinian teach- 
 ing became intolerable for even the Mediaeval con- 
 science and as a result the doctrine of purgatory 
 was evoked to soften it. Scotus Hrigena, it should 
 be said, in the period between Augustine and An- 
 selm appears to have approached the early Johan- 
 nine conception of the future life more nearly than 
 the orthodox theologians but there is some ques- 
 tion as to whether he did not pass over into real 
 
52 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Pantheism. While the church generally accepted 
 the doctrine of purgatory, it held also to the old 
 Augustinian views of the eternal torment of the 
 impenitent and of the eternal happiness of the 
 redeemed. The earlier teachings concerning a 
 final judgment and the eschatological situation 
 in general were accepted as commonplaces of reli- 
 gion. The Mediaeval mind was essentially other- 
 worldly and ascetic in its temper. The life beyond 
 to most adherents of the church was more real 
 than the present existence. Every day on earth 
 was lived, so to speak, in the presence of the here- 
 after and life itself was regarded in the light of a 
 gloomy pilgrimage to the highlands of eternity. 
 It is scarcely to be questioned that the conviction 
 of personal immortality was more pronounced and 
 more unhesitating during the Mediaeval era than at 
 any other time in the history of the world. 
 Heaven and hell were supreme realities, and no 
 earthly assize could be more certain or inescapable 
 than the great final judgment which Michel- 
 angelo has pictured on the wall of the Sistine 
 Chapel. Doubtless there were a few skeptics even 
 during these days, but they were uninfluential and 
 for the most part unknown. In the current state 
 of mind of both rulers and people, it was not 
 wholesome to entertain or to express doubts con- 
 cerning any of these important matters. A gen- 
 eration which accepted with literal exactness the 
 
GREEK THOUGHT AND IMMORTALITY Oo 
 
 gruesome details of the hell of Dante and Augus- 
 tine was not squeamish about the infliction of 
 punishments in this material world. No offense 
 against the moral law was looked upon as more 
 serious than theological heresy. Under the cir- 
 cumstances, people who had doubts preferred to 
 keep them to themselves or put them aside as sim- 
 ply suggestions of the devil with a view to the 
 eternal destruction of their souls. 
 
 In the finely spun and almost interminable dis- 
 cussions of the Schoolmen, covering as it would 
 seem almost everything in the world or out of it, 
 there is no essential difference concerning the doc- 
 trine of the future life. From Anselm to Occam, 
 all of them were agreed as concerning the im- 
 mortality of the soul and the general schedule of 
 future rewards and punishments. St. Anselm in 
 the seventy-second chapter of the Monologium has 
 admirably summed up the thought of the period 
 in the words, ‘‘Every human soul is immortal. 
 And it is either forever miserable, or at some time 
 purely blessed.’’ 
 
 In the discussion of this proposition, which 
 serves as the theme of the chapter, Anselm proves 
 that even the souls of infants are immortal be- 
 cause all human spirits are of the same nature and 
 since the redeemed are eternally blessed, there- 
 fore the characteristic of immortality must ap- 
 pertain to all. To quote his own language: 
 
o4+ HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 But undoubtedly all human souls are of the same nature. Hence, 
 since it is established that some are immortal, every human soul 
 must be immortal. But since every living being is either never, or 
 at some time, truly secure from all trouble, necessarily also, every 
 human soul is either ever miserable, or at some time truly blessed. 
 
 With the rediscovery of Plato and Aristotle in 
 the original, scholasticism became more pro- 
 nouncedly Hellenistic than before. The Platonic 
 ideas furnished the basis of the philosophy of 
 Realism while Nominalism drew its inspiration 
 from the principles of Aristotle. Practically every 
 Mediaeval theologian was either a Platonist or an 
 Aristotelian or a combination of the two. Marsilio 
 Ficino was not the only student of his age who 
 kept a votive lamp burning continually before the 
 bust of Plato, nor was Mirandola the only devout 
 Catholic who, as Streeter says, ‘‘devoted all his 
 passionate power to the reconciliation of Platon- 
 ism and Christianity.’’ Humanism itself was sim- 
 ply an illustration of the preponderance of the 
 classical influence over its Christian setting. The 
 Schoolmen proper did not go so far, but the sub- 
 conscious influence of the great classical philoso- 
 phers upon their lives was none the less extensive 
 and profound. The Greek concept of immortality 
 passed into Christian thought and became an 
 integral part of the orthodox Christian eschat- 
 
 ology. 
 
or 
 
 GREEK THOUGHT AND IMMORTALITY t 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. St. Augustine, The City of God. Books XVII and XVIII. 
 
 . Dante, The Divine Comedy, The Inferno. 
 
 . Workman, Christian Thought to the Reformation, Chapter IT. 
 F. W. Farrar, The Eternal Hope, Sermon ITI. 
 
 . St. Anselm, Monologium, Chapter XXIT. 
 
 . A. Streeter, Monograph on Botticelli, Chapter I. 
 
 > Of oo bo 
 
CHAPTER V 
 IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS 
 
 HE statements concerning the future life 
 ‘ which are found in the Ecumenical creeds are 
 plain and simple assertions of the commonly ac- 
 . cepted thinking upon the subject. The general 
 judgment, the second coming of Christ, the life 
 everlasting, the resurrection of the body (the lat- 
 ter term interpreted in various ways), and other 
 somewhat general expressions make up the sub- 
 stance of the eschatological material. It must be 
 said that there is room for considerable difference 
 of opinion as to the implications of some of these 
 ereedal provisions. There is little reason to doubt 
 that those who formulated these standards of faith 
 * held to the prevailing views of the inherent im- 
 mortality of the soul and the Graeco-Christian 
 position in general. At the same time, the more 
 distinctly mystical interpretation of eternal life 
 ~ undoubtedly found a place in the thought of 
 not a few of these early theologians. Perhaps this 
 interpretation was more often unconscious than 
 conscious, but in any event it blossoms forth in the 
 pages of their writings at times under the most 
 unexpected circumstances. 
 
 56 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS sf! 
 
 With the dawn of the reformation, the Mediaeval 
 doctrine of immortality held full sway through- 
 out the church. Protestantism for the most part 
 went back of the scholastics to Augustine and to 
 Paul, the latter interpreted always in the light of 
 the teachings of the former. There were certain 
 eschatological details concerning which the new 
 movement as a whole diverged widely from 
 the Roman Catholic viewpoint. The doctrine of 
 indulgences which furnished the immediate occa- 
 sion of Martin Luther’s rebellion constituted one 
 of these points of difference. The dogma of pur- 
 gatory in general speedily came under the Prot- 
 estant ban and was universally rejected by the 
 reformers. Augustine knows nothing of purga- 
 tory and Calvin and Luther as we have seen went 
 back directly to Augustine. As a consequence, 
 the teaching of current Protestant theology con- 
 cerning the future life was harsher, more sombre, 
 and more antithetical to our modern standards 
 than was the parallel doctrine of Roman Catholi- 
 cism. Aquinas toned down the rigors of the 
 Augustinian Inferno and the Roman Catholics ac- 
 cepted this modified position while the Protes- 
 tants reverted to the most extreme forms of the 
 earlier eschatology. Calvin’s hell is if anything 
 worse than Augustine’s, and Protestantism almost 
 without exception followed Calvin in his views of 
 the subject. The culmination of this morbid es- 
 chatology is found in the sermons of Jonathan 
 
58 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Edwards which have become classics in this partic- 
 ular field. Canon Farrar quotes as an illustration 
 of Edwards’ teaching this passage from his ser- 
 mon entitled ‘‘Sinners in the Hands of an Angry 
 Bea Ls Pee 
 
 The God that holds you over the pit of hell much in the same 
 way as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, 
 abhors you and is dreadfully provoked 
 
 and inquires whether this is to be regarded as 
 orthodox teaching or not. He also quotes from 
 the contemporary discourses of Mr. Charles H. 
 Spurgeon to the following effect: 
 
 Thou wilt look up there on the throne of God, and it shall be 
 written, ‘‘Forever.’’ When the damned jingle the burning irons of 
 their torment they shall say, ‘‘Forever!’’ When they howl, Echo 
 eries, ‘‘ Forever! ’’ 
 
 ‘¢ Forever’? is written on their racks, 
 ‘<FWorever’’ on their chains, 
 ‘“Forever’’ burneth in the fire, 
 ‘¢Forever,’’ ever reigns. 
 
 In the commentaries of Adam Clarke, Matthew 
 Henry, and other authoritative Protestant inter- 
 preters, we find expressions very similar to those 
 used by Edwards and Spurgeon. Clarke espe- 
 cially appears to take delight in harrowing the feel- 
 ings of his readers by the most elaborate com- 
 ments upon the Scriptural passages which refer 
 to the undying worm and the unquenchable fire. 
 This type of exegesis was practically universal 
 
~ 
 
 IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS 59 
 
 on the part of Protestant evangelists and the 
 clergy in general. Even in our own age the ser- 
 mons of many evangelists are saturated with it. 
 During the last half century, the pulpit as a whole, 
 as Canon Gore so aptly says, has discarded the 
 doctrine, but there has been no serious attempt to 
 revise creedal standards in the interest of the new 
 interpretation. 
 
 The Roman Catholic eschatology is given in 
 authoritative fashion in the decrees of the Council 
 of Trent. In this historic document, the doctrines 
 of purgatory, indulgences, and the future state in 
 general are expressed, for the most part, in har- 
 mony with the views of Aquinas and his contem- 
 poraries. In Session VI, Canon 30, we find the 
 following statement: 
 
 If any one saith, that after the grace of Justification has been 
 received, to every penitent sinner, the guilt is remitted and the 
 debt of eternal punishment is blotted out in such wise that there 
 remains not any debt of temporal punishment to be discharged 
 either in this world, or in the next in Purgatory, before the en- 
 
 trance to the kingdom of heaven can be opened: let him be 
 anathema. 
 
 In the main, Roman Catholicism has adhered 
 more rigidly to the dogma of personal immortality 
 so far as clerical teaching is concerned than has 
 been true of current Protestantism. The voice of 
 the church, with the exception of a few modernists, 
 has been unanimous in support of the orthodox 
 doctrine of personal survival. Whether the bulk 
 
 ~ 
 
60 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 of the laity has escaped the contagion of doubt 
 upon the subject which has swept over the world 
 during the last half century it is difficult to say. 
 To a much larger degree than is true of the aver- 
 age Protestant, the devout Catholic entrusts his 
 religious thinking. to his ecclesiastical superiors. 
 On this account, belief in the future life is probably 
 more general on the part of the Roman Catholic 
 masses than is true of Protestantism. This is not 
 because the doctrinal standards of the latter 
 diverge at this point from those of the older 
 church, but simply because they have less prac- 
 tical weight in the thought life of their adherents. 
 
 The teaching of the Reformed churches is quite 
 specific upon the question. In Martin Luther’s 
 Shorter Catechism, it is distinctly taught that the 
 general judgment includes all human beings and 
 that the righteous are to live forever in bliss and 
 the wicked in eternal torment. The resurrection 
 of the material body of Christ is directly asserted 
 and is indicated as a type of our own resurrection. 
 The Heidelberg Catechism says specifically in an- 
 swer to the question, ‘‘What comfort does the 
 resurrection of the body give you?”’ 
 
 That not only my soul, upon the leaving this life, shall be imme- 
 diately carried up to heaven, to be united with Jesus Christ its 
 Head, but that my body, being also raised again by the power of 
 that Divine Redeemer, shall be reunited to my soul, and rendered 
 conformable to the glorious body of Jesus Christ. 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS 61 
 
 It is interesting to note in this connection that 
 the Heidelberg formula approximates more nearly 
 to the Johannine conception of eternal life than is 
 true of most other pronouncements of the period. 
 In answer to the question, ‘‘ And what consolation 
 do you receive from the article of eternal life?’’ 
 the catechism says, 
 
 That as at present I perceive in my heart a beginning of eternal 
 glory, I shall likewise after this life enjoy that perfect happiness 
 which the eye has not seen or ear heard, and which never entered 
 into the heart of man to conceive, by praising God through all 
 eternity. 
 
 The Shorter Westminster Catechism asserts 
 the Augustinian eschatology practically without 
 modification. Lightfoot in his interpretation of 
 the Thirty-nine Articles somewhat modifies the 
 ordinary meaning of Article ITV which deals with 
 the resurrection of Christ but asserts that it clearly 
 teaches a ‘‘belief in the continued life of the spirit, 
 when, after the body dies, it returns to that in- 
 visible world by which the visible world which we 
 inhabit is so mysteriously surrounded.’’ 
 
 Hagenbach in his History of Christian Doctrine 
 sums up the matter, we think very correctly, in 
 the following words upon the eschatology of the 
 Reformation period: 
 
 And, lastly, Protestants and Roman Catholics were in almost per- 
 fect accordance as to the doctrine of the last things (with the ex- 
 
 ception of the doctrine concerning purgatory). The minor sects 
 also adopted, in the main, the same views respecting the second 
 
62 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 advent of Christ to judge the world, and the resurrection of the 
 body. As regards the state of the blessed and the lost, the opin- 
 ions of the different denominations were modified in various ways 
 by their respective creeds, but these differences were not introduced 
 into the symbolical books. 
 
 The creedal confessions of orthodox Christen- 
 dom remain of course today precisely what they 
 were at the time of the Reformation. In actual 
 practice, however, among the Protestant churches, 
 the interpretations which the vast majority of both 
 the clergy and the laity attach to these historic 
 symbols diverge widely from those which were 
 commonly accepted when the creeds were written. 
 This changed point of view has largely come about 
 as a result of the scientific progress of the last 
 half century. The situation has been admirably 
 outlined by Bishop Gore in his recent volume en- 
 titled Belief in God. In discussing ‘‘The Break- 
 down of Tradition’’ at the very beginning of the 
 book, he refers to the prevailing note of the day 
 with regard to the older standards of the chureh 
 as one ‘‘of uncertainty and even bewilderment.”’ 
 This uncertainty and bewilderment apply espe- 
 cially to the problem of immortality. The reac- 
 tion from the extreme Calvinistic view concern- 
 ing the future life and especially future punish- 
 ment is now in full swing. However we may ac- 
 count for the fact, no careful observer of the pres- 
 ent religious situation can dispute the correctness 
 of the above statement. 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS 63 
 
 The extent to which Protestant views in the field 
 of eschatology have really changed is admirably 
 illustrated in the brief outline of the Reformed 
 faith given as an introduction to The Presbyterian 
 Handbook for 1923. Comparing the statements 
 contained in this summary of present day Cal- 
 vinism with the doctrine of Augustine and the 
 Protestant theologians who imitated him so faith- 
 fully, one is conscious of the widest divergence. 
 The rigid predestination of the older thinkers is 
 softened down to the following comparatively in- 
 nocuous declaration: 
 
 We believe that God, from the beginning, in His own good 
 pleasure, gave to His Son a people, an innumerable multitude, 
 chosen in Christ, unto holiness, service, and salvation, we believe 
 that all who come to years of discretion can receive this salvation 
 only through faith and repentance; and we believe that all who die 
 in infancy, and all others given by the Father to the Son who are 
 beyond the reach of the outward means of grace are regenerated 
 and saved by Christ through the Spirit, who works when and where 
 and how He pleases. 
 
 In the section entitled ‘‘Of the Resurrection and 
 the Life to Come,’’ we find this declaration: 
 
 We believe that in the life to come the spirits of the just, at 
 death made free from sin, enjoy immediate communion with God 
 and the vision of His glory; and we confidently look for the gen- 
 eral resurrection in the last day, when the bodies of those who 
 sleep in Christ shall be fashioned in the likeness of the glorious 
 body of their Lord, with whom they shall live and reign forever. 
 
Ded 
 
 ran 
 
 64. HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 One cannot help wondering what Jonathan Ed- 
 wards or even John Calvin himself would say con- 
 cerning the section entitled ‘‘Of the Last Judg- 
 ment.’’ It runs as follows: 
 
 We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ will come again in glori- 
 ous majesty to judge the world and to make a final separation be- 
 tween the righteous and the wicked. The wicked shall receive the 
 eternal award of their sins, and the Lord will manifest the glory 
 of His mercy in the salvation of His people and their entrance 
 upon the full enjoyment of eternal life. 
 
 The three sections above quoted contain prac- 
 tically everything which has to do with the field 
 of eschatology. It will be readily observed that we 
 have traversed a great distance in these carefully 
 guarded pronouncements from the stern and clear- 
 cut interpretations of the centuries past. There is 
 practically nothing said about hell, about the in- 
 herent immortality of the human spirit or about 
 the resurrection of the material body. It is stated 
 that there is to be a separation of the righteous 
 from the wicked at the general judgment, but the 
 status of the condemned is not definitely indicated. 
 
 What has taken place in the thought of the most 
 theologically inclined of all Protestant com- 
 munions has doubtless been true in greater or less 
 degree of the others. We must now turn to con- 
 sider more in detail the influences which have led 
 to what Bishop Gore calls the ‘‘note of uncertainty 
 and bewilderment’’ which characterizes so much of 
 the present day thinking upon immortality. 
 
IMMORTALITY AND THE CREEDS 65 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. Farrar, The Eternal Hope. Sermon 3. 
 
 2. A. Clarke, Commentary on Mark IX. 
 
 3. C. Gore, Belief in God, Chapter I. 
 
 4. Hagenbach, History of Christian Doctrine, Vol. II, seventh 
 division. 
 
 5. The Presbyterian Handbook for 1923, Introduction. 
 
 6. Jonathan Edwards’ Sermons. 
 
 7. The Heidelberg Catechism, questions 57, 58. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY 
 
 Inv, [RES philosophy begins with Descartes. 
 The French thinker in his efforts to secure 
 a solid basis for metaphysics postulated his fa- 
 mous ‘‘cogito ergo sum”’ (I think, therefore I am) 
 as the irreducible minimum of speculation. The 
 Cartesian doctrine of the soul, at bottom, differed 
 but little from St. Anselm’s, and the ontological 
 argument of the latter is really back of the French 
 philosopher’s viewpoint. Descartes believed in the 
 soul as a simple substance, quite in harmony with 
 the Mediaeval teaching. He was hard put to it 
 to explain the interaction of soul and body, but it 
 is only fair to say that his successors have not 
 greatly improved upon the way in which he met 
 the situation. 
 
 Spinoza, and to a certain extent Leibnitz, de- 
 veloped the modern theory of psycho-physical 
 parallelism and attempted to get rid of Descartes’ 
 problem by the simple process of ignoring it. 
 Spinoza in his doctrine of the one unitary Sub- 
 stance with its two parallel attributes of thought 
 and extension, or, as we may express them, of body 
 and mind, anticipated much that is found in recent 
 
 66 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY 67 
 
 psychological discussion. Of course from the 
 Spinozistic viewpoint, personal immortality is un- 
 tenable. Reality pertains to Substance alone and 
 consciousness in the individual, at death, simply 
 merges into the all-inclusive Absolute. 
 
 Locke and the English Empirical school attacked 
 the Cartesian doctrine of a soul substance with the 
 utmost vigor. In dealing with the subject of iden- 
 tity and diversity, he argues that the idea of an im- 
 material substance is absurd. It has no function 
 to discharge and the law of parsimony demands 
 that it should be abandoned. William James, 
 James Ward, F. H. Bradley, and many other 
 modern psychologists in their arguments against 
 the older theories of the soul do little more than 
 repeat the considerations previously advanced by 
 Locke. The final result of the Lockian criticism 
 as it developed into the idealism of Berkeley and 
 the skepticism of David Hume, is well known. 
 Locke himself did not think that he was doing any 
 damage to religion by getting rid of the immaterial 
 soul. To quote his own language, ‘‘ All the great 
 ends of morality and religion are well enough 
 secured, without philosophical proofs of the soul’s 
 immateriality.’’ In the light of later develop- 
 ments, it may be questioned whether his confidence 
 was justified. 
 
 Locke’s Empiricism found its final culmination 
 in the philosophical nihilism of Hume. The latter 
 
68 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 -» philosopher disposes of the doctrine of immortal- 
 ity in his Essays in the most simple and complete 
 fashion. His argument is worth quoting somewhat 
 in detail because present day skepticism has not 
 improved upon it: 
 
 Metaphysical topics suppose that the soul is immaterial, and 
 that it is impossible for thought to belong to a material substance. 
 But just metaphysics teach us, that the notion of substance is 
 wholly confused and imperfect, and that we have no other idea of 
 any substance, than as an aggregate of particular qualities inher- 
 ing in an unknown something. Matter, therefore, and spirit, are at 
 bottom equally unknown, and we cannot determine what qualities 
 inhere in the one or in the other. . . . . The most positive 
 asserter of the mortality of the soul never denies the immortality 
 of its substance, and that an immaterial substance, as well as a 
 material, may lose its memory or consciousness, appears in part 
 from experience, if the soul be immaterial. Reasoning from the 
 common course of nature, and without supposing any new interpo- 
 sition of the Supreme Cause, which ought always to be excluded 
 from philosophy, what is incorruptible must also be ingenerable. 
 The soul, therefore, if immortal, existed before our birth, and if 
 the former existence no ways concerned us, neither will the latter. 
 Animals undoubtedly feel, think, love, hate, will and even reason, 
 though in a more imperfect manner than men. Are their souls also 
 immaterial and immortal?’’ 
 
 Having demolished the metaphysical arguments 
 for immortality, Hume turns to the moral argu- 
 ment and shows that it is impossible to predicate 
 the divine action upon the basis of human judg- 
 ment. He says very cleverly that the justice of 
 God is beyond our comprehension and that we 
 have no right to draw any specific conclusions 
 from it. To quote his own language, ‘‘It is very 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY 69 
 
 safe for us to affirm, that whatever we know the 
 Deity to have actually done is best, but it is very 
 dangerous to affirm that He must always do what 
 to us seems best.’’ He is especially satirical in 
 dealing with the question of future rewards and 
 punishments. He says: 
 
 Heaven and hell suppose two distinct species of men, the good 
 and the bad, but the greatest part of mankind float betwixt vice 
 and virtue. Were one to go round the world with an intention of 
 giving a good supper to the righteous and a sound drubbing to 
 the wicked, he would frequently be embarrassed in his choice, and 
 would find the merits and demerits of most men and women scarcely 
 amount to the value of either. 
 
 It is in his reference to the physical arguments 
 that the Scotch philosopher appears to make his 
 best ease. He contends that the analogy of nature 
 is all against the survival of the soul after death. 
 The last symptoms which we find present in the 
 mind are those of disorder, weakness, insensibility, 
 and stupidity, ‘‘the forerunners of its annihila- 
 tion.’”’ Even sleep, he says, is attended with 
 ‘‘temporary extinction’’ or at least ‘‘a great con- 
 fusion in the soul.’’ He continues: 
 
 Judging by the usual analogy of nature, no form can continue 
 when transferred to a condition of life very different from the 
 original one in which it was placed. Trees perish in the water, 
 fishes in the air, animals in the earth. Even so small a difference 
 as that of climate is often fatal. What reason then to imagine 
 that an immense alteration, such as is made on the soul by the dis- 
 solution of its body, and all its organs of thought and sensation, 
 ean be effected without the dissolution of the whole? Everything 
 
70 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 is in common between soul and body. The organs of the one are 
 all of them the organs of the other, the existence, therefore, of the 
 one must be dependent on the other. The souls of animals are 
 allowed to be mortal, and they bear so near a resemblance to the 
 souls of men, that the analogy from one to the other forms a very 
 strong argument. 
 
 Hume is distressed by the problem presented 
 in the innumerable multitude of beings who would 
 have to be provided with eternal habitations if 
 they were all immortal. Every planet in every 
 solar system, he thinks, may be peopled with in- 
 telligent beings who would deserve immortality 
 just as much as we do. This being true, it would 
 require the constant construction of new universes 
 in order to find accommodations for such a host. 
 The problem is large enough even when regarded 
 only from the point of view of our own earthly 
 history. 
 
 When it is asked, whether Agamemnon, Thersites, Hannibal, 
 Varro, and every stupid clown that ever existed in Italy, Scythia, 
 Bactria, or Guinlea, are now alive, can any man think, that a 
 scrutiny of nature will furnish arguments strong enough to answer 
 80 strange a question in the affirmative? 
 
 Hume concludes, therefore, that the immortality 
 of the soul cannot be demonstrated by the mere 
 light of reason and that ‘‘it is the gospel, and the 
 gospel alone that has brought life and immortality 
 to light.”’ In view of his general attitude toward 
 religion, the last quotation appears to possess no 
 slight degree of irony. 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY (al 
 
 Kant, as the world knows, followed Hume. In 
 the Critique of Pure Reason, the conclusions 
 reached with regard to personal immortality are 
 precisely those given in the paragraph above. 
 Human reason, Kant agrees, is utterly incapable 
 of demonstrating immortality. In the Critique of 
 Practical Reason, however, the German philosopher 
 comes back strong in defense of the doctrines which 
 he had disproved in his earlier volume. God, 
 Freedom, and Immortality are all postulates of the 
 practical reason and therefore must be accepted, 
 although their truthfulness cannot be theoretically 
 demonstrated. With regard to immortality, Kant 
 says that it is necessarily demanded by the moral 
 order of the universe and that ethics is impossible 
 without it. In the present world, justice is not 
 always done, but in a moral universe justice must 
 always triumph. Therefore there must be another 
 world in order to preserve the moral order. Of 
 course, Kant does not pretend to prove that the 
 universe is moral. He assumes this and assuming 
 it produces his argument for survival. Granted 
 the necessary presupposition and Kant’s position 
 will always have great weight. With a type of 
 mind which is inclined toward pessimism, it will 
 have no more value than the theoretical proofs 
 so elaborately demolished in the Critique of Pure 
 Reason. 
 
 The post-Kantian philosophers, Fichte, Schel- 
 
rp HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 ling, and Hegel in the main tended in the direction 
 of a Pantheistic absorption of the individual soul 
 in the Absolute. It is somewhat difficult to say 
 just what their views with regard to individual 
 immortality were in most cases but the tendency 
 was in the direction indicated. Even Schleier- 
 macher appears to have been doubtful about in- 
 dividual immortality. The left wing Hegelians 
 plunged completely into the abyss of Atheism or 
 at the best into a materialistic Pantheism which 
 found no place for the existence of the soul, to say 
 nothing of its survival after death. On the other 
 hand, the English and Scotch neo-Hegelians such 
 as Thomas Hill Green, the Cairds, the Seths, Wal- 
 lace, and others of the same school carefully 
 guarded the doctrine of immortality along with 
 their belief in the Hegelian Absolute. James Seth 
 in the concluding section of his Ethical Principles 
 draws a clear line of demarcation between his own 
 position and what may be styled the typical 
 Hegelian conclusion with regard to immortality. 
 His brother, A. Seth (Pringle-Pattison) in his two 
 series of Gifford lectures has brilliantly presented 
 the same point of view. Professor Josiah Royce 
 has also argued for personal immortality upon a 
 neo-Hegelian basis. Sir Henry Jones in his late 
 Gifford series entitled A Faith That Enqures 
 reaches similar conclusions. It appears only fair 
 to say that the neo-Hegelian school as a whole has 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY 73 
 
 stood out more thoroughly in defense of personal 
 immortality than any other movement in the field 
 of philosophy during the last century. 
 
 Co-extensive with the rise of the doctrine of 
 evolution came the development of Agnosticism as 
 an attempted solution of the problems of the uni- 
 verse. Mr. Herbert Spencer, who may be regarded 
 as the apostle of the school, relegated Kant’s 
 postulates of the practical reason to the Unknow- 
 able and refused to discuss them further. The 
 prevailing attitude of Agnosticism toward the 
 future life is seen at its best in the epitaph of 
 Thomas H. Huxley written by his wife. 
 
 Be not afraid, ye waiting souls that weep; 
 For still He giveth His beloved sleep, 
 And if an endless sleep He wills, so best. 
 
 One line of development from Kant which has 
 exerted more influence over present day thinking 
 than is usually supposed is that of the pessimistic 
 idealism of Schopenhauer and his disciples. Start- 
 ing with the Absolute as unconscious will or mere 
 blind striving, Schopenhauer developed an amaz- 
 ingly clever interpretation of reality. From his 
 point of view, personal immortality is a delusion 
 and a sham, the desire for it originating in the 
 presence of the unconscious Will to live in us 
 which of course will go on in other forms of 
 existence after our personalities have disappeared. 
 Von Hartmann, in his Philosophy of the Uncon- 
 
74 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 scious, has carried Schopenhauer’s position 
 farther and has singularly anticipated much pres- 
 ent day discussion. The influence of the pessimists 
 upon present day thought has been accentuated by 
 its brilliant presentation in the novels of Thomas 
 Hardy and other -well-known writers of modern 
 prose and poetry. Quite a good deal of the present 
 uncertainty with regard to a future life arises, 
 consciously or unconsciously, from the subtle in- 
 fluence of Schopenhauer and his followers. 
 
 One of the significant forces in modern thought, 
 especially in its influence upon organized Chris- 
 tianity, is the philosophy of Positivism as taught 
 by August Comte and his followers. Positivism 
 rules out any possible immortality for the individ- 
 ual, finding its satisfaction in the immortality of 
 the race. Idealized humanity living under perfect 
 social surroundings and with ever increasing mate- 
 rial comforts is the goal of the positive philosophy. 
 As a distinct religious movement, Positivism 
 failed completely but it may be questioned whether 
 it has not achieved pronounced success in its in- 
 roads upon orthodox Christianity. The number 
 of ministers and church leaders generally who are 
 really Positivists in their thinking at the present 
 time is much larger than most people suppose. 
 Comte failed to conquer the church from the out- 
 side, but it remains to be seen whether he will 
 sueceed in his attack from within. Much of the 
 popularity of Positivism, as was true in the case 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY ) 
 
 of pessimism, arises from its artistic presenta- 
 tion. For example, the doctrine of racial immor- 
 tality sounds tremendously appealing in a poem 
 like George Eliot’s The Choir Invisible: 
 
 O may I join the choir invisible 
 
 Of those immortal dead who live again 
 
 In minds made better by their presence; live 
 
 In pulses stirred to generosity; 
 
 In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 
 
 Of miserable aims that end with self; 
 
 In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, 
 And with their mild persistence urge men’s minds 
 To vaster issues. 
 
 Notwithstanding the high altruism of such an 
 appeal, the fact remains that there is a pessimistic 
 coloring about it which makes it ineffective as a 
 motive force with the large majority of human 
 beings. 
 
 The latest movement in contemporary philos- 
 ophy, the New Realism, is on the whole unsym- 
 pathetic with the idea of personal immortality. 
 Starting from a more or less materialistic basis, 
 the New Realist achieves negative or at best doubt- 
 ful conclusions with regard to the perdurability 
 of the human personality. Mr. Bertrand Russell, 
 for example, finds little solace in the positivistic 
 viewpoint of George Eliot since the race which ab- 
 sorbs all individual values must itself come fo an 
 end at some period, and thus destroy everything 
 that human beings with so much self-sacrifice have 
 
76 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 accumulated, and yet he has no faith in the doc- 
 trine of individual immortality. Perhaps the best 
 statement of the realistic attitude is given by Pro- 
 fessor Alexander in his Gifford lectures entitled 
 Space, Time and Deity. In the concluding chap- 
 ter of this series, ‘‘ Deity and Value,’’ he says: 
 
 The mere desire that we feel to be present ourselves and con- 
 tinue our work begun here, admirable as it is, because the passion 
 to do things ourselves is at the root of all our endeavours, cannot 
 overrule the facts of our apparent limitation to the time and place 
 of our bodily life. The data do not allow us to suppose, so far as 
 we have seen, that our minds, even if we believe that they only 
 use the body as an instrument, do exist without the instrument, and 
 we are certainly not entitled because of our desire of a continued 
 existence (possessed by different persons in very different degrees of 
 strength, and by some not at all) to influence our metaphysics of 
 mind, so as to support a thesis which would lend itself to that 
 wish. For that wish of continued existence may be replaced, and 
 perhaps with greater humanity, by resigning our work to others, 
 as we are accustomed to do here, when the occasion demands. 
 
 The present current in philosophical thinking, 
 so far as the New Realism is concerned, seems 
 therefore in the direction of a rather negative at- 
 titude toward personal survival after death. While 
 this is true, it should also be remembered that 
 there are quite a number of realistic or semi- 
 realistic pluralists like James Ward and F. C. S. 
 Schiller who believe thoroughly in the doctrine of 
 personal immortality. 
 
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND IMMORTALITY 77 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality. Lectures 4, 5, 
 and 8. 
 
 2. D. Hume, Essays, on Immortality. 
 
 3. H. Spencer, First Principles. Part I. 
 
 4. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, Transcendental Dialectic. 
 
 5. A. Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea. Books 1 
 and 2. 
 
 6. B. Spinoza, Ethics. 
 
 7. S. Alexander, Space, Time, and. Deity, Vol. II, page 423. 
 
 8. F. C. 8. Schiller, Riddles of the Sphinx. Book 2, Chapter XI. 
 
 9. J. Ward, The Realm of Ends. Lecture 18. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 MODERN SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY 
 
 [Pe modern philosophy begins with Descartes, it 
 is usually affirmed that modern science begins 
 with Francis Bacon. Beyond any question, the 
 great Englishman with his emphasis upon induction 
 and experiment laid the foundations of later scien- 
 tific progress, and yet many years elapsed before 
 Bacon’s vision passed into realization. It was not 
 until the early part of the nineteenth century that 
 our modern scientific age really began. It would 
 be tedious to recapitulate the history of the differ- 
 ent sciences during the past century nor is such a 
 process necessary to our purpose. What we are 
 concerned with here is to indicate the bearing of 
 the enormous accumulation of scientific material 
 during this period upon the problem of personal im- 
 mortality. There can be no doubt that science has 
 had much to do with regard to the popular view of 
 the subject. Perhaps the majority of people who 
 disbelieve in immortality today assume such an 
 attitude because of what they believe to be scien- 
 tific evidence. The best illustration of this fact is 
 found in the data concerning the attitude of pres- 
 ent day men of science toward the question under 
 78 
 

 
 MODERN SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY 79 
 
 discussion, published in Professor James H. 
 Leuba’s Lhe Belief in God and Immortality. 
 Professor Leuba finds that out of a selected num- 
 ber of scientists, 50.7% of the physicists believed 
 in immortality and only 37% of the biologists. Of 
 the historians, 51.5% believed in a future life and 
 50.0% of the sociologists. In the field of psychol- 
 ogy, the results were practically negative, only 
 19.8% believing in a future life. Of course, Dr. 
 Leuba’s figures are not at all conclusive because 
 of the circumstances attending the induction, and 
 yet they may be regarded as possessing consider- 
 able value. Beyond any question, they indicate a 
 decidedly negative attitude on the part of many 
 present day scientists concerning the subject of 
 immortality. 
 
 Francis Bacon himself was thoroughly orthodox 
 in his religious views and appears to have enter- 
 tained no doubt of personal existence after death. 
 In this respect, his example was followed by the 
 most eminent of his successors during the next two 
 centuries. Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Buffon, 
 and the most outstanding names in the early his- 
 tory of modern science were believers in the Chris- 
 tian doctrine of immortality. The beginning of 
 widespread doubt with regard to the accepted 
 dogmas of religion on the part of scientific investi- 
 gators came with the rapid development of the 
 biological and physical sciences in the first half of 
 
80 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the nineteenth century. The doctrine of evolution 
 especially led to widespread hostility to the ortho- 
 dox view. It is doubtless true that a good deal of 
 this opposition arose from the mistaken and in- 
 temperate attitude of certain ecclesiastical leaders 
 toward the new scientific discoveries when the lat- 
 ter were first made known to the world. The posi- 
 tion of Darwin, Huxley, and Spencer with regard 
 to Christianity in general was not made more 
 cordial by the attacks of the clergy upon what 
 these thinkers considered indisputable scientific 
 data. Of course this attitude changed after a time, 
 but in many cases the damage done was irrep- 
 arable. The present day schism between science 
 and religion indicated by the statistics of Professor 
 Leuba and others arose in no slight degree from 
 the prejudiced hostility of the church toward 
 science during the last century and in the deep 
 
 seated resentment of scientists arising from th 
 fact. 
 
 There is a certain sense in which it may be sé 
 that the publication of the Origin of Species i 
 stituted a new era in the history of knowledge 
 
 d 
 
 From the time of Bacon down to that of Darwin — 
 
 we mark a rather definite period in the develop- 
 ment of scientific investigation. In this period, 
 the idea of induction or of experiment generally 
 dominated the thought of the world. Beginning 
 with Darwin, a new Idea, as Hegel would put it. 
 
 . 
 
. 
 . 
 
 MODERN SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY SI 
 
 came to light and asserted precedence over all 
 others. This Idea was the conception of develop- 
 ment. It is not too much to say that the principle 
 of evolution has outshadowed all other considera- 
 tions in scientific circles during the past half cen- 
 tury. It has entered every department of knowl- 
 edge: biology, astronomy, sociology, psychology, 
 and even philosophy and theology. There can be 
 little question but that the principle has been over- 
 emphasized as a result of what may be styled its 
 extreme fashionableness, but no one will dispute 
 the important part that it has played in the his- 
 tory of scientific progress. It is difficult to find a 
 scientific authority of the present day who does 
 not give the theory a large place in his thinking. 
 If the early founders of the evolutionary school 
 could return to us, they would doubtless feel abun- 
 
 _ dantly satisfied with the results which their teach- 
 
 “ngs have achieved. 
 
 _ From the beginning, the leading protagonists of 
 the new dogma of evolution were skeptically in- 
 ‘clined concerning the doctrine of immortality. Mr. 
 
 Darwin himself was a devout Christian when he 
 
 began his scientific investigations. At the close of 
 
 his life, he assumed a thoroughly agnostic attitude 
 
 : 
 
 toward the major problems of religion including 
 immortality. He has borne eloquent testimony to 
 the slow and almost imperceptible stages which 
 marked the transition from his period of belief to 
 
82, HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the period of doubt. The determining factor in 
 the entire process was of course hig conviction 
 that scientific evolution cut the ground away from 
 the current orthodox theology. Like Huxley, he 
 was not disposed to assert any positive belief in 
 the extinction of personality at the time of death, 
 but one infers from his writings that he regarded 
 such a result as highly probable. In any event, 
 he did not consider the evidence in favor of sur- 
 vival as adequate or convincing. Mr. Darwin’s 
 attitude told heavily against Christianity with the 
 generation which followed him. His outstanding 
 reputation as a scientist, his frank and tolerant 
 attitude toward all disputed questions, the religious 
 background of his earlier years, and his obvious 
 desire to adhere to the old forms and teachings 
 as far as possible could not but influence his dis- 
 ciples profoundly. Huxley’s opposition to the 
 church hardly carried so much weight with it be- 
 cause there was about it a touch of the forensic, 
 but there was nothing of this kind ever associated 
 with the name of Darwin. It is true that a number 
 of brilhant evolutionists, perhaps the two most 
 brilliant after Darwin and Huxley, that is to say 
 Wallace and Romanes, adhered sooner or later to 
 the Christian viewpoint. Romanes began by going 
 much farther than Darwin toward the atheistical 
 position, but closed his career a devout son of the 
 church. Wallace reached definitely spiritistic con- 
 clusions with regard to the nature of man and 
 
MODERN SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY 83 
 
 accepted in thoroughgoing fashion the dogma of 
 personal immortality. 
 
 Other leading evolutionists went much farther 
 than Darwin or Huxley in their denial of orthodox 
 Christian doctrines. Ernest Haeckel, for example, 
 developed a philosophy of materialistic monism 
 which entirely eliminated all three of the Kantian 
 postulates of religion—God, Freedom, and Immor- 
 tality. Haeckel in his History of Creation en- 
 deavored to outshine the Book of Genesis and had 
 no hesitancy about claiming success for his accom- 
 plishment. The tendency among scientists at this 
 time was clearly in the direction of a thorough- 
 going materialism. In psychology, the psycho- 
 physical parallelistic theory held general sway, but 
 was obviously regarded as only a prelude in most 
 eases to an agnostic metaphysic. There were of 
 course some spiritualists but the majority were 
 either agnostics or materialistic monists. 
 
 A typical representative of the modern material- 
 istic attitude may be found in Professor Wilhelm 
 Ostwald of the University of Leipzig who gave the 
 Ingersoll lecture on Individuality and Immortality 
 in 1906. In this interesting and fascinatingly writ- 
 ten document, the author in kindly but none the 
 less definite fashion does away completely with the 
 old idea of personal immortality. There is nothing 
 in the scientific world, as he sees it, which even 
 hints at the idea of personal survival. All that 
 
84 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 remains in nature is the inheritance preserved in 
 the life of the species, and this is all which Ostwald 
 thinks we ought to expect in the case of human 
 beings. Moreover, he does not consider immor- 
 tality desirable. The author’s personal confession 
 is interesting not only because it is typical of so 
 much of modern scientific thinking, but also be- 
 cause of the distinctly human touch which it pos- 
 Sesses: 
 
 Considered from this standpoint (the apparent necessity for the 
 feebleness of old age) death is not only not an evil, but it is a 
 necessary factor in the existence of the race. And looking into my 
 own mind with all the frankness and scientific objectiveness which 
 I can apply to the most personal question, I find no horror con- 
 nected with the idea of my own death. Of course it is objection- 
 able to suffer illness or pain, and there are beside still many things 
 which I should like to do or to experience before I die, but this 
 would be a loss to me only if I were afterward conscious of it and 
 could regret it, and such possibilities seem to be out of the question. 
 As to my friends and relations, they will feel my loss the less, the 
 older I become. After I have lived out the span of my life, the 
 bodily ending will seem a perfectly natural thing, and it will be 
 more a feeling of relief than one of sorrow that will come in watch- 
 ing the end. 
 
 One must go back to Epicurus with his medita- 
 tion upon the beneficence of death to find an ade- 
 quate parallel to these words. In fact, there is 
 much about the attitude of modern scientific ma- 
 terialism which reminds one of the pagan culture 
 of the Graeco-Roman period. It is not without 
 significance that so keenly responsive a nature as 
 that of Walter Pater should have found in the 
 
MODERN SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY 85 
 
 older Epicurean culture the most stimulating re- 
 sponse to the promptings of his own age. It is 
 interesting in this connection to note that Ostwald 
 regards the Kantian view that immortality is 
 necessary for the preservation of the moral order 
 with complete and almost disdainful skepticism. 
 ‘*To frighten people into ethical action by threat- 
 ening them with eternal punishment is a poor and 
 inefficacious way of influencing them,’’ he says. 
 The only way to real advancement in the ethical 
 world is by the development of habits which will 
 enable us to act spontaneously in unselfish ways 
 and for the good of humanity as a whole. Moral- 
 ity does not need a future life and is indeed better 
 off without it. 
 
 Professor William James is perhaps more 
 typical of the English and American group of 
 scientists than Professor Ostwald. James through- 
 out his career preserved an open mind toward the 
 question of immortality. In his psychology, he 
 fought manfully to secure a foothold for the free- 
 dom of the will and in his Ingersoll lecture for 
 1897-98 he put up a battle for at least the will to 
 believe in a future life. His long and continued 
 interest in the problems of psychical research is 
 familiar to everyone. He has been quoted by both 
 materialists and spiritualists as a supporter 
 of their respective doctrines, but the truth seems 
 to be that he was never quite able to reach a definite 
 
86 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 conclusion with regard to the great questions at 
 issue. He was not an agnostic, for he believed that 
 the problems were not incapable of solution in the 
 nature of the case, but simply that they have thus 
 far not been solved. He kept an open mind with 
 regard to all of them, and apparently passed into 
 the unknown without being quite sure just what 
 to expect but entirely unafraid and without any 
 spirit of pessimism disturbing hig soul. 
 
 There is a tendency at the present time to re- 
 gard the doctrine of evolution as distinctly help- 
 ful to a rational view of immortality. We shall 
 discuss this point of view in a chapter especially 
 devoted to it a little later. The current would seem 
 to be running more directly toward this attitude 
 during recent years. On the whole, however, the 
 modern scientific movement can scarcely be said 
 to have contributed toward the encouragement of 
 the Christian doctrine of immortality. Neverthe- 
 less there are many indications that science will 
 yet become an efficient factor in fostering a living 
 faith in a future existence. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 . Leuba, The Belief in God and Immortality, Part IT. 
 
 . W. Ostwald, Individuality and Immortality, pp. 62, 63. 
 . W. James, Human Immortality, pp. 3, 4, 42-45. 
 
 . G. J. Romanes, Thoughts on Religion. 
 
 . T. H. Huxley, Life and Letters, Vol. II. 
 
 Cle GO DO 
 
 ii a i 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE PROOFS FROM PSYCHICAL 
 RESEARCH 
 
 NE phase of scientific development has un- 
 
 questionably furnished a new interest in the 
 subject of immortality. We refer to the investiga- 
 tions of the Society for Psychical Research con- 
 cerning which there has been so much discussion 
 during recent years. An organization which has 
 included in its membership men like Henry Sidg- 
 wick, William James, A. J. Balfour, Sir Oliver 
 Lodge, Sir William Crookes, F. W. H. Myers, and 
 many others scareely less emiment, assuredly de- 
 mands some respect on the part of those who are 
 not hopelessly prejudiced in favor of a particular 
 hypothesis. While this is correct, it must be con- 
 fessed that the results obtained by the psychical 
 researchers appear to be singularly inconclusive 
 concerning the problems raised in their discus- 
 sions. It is true that some men like Professor 
 Hyslop, F. W. H. Myers, Sir Oliver Lodge, Arthur 
 Conan Doyle, and others have become thoroughly 
 convineed of the spiritistic hypothesis. The argu- 
 ments which have converted these thinkers un- 
 fortunately seem singularly unconvincing to many 
 
 other minds. 
 87 
 
88 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Since the Great War the public has been deluged 
 with spiritualistic literature purporting to furnish 
 evidence of communications ‘‘from the other side.”’ 
 Perhaps the most notable of these volumes is the 
 Raymond of Sir Oliver Lodge. This book has 
 received wide circulation and has been read with 
 sympathetic interest by many people who cannot 
 accept its conclusions. It purports to contain mes- 
 sages from the author’s son who was killed in 
 France during the war, together with certain com- 
 ments and conclusions concerning the life to come 
 on the part of Sir Oliver himself. The thorough- 
 going manner in which the author accepts the 
 validity of his hypothesis concerning the life be- 
 yond is apparent throughout the book. Take, for 
 example, words like these: 
 
 I am convinced of continued existence on the other side of death 
 as I am of existence here. It may be said, you cannot be as sure 
 as you are of sensory experience. I say I can. A physicist is 
 never limited to direct sensory impressions, he has to deal with a 
 multitude of conceptions and things, for which he has no physical 
 organ, the dynamical theory of heat, for instance, and of gases, the 
 theories of electricity, of magnetism, of chemical affinity, of cohe- 
 sion, aye, and his apprehension of the ether itself, lead him into 
 regions where sight and hearing and touch are impotent as direct 
 witnesses, where they are no longer efficient guides. In such regions 
 
 everything has to be interpreted in terms of the insensible, the 
 apparently unsubstantial, and in a definite sense, the imaginary. 
 
 In other words, the hypothetical data of the 
 sciences in their search for the explanation of phys- 
 ical phenomena appear so unsubstantial and so 
 imaginary that the communications of spiritistic 
 
THE PROOFS FROM PSYCHICAL RESEARCH 89 
 
 mediums are not incredible. The various doctrines 
 held by orthodox scientists concerning the structure 
 of atoms, electrons, and the ether seem to Sir 
 Oliver to be quite as unsubstantial as the spirit of 
 Raymond. Paradoxical as it may appear, it is 
 frequently true that the most thoroughgoing gcien- 
 tific investigators are at least as credulous as are 
 the theologians themselves. 
 
 Frederic W. H. Myers in his two bulky volumes 
 entitled Human Personality and Its Survival of 
 Bodily Death has doubtless made out the best 
 case for the psychical research movement. Mr. 
 Myers has brought together such an enormous 
 mass of material that it appears overwhelming 
 from the standpoint of the number of witnesses. 
 The evidence was apparently conclusive to the 
 author of the book himself and produced definite 
 conviction concerning the reality of personal sur- 
 vival. It has doubtless had the same effect upon a 
 certain proportion of its readers whose minds were 
 especially open to the reception of this kind of 
 testimony. On the other hand, even the most de-- 
 voted admirers of Mr. Myers, and the writer con-” 
 fesses himself to be one, will scarcely claim that 
 his work has had any very pronounced influence 
 in convineing the bulk of people that the soul sur- 
 vives bodily dissolution. For a long time, Pro- 
 fessor J. H. Hyslop believed that if he could secure 
 an appropriation of a million dollars from Con- 
 
90 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 gress he could demonstrate upon the basis of 
 scientific evidence and beyond the possibility of a 
 reasonable doubt that the human spirit is im- 
 mortal. The members of Congress remained un- 
 convineed despite the vast issues at stake and re- 
 fused to make the appropriation. No doubt most 
 of them believed that the money could only be 
 applied toward gathering a bulk of testimony re- 
 sembling the material collected by Mr. Myers and 
 possessing no more evidential value. Under the 
 circumstances they doubtless regarded themselves 
 as justified in confining their appropriations to the 
 purely material field. 
 
 Outside of the members of the American and 
 Hnglish Societies for Psychical Research, scientists 
 as a rule have rigidly tabooed the spiritualistic 
 theory. Professor Munsterberg said before his 
 death that the evidential facts alleged by psychical 
 research not only do not exist, but can never exist. 
 Professor A. EK. Taylor of the British Academy 
 asserts that the solution of the mediumistic phenom- 
 ena must either be fraud or telepathy or, if these 
 theories break down, possible demoniacal posses- 
 sion. Professor Leuba in The Belief in God and 
 Immortality devotes several pages to proving the 
 fraudulent character of the spiritualistic phe- 
 nomena. He refers especially to the complete 
 exposé of Eusapia Palladino at Columbia Univer- 
 sity in 1910. He also criticises rather freely the 
 
 —) > 
 
THE PROOFS FROM PSYCHICAL RESEARCH 91 
 
 proots of survival through what is called ‘‘cross- 
 correspondence.’’ His solution appears to be that 
 telepathy is quite as satisfactory an explanation 
 of the facts as is needed. One gathers from his 
 general position, however, that the telepathic hy- 
 pothesis is scarcely more agreeable to him than 
 the existence of spirits. The fact is that from a 
 scientific point of view telepathy is hardly more 
 credible than straight out spiritualism. Doctor 
 Leuba justly criticises the unsatisfactory character 
 of the future life as brought out in the mediumistic 
 reports. He says: 
 
 Whether the results of the S. P. R. are regarded as proving sur- 
 vival or not, it must be admitted that no amount of ingenuity in 
 explanation and no optimism ean hide the unattractiveness of the 
 glimpses that may have been caught of the other life: there is no 
 hint in these glimpses of any glorification, nor, for that matter, of 
 any retribution. That other world would come much closer to a 
 realization of the primary than of the modern conception of con- 
 tinuation. The disincarnate souls appear on the whole as enfeebled_ 
 and inefficient replicas of earthly beings. This is not the kind of 
 continuation which the modern world desires; it lacks the essential 
 features of the Christian conception of immortality. 
 
 The great objection to the whole spiritualistic 
 program so far as evidence of survival is con- 
 cerned appears to he precisely at the point where 
 Professor Leuba hag criticised it. As some one 
 has said, if we are all to become driveling idiots 
 as soon as we cross the border into eternity, the 
 prospect is so unappealing that we naturally hesi- 
 tate about believing that such a catastrophe can 
 
92 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 be true. If William James, for example, talked 
 as badly during his lifetime as the mediums have 
 made him talk since his death, he would never have 
 achieved his reputation as a master of English 
 thought and style. It is impossible to point to a 
 single significant. contribution concerning the 
 nature of the future life which has been obtained 
 by spiritistic means. What information might 
 otherwise appear significant is of such contradic- 
 tory character that it loses its value. The spirits 
 who furnish ‘‘news’’ concerning the life beyond 
 do not agree as to the character of that life and 
 their statements are so vague and at times so child- 
 ish as to become little short of disgusting. Of 
 course efforts have been made to account for this 
 situation, since the days of Myers, by the assump- 
 tion that the spirits themselves are not at their 
 best when they are communicating with earthly 
 beings and that the difficulties of ‘‘ getting across’’ 
 are such that only the most confused and garbled 
 reports can be secured. This explanation seems 
 inadequate to many minds. The conversations 
 which men like James, Hodgson and others are 
 reported to have carried on through spiritualistic 
 mediums are so unlike what their friends would 
 normally anticipate that they can scarcely be re- 
 garded as garbled representations of a genuine 
 original. One can hardly see how the material 
 attributed to some of these men could ever have 
 possessed the remotest connection with their think- 
 
THE PROOFS FROM PSYCHICAL RESEARCH 93 
 
 ing. Had the communications from the other side 
 been of such a character as to harmonize with the 
 earthly personalities of those from whom they 
 have purported to come, it would make a strong 
 argument for the spiritistic hypothesis. Unfortu- 
 nately for the theory, however, the argument in the 
 main appears to be negative. 
 
 Of course some of the phenomena cited by 
 Myers, Hyslop and others appear difficult to ex- 
 plain on any naturalistic hypothesis. Mr. Randall 
 in his recent work on the significance of psychical 
 research entitled The New Light on Immortality 
 concedes that all the phenomena so far known 
 may eventually be explained ‘‘on some theory of 
 telepathy or mind reading, or through the activity 
 of psychic powers in man whose nature or opera- 
 tions are not yet understood. On this theory all 
 these phenomena, even the most mysterious and 
 baffling at present, would ultimately be reduced to 
 purely psychic phenomena with which discarnate 
 intelligences have nothing whatever to do.’’ Mr. 
 Randall himself does not accept this interpreta- 
 tion, being inclined to the spiritualistic hypothesis 
 accepted by Myers and Hyslop. Nevertheless, he 
 concedes that the case is still doubtful, at least 
 from the standpoint of many intelligent people. 
 He believes that future investigation will definitely 
 turn the balance in favor of spiritism, but acknowl- 
 
 ~ 
 
94. HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 edges that hig views in this respect are matters 
 of faith rather than demonstration. 
 
 More than a quarter of a century ago Mr. 
 Thomas Jay Hudson attacked the reality of spirit 
 communications and claimed that all psychic 
 phenomena of the spiritistic type could be ex- 
 plained on the basis of telepathy. It is interest- 
 ing to note his conclusion as presented in his book 
 entitled A Scientific Demonstration of the Future 
 Infe written in 1895. He says: 
 
 My proposition is that psychic phenomena properly interpreted, 
 including that which they attribute to disembodied spirits, furnish 
 indubitable evidence of a future life, and that the only interpreta- 
 
 tion which science can give to such phenomena is that they emanate 
 from the living psychic, and never from disembodied spirits. 
 
 It would be easy to cite multitudinous cases of 
 extraordinary and bizarre circumstances from the 
 volumes of Myers, Hyslop, Barrett, Flammarion, 
 and many others, which tend to prove the reality 
 of spiritistic phenomena. These data, however, do 
 not make out a clear case for survival, as we have 
 already seen, and our space limitations are such 
 that it appears unnecessary to quote them. After 
 reading the documentary evidence with sym- 
 pathetic interest, the writer at least is inclined to 
 say with William James: 
 
 I have been tempted at times to believe that the Creator has 
 eternally intended this department of nature to remain baffling, to 
 prompt our curiosities and hopes and suspicions all in equal meas- 
 ure, so that, although ghosts and clairvoyances, and raps and mes- 
 
THE PROOFS FROM PSYCHICAL RESEARCH O45 
 
 sages from spirits are always seeming to exist and can never be 
 fully explained away, they also seem never to be susceptible of full 
 corroboration. 
 
 On the whole, it would seem that a certain con- 
 tribution toward the solution of the problem of 
 immortality from a scientific standpoint has been 
 made by the students of psychic phenomena. 
 Nevertheless with a few exceptions the most ard- 
 ent of these students will scarcely claim that they 
 have solved the problem. Perhaps, as James sur- 
 mised, it will take centuries to reach a solution on 
 the basis of psychic investigation. In any event, 
 up to the present time the matter remains one of 
 faith rather than one of scientific demonstration. 
 
 ~The Psychical Researchers, we are inclined to 
 believe, have helped to sustain faith in the fact 
 of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. There are 
 so many points in common between the spiritistic 
 phenomena collected by Myers and Hyslop and the 
 Seripture record of the Appearances during the 
 Forty Days that the interest aroused in the one 
 group has led to renewed interest in the other. 
 However we may explain the later evidence, it cer- 
 tainly tends to make the earlier more intelligible 
 to the modern mind. As the writer sees the matter, 
 this is the most important contribution which 
 psychic research has made to Christianity. Not 
 a few people whose faith in the Resurrection had 
 become dim have had it strengthened and renewed 
 
96 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 by reading the evidence furnished in the ponderous 
 volumes of the proceedings of the Society for 
 Psychical Research. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. F. W. H. Myers, Human Personality and Its Survival of 
 Bodily Death. 
 
 2. O. Lodge, Raymond. 
 
 3. T. J. Hudson, A Scientific Demonstration of the Future Life, 
 Chapters III, IV, and V. 
 
 4. Leuba, The Belief in God and Immortality, Part I, Chapter 
 VI. 
 
 5. Randall, The New Light on Immortality, Chapter IV. 
 
 6. A. W. Martin, Faith in a Future Life, Chapter VI. 
 
 7. S. McComb, The Future Life in the Light of Modern In- 
 quiry, Chapter VIIT. 
 
 8. B. King, The Abolishing of Death, Chapters I and II. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THEOSOPHY AND THE DOCTRINE OF 
 KARMA 
 
 N° study of the future life would be in any 
 
 sense complete without some reference to the 
 so-called doctrine of Karma and to theories of 
 metempsychosis in general. We have already re- 
 ferred to the views of transmigration and pre- 
 existence held by the Greek philosophers and by 
 certain of the early Christian theologians. These 
 views have come down from very ancient sources 
 and are still held by perhaps a majority of the 
 human family. The origin of the idea appears to 
 be quite simple. Certain family resemblances sug- 
 gested to the primitive mind the idea that a child 
 was the incarnation of its father or of some one 
 of its ancestors. Moreover, in the early stages of 
 development the savage mind was quick to detect 
 fancied resemblances to animals on the part of 
 children, and was prone to account for such re- 
 semblances on the basis of transmigration. Tylor, 
 Frazer, and others have called attention to in- 
 stances of this kind. The totemistic theory is 
 closely related to the same point of view. The idea 
 of the totem was that of a mystical blood brother- 
 hood with some animal which was looked upon as 
 
 97 
 
98 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the ancestor of the clan and as a guardian spirit im 
 times of trial and of need. According to the totem 
 theory when a member of the tribe died, his spirit 
 was supposed to go back to the clan totem and to 
 assume its appearance and shape as an animal. 
 The transition from such a view to the ordinary 
 doctrine of metempyschosis is quite easy. In any 
 event, from whatever source or sources the trans- 
 migration theory may have come, nothing is more 
 certain than the fact that we find it present in the 
 oldest traces of religion and of civilization which 
 have come down to us. 
 
 The doctrine of transmigration found place in 
 the religions of the East and has held uninter- 
 rupted sway over most of them since the time of 
 the origin of Buddhism, about 600 B. C. As Dr. 
 Cave and others have shown, the teaching is not 
 found in the old Vedic religions which preceded 
 the later Indian cults. From the older point of 
 view, the soul passed after death to a somewhat 
 crudely fashioned heaven or hell quite in line with 
 later Western views. The present day doctrine of 
 the future was introduced into the Hindu religions 
 through the Upanishads. It is here that we find 
 the first expression of Karma, an Oriental word 
 which means ‘‘work’’ or ‘‘deed’’ and which ex- 
 presses the idea that a man must continually reap 
 that which he sows. Every action carries with it 
 its own penalty and there is no possibility of 
 separating the two. No more rigid doctrine of 
 
THEOSOPHY AND THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA 99 
 
 retribution is conceivable, and no more complete 
 embodiment of what is sometimes called ‘‘the law 
 of the harvest’’ has ever been fashioned by the 
 human mind. Every man, from the standpoint of 
 Karma, becomes his own judge and passes sentence 
 upon his own life. Moreover, the place where the 
 sentence is carried out is not in some shadowy 
 other world, but in this same human life where 
 the original deed was committed. The only dif- 
 ference is that the expiation is carried on through 
 successive reincarnations which afford ample time 
 and opportunity for complete retribution. In these 
 various stages through which the spirit passes, it 
 is not immediately conscious of its previous exist- 
 ence, but nevertheless the character which it pos- 
 sesses has come down unimpaired from the earlier 
 level of hfe. The Buddhist teaching elaborates 
 this law in minute detail. Tylor in his Primitive 
 Culture gives numerous illustrations of the de- 
 tailed manner in which the interpreters of Karma 
 explain the operation of the law: 
 
 The stealer of food shall be dyspeptic, the scandal monger shall 
 have foul breath, the horse stealer shall go lame. Stealers of grain 
 and meats shall turn into rats and vultures, the thief who took 
 dyed garments or perfumes shall become a red partridge or a musk- 
 rat. . . . . When good King Bunsari’s feet were burned and 
 rubbed with salt by command of his cruel son, that he might not 
 walk, why was the torture inflicted on a man so holy? Because in 
 a previous birth he had walked near a dagoba with his slippers on, 
 and had trodden on priest’s carpet without washing his feet. 
 
100 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Of course the doctrine of Karma has held its 
 sway primarily because it appears to present some 
 moral justification for the apparent inequalities of 
 human experience. The never-ending question 
 concerning the sufferings of the righteous and of 
 the innocent 1s answered by saying that they were 
 not righteous or innocent in some earlier existence 
 and are now only atoning for their misdeeds of the 
 past. At the time when the Titanic crashed into 
 an iceberg in the mid-Atlantic and caused the loss 
 of many hundreds of lives, the modern Theoso- 
 phists explained the sufferings of those who went 
 down with the vessel or who perished by cold and 
 exhaustion in the ocean on the basis of the law of 
 Karma. The writer distinctly remembers a lec- 
 turer who belonged to the movement above men- 
 tioned elaborating in detail the explanation that 
 however innocent the numerous victims of the 
 disaster might appear to us, their fate proved that 
 in some previous existence they must have been 
 guilty of some sin or sins which had to be expiated 
 in relentless fashion in the present life. The ex- 
 planation appealed to many of his hearers even 
 in a typical western audience. 
 
 The supreme objection to the whole theory of 
 Karma, as Professor Pringle-Pattison has clearly 
 shown, consists in the fact that it does not satisfy 
 the demands of justice. The retribution which it 
 furnishes is after all only formal or imaginary. 
 
THEOSOPHY AND THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA 10] 
 
 Unless there is memory of the previous existences 
 in one definite self-consciousness which binds them 
 together there is no possible morality involved in 
 the process of transmigration. The Karma which 
 is carried over from one life to another retains 
 no identity if memory or self-consciousness is de- 
 stroyed. On this basis, it has as little meaning 
 or value as the old soul substance which David 
 Hume so mercilessly ridicules in his essays. There 
 ig no possible justice or morality involved in B 
 experiencing a Karma carried over from a previ- 
 ous existence, which we may designate as A, un- 
 less B knows this previous existence as his own 
 and the Karma as properly belonging to him. It 
 is of the essence of the doctrine of Karma, how- 
 ever, that no such consciousness is possible. It is 
 the unconscious Karma which gives point to the 
 theory. At the same time it is this unconscious 
 feature which totally destroys its moral signif- 
 icance. A parallel in actual life would be the 
 punishment of an individual for some offense com- 
 mitted during or before a total amnesia. What- 
 ever the crime might have been, it would mean 
 nothing to the person out of whose memory it had 
 passed entirely and he could only think of himself 
 as punished for something which had no connection 
 with his character. Modern conceptions of justice 
 would not approve a penalty of this kind if the 
 facts were clearly established. 
 
102 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 The theory of metempsychosis has always pos- 
 sessed attraction for a certain type of mind and 
 some modern authors have tried to rehabilitate it 
 during recent years. One naturally thinks of Wil- 
 liam Wordsworth, of Cardinal Newman, and of 
 other nineteenth century poets. In the realm of 
 philosophy, one of its foremost advocates has been 
 Mr. F. C. S. Schiller who in his Riddles of the 
 Sphinw has worked out a metaphysical solution 
 of reality which carries with it the idea of the con- 
 stantly recurring incarnations of a plurality of 
 spirits whose interactions have produced the uni- 
 verse aS we know it. Mr. Schiller defends the idea 
 of pre-existence with rare dialectical skill but his 
 arguments remain unconvineing to most of us. 
 The old Socratic or Platonic proofs have been 
 destroyed by modern psychologists and there ap- 
 pears to be no valid foundation for constructing 
 a new argument. The whole theory is purely 
 speculative and depends for its popularity upon a 
 surface conception of retribution. When we go 
 beneath the surface, as has been indicated, the 
 moral appeal of the doctrine is entirely lost. The 
 sort of justice which punishes one individual for 
 the misdeeds of another, and this is what the 
 system comes to when it is reduced to essential 
 facts, makes no appeal to the modern conscience. 
 Such retribution is not in reality retribution at all. 
 It is not the doctrine, as has sometimes been said, 
 
THEOSOPHY AND THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA 103 
 
 that whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also 
 reap, but rather what one man sows another man 
 shall surely reap. The fact that the latter state- 
 ment contains an element of truth does not affect 
 its significance as a moral proposition. Children 
 do undoubtedly suffer for the sins of their parents, 
 but it cannot be said that there is any special 
 moral significance attached to the process. 
 Notwithstanding the essential non-morality, from 
 the higher point of view, of the doctrine of Karma, 
 we find it asserted in the writings of not a few 
 present day thinkers. The Theosophical Society 
 has popularized the theory and has introduced it 
 to many Christians. Mrs. Anne Besant, for ex- 
 ample, defines Karma as ‘‘the law of action and 
 reaction.’’ She is quite enthusiastic in her state- 
 ment of the moral value of the doctrine. To her 
 it is a true gospel, since it ‘‘makes an end of 
 despair, encourages effort, cheers with the 
 proclamation of final success, and insures the 
 permanence of every fragment of good in us.’’ 
 She continues further: | 
 
 Its value as an explanation of life is untold. The criminal, the 
 lowest and vilest, the poorest, foulest specimen of our race, is only 
 a baby soul, coming into a savage body, and thrown into a civiliza- 
 tion for which he is unfit if left to follow his own instincts. 
 
 The knowledge of reincarnation shows us how the social instincts 
 have evolved, why self sacrifice is the law of evolution for man, 
 how we may plan out our own future evolution under natural laws. 
 It teaches us that qualities evolved from earthly experience are 
 
104. HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 returned to earth for the service of man, and how every effort 
 brings its full result under unerring law. 
 
 Karma is a Law of Nature, it compels the ignorant, but it gives 
 freedom to the wise. The three subsidiary expressions of it that 
 bear most on our destiny are, ‘‘Thought builds character’’; ‘‘ De- 
 sire attracts its object and creates opportunity for grasping it’’; 
 ““ Action causes a favorable or unfavorable environment according 
 as it has brought happiness or unhappiness to others.’’ 
 
 Mrs. Besant stresses the idea that Karma is 
 simply a natural law which, lke other natural 
 laws, has no moral quality in itself, but can be 
 used either for good or for evil in accordance with 
 the judgments and purpose of individuals. This 
 idea is at variance with the usual interpretation of 
 the doctrine which makes it the incarnation of jus- 
 tice and a definite embodiment of the moral order 
 of the universe. The advocates of Karma do not 
 manifest any great consistency in the logie which 
 they use to reach their conclusions. Some of them, 
 in fact, contradict directly the statements of 
 others. Professor Pringle-Pattison hag called at- 
 tention to the fact that Alger in his History of 
 the Doctrine of a Future Life argues for the rein- 
 carnation position on the ground that every suffer- 
 ing we endure is the consequence of the deeds of 
 others, and not of our own faults, and on this 
 account parallels the idea with that of the Chris- 
 tian doctrine of the atonement. This is of course 
 the exact opposite of the ordinary interpretation 
 of Karma which embodies the idea that every soul 
 suffers precisely, as Miss Dougall says, ‘‘accord- 
 
THEOSOPHY AND THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA 105 
 
 ing to its sins and no one suffers for the sing of 
 another.’’ We thus have Karma advocated as a 
 purely individual law and also as a principle of 
 atonement for others; as the universal moral law 
 of the world and as a natural law which is es- 
 sentially non-moral. Amid contradictions such as 
 these it is difficult to see how the doctrine can make 
 any serious appeal to present day thought levels. 
 Miss Lily Dougall in her essay on Reimcarnation, 
 Karma, and Theosophy discusses the problem of 
 Karma in detail and reaches the following con- 
 clusion: 
 
 The law of Karma candidly considered offends the instinct of 
 justice in any healthy mind that believes in God. The fact that 
 Christian thinkers have often taught as crude and cruel a doctrine 
 of the Divine government of the world does not make the law of 
 Karma, as expounded by Theosophy more just. It portrays hor- 
 rible injustice on the part of a Divine Power, who binds fallible 
 men upon the wheel of time and offers them no excuse but by toil- 
 
 some effort and the fire of suffering, while He Himself holds aloof 
 both from effort and suffering. 
 
 On the whole, the teaching of Karma and the 
 Theosophical position generally appear to be a re- 
 versal rather than an advance in one’s thinking 
 concerning the future life. Doubtless they embody 
 a primitive effort to solve the problem of evil 
 and as such deserve a certain degree of respectful 
 consideration. The advance in scientific knowl- 
 edge, however, has made such solutions incredible, 
 and as Miss Dougall has said, there is no particular 
 reason for a healthy minded person to regret the 
 
106 HORIZONS: OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 outcome. The doctrine of Karma is after all only 
 a feature of that fundamental pessimism which 
 characterizes the typically Oriental view of the 
 universe. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. Pringle-Pattison, . The Idea of Immortality, Lecture VI. 
 
 2. A. Besant, Theosophy (People’s Books), p. 60-61. 
 
 3. Tylor, Primitive Culture, II, 15. 
 
 4. B. H. Streeter, Immortality, Chapter VIII. 
 
 5. F. C. 8. Schiller, Riddles of the Sphinx, Book III, Chapters 
 XI and XII. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 EVOLUTION AND IMMORTALITY 
 
 KX have already referred to the influence of 
 
 the theory of organic evolution upon the be- 
 lief in immortality. Considered as a whole, there 
 ean be little doubt but that this influence has tended 
 toward disbelief or, in any event, toward doubt 
 rather than toward belief in conscious survival 
 after death. Certainly this was true in the cases 
 of Darwin, Huxley, Spencer, Clifford, Haeckel and 
 numerous other scientists of the period. Begin- 
 ning with John Fiske and Henry Drummond, how- 
 ever, there has grown up a school of evolutionary 
 thought which finds definite promise of personal 
 immortality in the nature and history of organic 
 evolution. A considerable number of recent writers 
 have advocated this theory and it appears to be 
 definitely gaining ground. Professor Pringle-Pat- 
 tison, Professor James Y. Simpson, and other rep- 
 resentatives of the Scottish school of thought have 
 been especially enthusiastic over the idea. An ex- 
 cellent illustration of the position taken by these 
 men may also be found in the essay entitled ‘* The 
 Mind and the Brain’’ by Doctor J. A. Hadfield 
 published in Canon Streeter’s well-known volume 
 on Immortality. 
 
 107 
 
108 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Doctor Hadfield in the essay above mentioned 
 reviews the different theories of the relation of 
 mind and body now prevalent and proclaims his 
 definite adherence to the thoroughgoing evolution 
 of mind. It may be worth while to quote the con- 
 clusion which he reaches in his own language: 
 
 We may now summarize the stages of the evolution of the mind. 
 There are, of course, countless other intermediate stages but it is 
 sufficient for us to have mentioned the most important,— 
 
 (1) In the first stage, that illustrated in the amoeba, we have 
 as yet no conclusive proof of the presence of a mind, except per- 
 haps in the sense of a pervading mind, passive and impersonal, a 
 part of the cosmic mind working in and through the primitive 
 creature. 
 
 (2) In the second stage, we have the animals which possess a 
 nervous system, whose actions are controlled by the flow of nerve 
 energy or neurokyme. 
 
 (3) In the third stage, we have those animals in which incoming 
 sensations have developed a centre for sensations, the central nerv- 
 ous system, where nerve energy is stored, and from which it is dis- 
 charged by regularly constituted channels, and in response to spe- 
 cially strong stimuli. 
 
 (4) In the final stage, sensations are raised to a high pitch of 
 intensity and in some unknown way produce a psychic form of 
 energy we call consciousness. In this stage, also, the organism not 
 only has a store of nerve energy, but possesses the power of direct- 
 ing that energy at will into any channel which leads to the fulfill- 
 ment of its conscious purposes. : 
 
 The body thus appears to have produced what it can no longer 
 control, nor even understand; and evolution has brought forth the 
 flower and glory of its age-long development. 
 
 Doctor Hadfield does not claim that science has 
 demonstrated immortality or that the theory of 
 evolution necessarily leads to the conclusion which 
 
EVOLUTION AND IMMORTALITY 109 
 
 he indicates. He is concerned, much after the man- 
 ner of William James, simply with showing that 
 science does not make it impossible for one to be- 
 heve in immortality and in fact leads to the belief 
 that such a conclusion is probable. The whole 
 process of evolution is a pathway upward and it 
 would seem that the next step is the survival of 
 the spirit after death. Of course until more evi- 
 dence is forthcoming no scientist would affirm that 
 this situation actually obtains as a proved fact, 
 but he is at perfect liberty to affirm that the trend 
 of the scientific data which he possesses leads in 
 the direction of immortality and gives strong 
 ground for believing that at some time definite 
 proof will be secured to substantiate such an 
 hypothesis. To use his own words, ‘‘ For the pres- 
 ent, therefore, so far as science is concerned, life 
 after the grave is not a proved fact, but the evi- 
 dence is sufficient to justify faith in it.’’ This 
 faith, the author says further, is nothing more than 
 the religious counterpart of the hypothetical 
 method of the scientist. All scientific laws are 
 hypotheses and involve the element of faith. The 
 theologian’s belief in immortality is lhkewise an 
 hypothesis and is justified upon the basis of the 
 facts thus far discovered. Of course future in- 
 vestigation may definitely discredit the hypothesis, 
 but so far as we can see at present the evidence 
 is all in the other direction. At this point the 
 
110 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 author of course diverges widely from the position 
 held by a scientist like Professor Ostwald and 
 others of the same school whose conclusions have 
 been referred to in an earlier chapter. 
 
 The most recent and thoroughgoing plea for 
 what may be styled the evolutionary argument for 
 immortality is that of Professor Simpson of New 
 College, Edinburgh, in his volume entitled, Man 
 and the Attainment of Immortality. After trac- 
 ing in elaborate detail the history of the evolution 
 of man, Professor Simpson reaches the conclusion 
 that freedom is attained as a result of the process 
 and that this freedom is the harbinger of immor- 
 tality. He deals specifically with the Scriptural 
 doctrine of survival and boldly asserts that the 
 Bible teaches that continuity of personal existence 
 is morally conditioned or to use his own language, 
 ‘‘that man is immortable rather than immortal.’’ 
 In somewhat hurried fashion and yet considerably 
 in detail, he reviews the Hebrew doctrine of Sheol 
 and the New Testament teaching concerning eternal 
 life. He concludes that Jesus nowhere unequivo- 
 cally teaches the immortality of the soul. The 
 expression itself, he says, ‘‘is not a Biblical phrase, 
 is not even a Biblical conception.’’? Eternal life 
 with him is something to be won or attained and 
 is not a natural inheritance. A man’s life may be 
 lost, ‘‘he may be mulcted of his soul.’? Moreover 
 the teaching of Jesus is not directly connected - 
 
EVOLUTION AND IMMORTALITY Lit 
 
 with any question of rewards and punishments. 
 Statements in the Gospel which appear to possess 
 this connotation are largely secondary if not late 
 additions. Professor Simpson quotes Dr. Shar- 
 man to the effect that Jesus never used the word 
 Gehenna in any other sense than its literal mean- 
 ing as the Valley of Hinnom. Wherever any other 
 sense is required, the comparative study of docu- 
 ments shows that this sense is derived by subse- 
 quent modification of the original words of Jesus. 
 The statement of the rich young ruler, ‘‘Good Mas- 
 ter, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’’ to- 
 gether with the answer of Jesus assumes that 
 eternal life is a morally conditioned survival or 
 continuation of being. 
 
 In dealing with the fourth gospel, Professor 
 Simpson stresses the statement of Jesus that He 
 is the Resurrection and the life and that eternal 
 life is therefore a present possession rather than 
 something to be acquired in the future. Likewise 
 in discussing the Pauline theology, the same point 
 of view is emphasized. For St. Paul, salvation is 
 a process. Life begins here and goes on without 
 a break. In none of Paul’s writings, ‘‘is there any 
 suggestion of a resurrection of the wicked.’’ St. 
 Paul never distinguishes between physical and 
 moral destruction. Professor Simpson concedes 
 that there are a few passages in the Pauline and 
 Lucan writings which are contrary to his inter- 
 
112 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 pretation. This is especially true of Acts 24:14, 
 15. Such passages are best understood as expan- 
 sions of the original data. The other New Testa- 
 ment writers all contribute to the same conclusion. 
 Immortality is the result of conscious union with 
 God and can come only through such union. If 
 we take into account the main line of argument 
 which runs thronghout the New Testament, there 
 ean be no doubt, from the author’s point of view, 
 that the future life is dependent upon our union 
 with the divine life in our present material exist- 
 ence. Jesus explained His own being in this way 
 and obviously intended for His followers to em- 
 body the same truth. To quote Professor Simp- 
 son’s own words: 
 
 Yet our Lord’s own explanation of His life was that it was one 
 with the life of God—that He so lived and moved and had His 
 being in God that their character and purposes were one. That 
 was the secret of His life, according to Himself—not a Virgin 
 birth. Our Lord Himself never gave that reason, never hinted at it. 
 
 Professor Pringle-Pattison in his recent Gifford 
 lectures, to which we have already referred a num- 
 ber of times, adopts substantially the position of 
 Professor Simpson. He reviews in detail the his- 
 tory of the idea of immortality, tracing its earliest 
 appearance in the animistic traditions of primitive 
 man and bringing it down to the most recent 
 period. He shows how the Christian view arose 
 upon the basis of the gospel records and the writ- 
 ings of Paul as interpreted through the medium of 
 
EVOLUTION AND IMMORTALITY 113 
 
 Greek philosophy. In thoroughly iluminating 
 fashion, he interprets the Platonic and Aristo- 
 telian doctrines concerning the future life and then 
 proceeds to show how the idea of a soul substance 
 came down from the Middle Age period into 
 modern philosophy. The absurdity of the theory 
 to Professor Pringle-Pattison’s mind has been 
 thoroughly demonstrated by numerous writers be- 
 ginning with David Hume. In a previous chapter, 
 we have dealt with this subject considerably in de- 
 tail. The Buddhistic doctrine of reincarnation and 
 Karma comes in for some very trenchant criticism 
 as well as the absolutist views of Professors Brad- 
 ley and Bosanquet. Throughout the rapid review 
 of the various theories treated in the volume there 
 is the clearest and most balanced judgment mani- ’ 
 fested on the part of the author. Nothing could 
 be more admirable than the manner in which the 
 entire subject is discussed. 
 
 With regard to Professor Pringle-Pattison’s in- 
 dividual conclusions upon the subject, it is interest- 
 ing to note that they are practically identical with 
 the view expressed in his earlier series of Gifford 
 lectures upon the idea of God. He does not think 
 that the question of personal survival is as signif- 
 icant as many religious and philosophical authori- 
 ties have declared. For example, he deprecates 
 Martin Luther’s statement, ‘‘If you believe in no 
 future life, I would not give a mushroom for your 
 God. Do then as you like. For, if no God, then 
 
114 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 no devil, no hell. As with a fallen tree, all is over 
 when you die. Then plunge into lechery, rascality, 
 robbery, and murder.’’ He also repeats the illus- 
 tration in his earlier Gifford lectures from the life 
 of Tennyson in which the great English poet is 
 said to have exclatrmed, red with excitement, that 
 if immortality is not true, ‘‘no God but a mocking 
 fiend created us,’’ and that if he believed this he 
 would ‘‘sink his head tonight in a chloroformed 
 handkerchief and have done with it all.’’ Pringle- 
 Pattison comments upon this statement to the ef- 
 fect that no attitude could be more irreligious. 
 From his point of view, morality is quite inde- 
 pendent of any such considerations and he appears 
 to think that religion might get along without them 
 too, as it did in the Old Testament period for so 
 many years. Nevertheless, in the main the argu- 
 ment of the book is a distinct plea for personal 
 immortality. The author grounds his faith in a 
 future life upon the nature of God as love and the 
 apparent improbability of the Divine Being allow- 
 ing his children to pass into nothingness after 
 having called them into existence. In rather 
 guarded fashion, he proclaims the doctrine of im- 
 mortability, as Professor Simpson styles it, ar- 
 guing that immortality must be attained and will 
 not be thrust upon those who are unwilling to 
 achieve it or who care nothing for it. In the con- 
 cluding section of his book, he contrasts the two 
 
a 
 
 EVOLUTION AND IMMORTALITY 115 
 
 opposite positions of Plato and Spinoza with re- 
 gard to the extent of consideration which should 
 be given to the problem of death. The wise man, 
 according to the great Athenian philosopher, is 
 the one who has constantly before him the certainty 
 of death, while the modern philosopher says that 
 there is nothing which the truly wise man will 
 think about so little as his approaching demise. 
 Something can be said for both points of view, 
 but on the whole the preference must be given to 
 the later rather than to the earlier thinker. Life 
 is best spent in the discharge of the present duty 
 and without overmuch concern as to the question 
 of future reward. If we have entered into the 
 divine life while here, we may be well assured 
 that we shall be sharers in that life hereafter. 
 There is something fine about the concluding para- 
 graph of the book: 
 
 If we are occupied with thoughts immortal and divine or with 
 some great cause which means for us the kingdom of God on earth, 
 or, for the matter of that, in doing anything that we feel is worth 
 doing, we have neither time nor inclination to brood over our per- 
 sonal future. Our life is full of these objective interests. So death 
 should find us; and to a mind so attuned physical death ought to 
 appear no more than an incident in life, an event to be accepted as 
 naturally as sleep. It should bring with it no suggestion of finality, 
 nor do we find that it really does so in those who thus live. Unbe- 
 
 lief in death, it has been said, seems to be the necessary character- 
 istic or concomitant of true spiritual life. 
 
 Another thinker of the Scottish school, the late 
 Sir Henry Jones, in his Gifford series published 
 
116 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 under the title, A Faith That Enqures, takes 
 substantially the same position as Professor 
 Pringle-Pattison. Immortality to him is directly 
 bound up with a belief in the goodness of the Ab- 
 solute and one genuine failure of the good in any 
 single life would mean a failure of the divine pur- 
 pose. Denial of the immortality of the soul be- 
 comes therefore from his point of view an assertion 
 of absolute skepticism. Sir Henry concedes that 
 there are problems connected with the relation of 
 the finite to the Absolute which are for the present 
 insoluble, but at all costs maintains his faith in 
 God, freedom, and immortality. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. B. H. Streeter, Immortality, Chapter IT. 
 
 2. J. Y. Simpson, Man and the Attainment of Immortality, 
 Chapters XI, XII and XIII. 
 
 3. Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality, Chapter X. 
 
 4. H. Jones, A Faith That Enquires, Lecture 19. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 THE SURRENDER OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 et the beginning of the present study, we re- 
 ferred to the fact that Count Tolstoi and cer- 
 tain other followers of Jesus Christ accept the 
 position that the Christian religion does not re- 
 quire an acceptance of the doctrine of personal 
 survival. These men for the most part make no 
 claim to fellowship with orthodox Christianity, al- 
 though advocating earnestly a return to the Chris- 
 tian ethic. In recent years, however, we find ad- 
 voeates of the same position occupying places of 
 leadership and importance in organized Christian 
 work. Not a few professors in our theological 
 Seminaries occasionally express sentiments of the 
 kind and now and then a similar word is heard 
 from the pulpit. 
 
 Perhaps the most notable illustration of this 
 clesiastical History in Harvard University. Pro- 
 fessor Kirsopp Lake of the Department of Ec- 
 clesiastical History in Harvard University. Pro- 
 fessor Lake is a scholar of wide repute in hig own 
 special field. In the Ingersoll lecture for 1922 on 
 Immortality and the Modern Mind, he states 
 with the utmost frankness that not only does he 
 not believe in personal survival but that, like Tol- 
 
 117 
 
118 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 stoi, he regards the doctrine as detrimental to the 
 true Christian ethic. Taking the saying of Jesus 
 in Mark 8:35, ‘‘For whosoever will save his life 
 shall lose it’? as the motto of the book and in a 
 certain sense as his own personal creed, the author 
 proceeds to interpret these words in such a way 
 as to eliminate any idea of individual immortality. 
 From the point of view of Doctor Lake, to lose 
 one’s self means to surrender those characteristics 
 of individuality and uniqueness which separate us 
 from our fellows and from the Divine Being in 
 order to find a larger life in the future progress 
 of our work. The argument advanced is the same 
 as that of Comte, and George Eliot and Frederic 
 Harrison and the positivists in general that the 
 immortality of influence is all that we can claim 
 and is all that we ought to desire. Professor Lake 
 stresses the altruistic feature of this teaching with 
 persuasive eloquence. To desire immortality for 
 one’s own personal existence, he thinks, is an es- 
 sentially selfish proposal, and in the course of hu- 
 man history has led to unfortunate results. Men 
 were not better during the Medieval period because 
 they believed much more thoroughly in the immor- 
 tality of the individual soul than they do today. 
 To quote his own language, ‘‘Even philanthropy 
 was put on a wrong basis, and the charity of the 
 Middle Ages was less often inspired by love of 
 man than by the hope of heaven. In general there 
 
THE SURRENDER OF IMMORTALITY 119 
 
 was produced a type of selfishness all the more 
 repulsive because it was sanctified.’’ 
 
 Our modern age has changed entirely men’s out- 
 look toward the future life, at least Doctor Lake 
 so interprets present day thinking and action. In 
 his own judgment, this new attitude is destined 
 to be regarded in future history as, ‘‘the great 
 change of our time, commensurate with the rise 
 of Christianity or with the Renaissance, far more 
 important than wars or revolutions.’’ The author 
 can see nothing but good in the new point of view. 
 Men no longer strive to achieve heaven for their 
 own individual souls, but they strive to make pos- 
 sible a heaven on earth for their children and 
 descendants. They are only concerned with the 
 good they can do for future generations without 
 any thought of reaping any immediate satisfaction 
 for themselves. Dr. Lake admits that these men 
 are usually materialists and while he does not sym- 
 pathize with their philosophical background, he 
 does have admiration for the ethical motive which 
 dominates their lives. Speaking of this general 
 class, he says, ‘‘Nevertheless there is no type of 
 man at present living who so completely sacrifices 
 himself for the good of others or cares so little 
 about saving his own life. They are not seeking 
 the crown, but many of them are bearing the cross, 
 and though seeking the crown has been the prac- 
 tice of the Christian, bearing the cross was the 
 precept of the Christ.’’ 
 
120 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 The reason for the changed point of view con- 
 cerning the life beyond the grave so widely prev- 
 alent during our modern age is explained with 
 the utmost frankness by Professor Lake. A better 
 knowledge of our physical nature and the laws 
 which control life has led to ‘‘the conviction that 
 the continuance of sensation is impossible without 
 physical structure, and that the survival of physi- 
 cal structure is extremely improbable.’’ In other 
 words, Professor Lake thinks science has shown 
 us that life is bound up with the bodily organism 
 and when the latter is dissolved by death, it is 
 folly to expect the survival of personality. Like 
 Professor Ostwald, Doctor Lake sees no proba- 
 bility that the soul can survive the body, and ap- 
 parently has no desire that it should do so. The 
 disbelief in personal immortality is not based upon 
 ethical but rather upon scientific considerations. 
 Men do not reject the orthodox view of the future 
 life because they have discovered it to be selfish 
 and immoral, but because they have found it to be 
 impossible. Inasmuch as it does not exist, they 
 are pleased to learn that it is a detriment rather 
 than a help to their ethical life. In making the 
 most of a presumable loss, they discover that they 
 are better off than they were before the loss oc- 
 curred. 
 
 Professor Lake says that the Christian view of 
 immortality is based upon two distinct strands, the 
 
THE SURRENDER OF IMMORTALITY 121 
 
 one he styles the doctrine of the Resurrection of the 
 Flesh and the other the doctrine of the Immortality 
 of the Soul. The former ‘‘was derived through 
 Pharisaic Judaism from Persian thought and was 
 held firmly and even passionately by orthodox 
 Christianity.’’ The latter came from Greek pagan 
 circles and especially the writings of Plato. Paul 
 joined the two ideas together in his teaching con- 
 cerning the spiritual body in the fifteenth chapter of 
 First Corinthians. Professor Lake is not quite sure 
 as to what Paul meant by a spiritual body, but he 
 thinks that it involved in a certain rarefied sense 
 the idea of the Resurrection of the Flesh. After 
 Paul’s time, the Greek belief in the immortality 
 of the soul gained precedence over the earlier view- 
 point. It came to be the dominant principle in the 
 eschatology of the Middle Ages with Dante’s 
 ghastly pictures of the Inferno. In the main, the 
 author follows the general outline already traced 
 at length in this study, so we need pursue this 
 phase of his discussion no further. It may be well 
 to remark, however, that Dr. Lake has small re- 
 spect for the development of Protestant eschatol- 
 ogy with its elimination of purgatory and its re- 
 tention of the Medieval heaven and hell. He says, 
 ‘‘Tt was a choice infinitely clumsy. It left out the 
 only educative element in the Medieval system and 
 retained an impossible combination of worn-out 
 Persian and Greek mythology.”’ 
 
122 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 What is left of the old doctrine at the present 
 time? Doctor Lake thinks there is very little. On 
 the part of both clergy and laity, belief in the Res- 
 urrection of the Flesh has become obsolete and 
 the Immortality of the Soul wavers in the balance. 
 Modern science in a very peculiar way agrees with 
 the conclusions of primitive Christian reasoning 
 with regard to the resurrection body. The early 
 Christian could not conceive of a life which did not 
 involve the physical organism and the present day 
 scientist agrees entirely with this point of view. 
 The only difference is that the Christian believed 
 that the body would be raised from the dead in its 
 material form while the scientist believes this to 
 be both impossible and absurd. Christian and 
 scientist alike agree that there can be no personal 
 consciousness without the body. The idea that the 
 soul can be immortal without the bodily organism 
 is rejected quite as completely by the materialistic 
 scientist as it was by the materialistic Christian 
 of the first century. 
 
 Professor Lake has little confidence in the evi- 
 dence for personal immortality furnished by the 
 Society for Psychical Research. He thinks that the 
 phenomena dealt with in the investigations of the 
 Society can be explained by telepathy. In the, to 
 him, extremely improbable event that the tele- 
 pathic explanation will not hold good, he feels sure 
 that the continuance of life beyond death must in- 
 
THE SURRENDER OF IMMORTALITY 123 
 
 volve a material basis. At this point, he agrees 
 with the early Christian attitude. He regards 
 it as much more probable, however, that the per- 
 manent survival of individuality is only ‘‘a pleas- 
 ant dream, impossible of fulfillment.’’ This con- 
 clusion does not appear to him to be undesirable, 
 as we have already seen. Accepting it frankly, he 
 then proceeds to build up his own theory of the 
 future life which he thinks will provide an ade- 
 quate and indeed a superior substitute for the 
 older Christian dogma. In brief, this substitute 
 involves two features. The first is the idea of the 
 Eastern mystics that human individuality is 
 merged at death in the one universal Being of God 
 and that the true goal of life is to seek such an 
 identification even before our physical existence 
 terminates. Along with this mystical absorption 
 in the Infinite, the author adds a second feature 
 borrowed directly from the Positivistic conception 
 of the immortality of influence. We live in the 
 good we have done, the unselfish service we have 
 rendered others, the part which we have had in 
 forwarding the general scheme of things. The 
 combination of these two considerations into what 
 may be called a sort of Pantheistic Positivism 
 Professor Lake thinks quite adequate to replace 
 the Pauline doctrine of the resurrection of the 
 dead. 
 
 The theory of Doctor Lake has been dealt with 
 elsewhere, under other heads, and need not require 
 
124 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 lengthy treatment at this time. Im all essential 
 particulars, it is simply a revival of the views of 
 Comte with an effort to give them added interest 
 and color by surrounding them with a tinge of 
 Oriental Theosophy. The objections which apply 
 to Positivism and Pantheism in general hold good 
 in the present instance. One cannot see the signifi- 
 eance of unselfish sacrifice for the good of the com- 
 ing generations when according to all the canons 
 of science which the Positivists accept, the material 
 universe is destined to disappear at some future 
 period. All the values preserved by innumerable 
 acts of self-sacrifice through the ages will then be 
 destroyed and leave not a wrack behind. The only 
 way they can be preserved is by the supposition 
 of some sort of spiritual transference and if we ac- 
 cept this in the end we had as well accept it in the 
 beginning. As for the mystical tinge which the 
 theory involves, it is as old as the Upanishads and 
 indeed older. It seems peculiar that it should be 
 revived by a professor of Ecclesiastical History 
 in one of the foremost Christian institutions of the 
 world at the beginning of the twentieth century. 
 The pagan world at the time of Christ was familiar 
 with the doctrine and found it unsatisfying. They 
 turned from it with gladness to accept Paul’s proc- 
 lamation of a genuine personal life beyond the 
 grave. ‘The idea of mystical absorption in the In- 
 finite carried little comfort to troubled souls in 
 
THE SURRENDER OF IMMORTALITY 125 
 
 those early days, and it carries little comfort now. 
 Had Christianity proclaimed such a gospel instead 
 of the triumphant message of the fifteenth chapter 
 of First Corinthians, it is safe to say that it would 
 not have gotten very far as a world religion. The 
 Western mind, at least, extracts small satisfac- 
 tion from the anticipation of Nirvana as the final 
 coal of existence. 
 
 We cannot help wondering when we read appeals 
 like those of Professor Lake in favor of substitut- 
 ing the gospel of Buddhism for the message of 
 Christianity just why we should go back to the 
 Ganges and the Indus for inspiration and help. 
 The Oriental world is now turning toward us in 
 order to find material for a new civilization. 
 Buddhism, with its inadequate social development 
 and Hinduism with its caste system and its pes- 
 simistic outlook have been weighed in the balances 
 and found wanting. The pragmatic test is against 
 them. Nor can we believe that Dr. Lake himself 
 would like to exchange our Western civilization, 
 inadequately Christian as it is, for the best type 
 of Hindu culture the ages have thus far developed. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. K. Lake, Immortality and the Modern Mind, pp. 6, 9, 10, 
 ae Ay, ol, 20, 34, 37. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 
 
 T’ now becomes necessary for us to gather to- 
 
 gether and to formulate in as definite fashion 
 as possible the conclusions which our brief his- 
 torical survey appears to warrant. It is quite 
 obvious that these conclusions must be couched in 
 language which although definite and specific must 
 possess to no slight degree the spirit of humility. 
 
 The first conclusion which appears justified is 
 the fact that certain pagan and pre-Christian views 
 which became attached to the early Christian con- 
 cept of immortality must be definitely cast aside. 
 Much of the Medieval eschatology with its em- 
 phasis upon a species of Christian edition of Tar- 
 tarus has been outgrown by the developing 
 thought of the world. It is impossible for men and 
 women who possess the rudiments of present day 
 culture to think of the future life in precisely the 
 same way that Augustine or Anselm or Calvin 
 thought of it. In certain ultra-conservative circles, 
 the older dogma may remain unimpaired, but these 
 circles must continue to grow smaller and will 
 eventually disappear. 
 
 A second inference which the facts seem to war- 
 rant is that of the dubious character of the old 
 
 126 
 
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION iby 
 
 Platonic doctrine concerning the inherent immor- 
 tality of the soul. The idea that all souls are in 
 their nature immortal and that all human beings 
 alike possess such souls is no longer as convineing 
 as it appeared some centuries ago. It is true that 
 a few scientific authorities of note still hold to the 
 ‘fsoul substance’’ viewpoint, but they are in the 
 minority at the present time. The writer does not 
 believe that the Platonic doctrine has been defi- 
 nitely disproved but he does believe that the 
 weight of argument is against it. The case can- 
 not be considered closed and evidence may be pro- 
 duced at some time in the future which will throw 
 an entirely different light on the situation, but as 
 things stand at present the older doctrine appears 
 to be removed from the realm of probability. 
 
 So far as the present attitude of philosophy to- 
 ward the question is concerned, the net result can- 
 not be considered as hostile to immortality. Cer- 
 tain representatives of the modern realistic school, 
 it is true, have discarded any belief in a future 
 life for the individual, but it cannot be said that this 
 is the prevailing teaching of philosophy even in the 
 group indicated. The modern idealistic school, 
 with the exception of some writers like Professors 
 Bradley and Bosanquet, in the main holds to the 
 future life, and there are not a few pluralists and 
 realists who take the same position. On the whole, 
 the net result of speculative thinking down to the 
 
128 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 present time cannot be said to be unfavorable to 
 the doctrine of personal immortality. This is the 
 third deduction which appears to be justified by 
 our historical analysis. 
 
 In the fourth place, a review of the history of 
 modern science leads to the conclusion that the em- 
 phasis upon scientific processes during the last 
 century has certainly modified and in some in- 
 stances destroyed traditional views of the future 
 life. In certain cases, scientific investigation ap- 
 pears to have led directly to disbelief in personal 
 survival after death. The tendency of scientific 
 thinkers and writers to lean toward a materialistic 
 metaphysic has had its influence in the same direc- 
 tion. On the other hand, the developments in the 
 field of psychical research and the later trend in 
 the interpretation of biological evolution have 
 proved important factors in helping to maintain 
 and strengthen the faith in immortality on the part 
 of many students. It seems fair to the facts to say 
 that the testimony of science thus far has on the 
 whole neither strengthened nor diminished the 
 argument for at least some form of personal sur- 
 vival. 
 
 A fifth consideration is the fact that efforts to 
 revive the Oriental philosophy of the future in our 
 western civilization cannot be said to have achieved 
 any marked success. The pantheistic doctrine of 
 the Hindu cults and especially the teachings con- 
 
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 129 
 
 cerning Karma and Nirvana have not been able to 
 make any marked impression upon western 
 thought. Occasionally a few exceptions may be 
 found as in the case of our modern Theosophists 
 and even certain university teachers, lke Pro- 
 fessor Lake, but the vast majority of present day 
 thinkers in the western world remain unattracted 
 by the Oriental view of metempsychosis and 
 similar theories. 
 
 In connection with the much mooted subject of 
 psychical research, or the argument from spirit- 
 ualism in its various forms, it may be said, in the 
 sixth place, that the evidence while somewhat im- 
 pressive at certain points and in a few cases con- 
 vincing to certain minds still appears to justify the 
 Scottish verdict of ‘‘not proven.’’ Beyond any 
 question, the psychical researchers have helped to 
 offset the general materialistic trend of modern 
 science, but this appears to be their most notable 
 contribution, at least down to the present time. 
 This was in substance the verdict of William - 
 James and he perhaps knew as much about the 
 facts and was capable of making as unprejudiced 
 deductions from them as anyone who could be 
 named. Psychical research therefore while not 
 proving personal survival has contributed not a 
 little toward strengthening the faith of those who 
 accept the doctrine on other grounds. 
 
 When we consider what we must regard as the 
 
130 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 real conception of immortality taught in the gos- 
 pels and by the early church as a whole, that is, 
 the belief that faith in Jesus Christ means incor- 
 poration in the divine life and continued existence 
 on this account, it seems obvious to the writer that 
 there is nothing in present day thought which tends 
 to discredit the doctrine. On the contrary, there 
 is much that helps to support and encourage it. 
 More than ever, the futility and purposelessness of 
 existence without the life beyond the grave be- 
 comes apparent to the thoughtful Christian of to- 
 day. Theories like those of Professor Lake do not 
 satisfy any more than they have satisfied in the 
 past. Only the consciousness of living fellowship 
 with the Father of our spirits brings satisfaction 
 and peace. As Professor Pringle-Pattison puts it, 
 
 Every other being is, as it were, a channel of the Universal 
 Will; but man, as self-conscious, can distinguish himself even from 
 his Maker, and set his own will against the divine. Is it, then, 
 unreasonable to conclude that an individuality so real, and the goal 
 apparently of an age-long process must be capable of surviving the 
 dissolution of the material frame through which it was brought into 
 being? The body, ceasing to be a living body, may relapse into its 
 elements when it has ‘‘fulfilled’’ itself, while the true individual, 
 
 in which that fulfillment consisted, pursues his destiny under new 
 conditions. 
 
 President George KE. Horr of the Newton Theo- 
 logical Institution in the Ingersoll Lecture for 1923 
 stresses this idea of fellowship with the Divine 
 Being with persuasiveness and power. He holds 
 that only through the family concept can the 
 
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION dus} 
 
 fatherhood of God be definitely realized. He re- 
 gards the immortality of influence as altogether in- 
 adequate for the conservation of true moral values. 
 He says, ‘‘The heirs of a fortune may enter into 
 an inheritance; but the reaction upon the character 
 of the one who by his industry, enterprise, and 
 facing of difficulties gained the wealth, cannot be 
 transmitted to others. The development and en- 
 richment of personality is the consummate result 
 of noble living, and if the living man ceases to 
 exist, that is lost forever. The choicest values per- 
 sist only in the lives of those who won them; they 
 cannot be transmitted.’’ Dr. Horr defines eternal © 
 life in line with the interpretation followed in the 
 first chapter of the present study and asserts that 
 the Easter message of the early church involved 
 this idea as its kernel. The doctrine of the Resur- 
 rection as St. Paul taught it embodied the same 
 conception. Moreover, the mystical evidence of 
 experience with the risen Lord in Paul’s own life 
 and in the lives of countless Christians since his 
 time has confirmed the theoretical evidence of the 
 reality of the future life. Such proof although 
 incommunicable to others is conclusive and over- 
 whelming to the one who possesses it. 
 
 Perhaps the chief drawback in the way of the 
 acceptance of a belief in the life beyond on the part 
 of most doubters of the present day is the modern 
 tendency toward materialism in every form. This 
 
132 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 tendency, while rejecting the older and cruder 
 materialistic views of eschatology, has found 
 nothing to take their place. The early Christians 
 thought of heaven and hell under forms of imagery 
 which we consider inadequate and crude. We have 
 not accustomed ourselves to clothing the great 
 truth embodied in the doctrine of immortality with 
 forms of imagery appropriate to our present de- 
 velopment. The nearest approach in this direction 
 - has been made by Fechner whose little book on 
 the future life remains one of the most appealing 
 and beautiful contributions to the subject. We 
 need a new vision of heaven which will interpret 
 the reality of the life to come in such forms as will 
 be meaningful to our present age. There is too 
 much disposition at the present time to feel that 
 we know nothing about the future life and can 
 know nothing about it, therefore we shall cease to 
 think about it. In the end, of course, there is a 
 tendency for us to give up our faith in it. Reality 
 demands a certain concreteness of imagery and 
 this is as true of the future life as it is of any other 
 consideration in the universe. 
 
 After all, one’s belief in immortality, like one’s 
 belief in God or in any concept that possesses 
 value, demands a certain degree of moral courage 
 and heroism. Professor L. P. Jacks, in his fas- 
 einating little book entitled Religious Perplex- 
 ities has called attention to this fact in simple 
 
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION 133 
 
 but unforgettable language. The universe is not 
 adapted to the coward nor to the cowardly type of 
 mind. We are surrounded on all sides by per- 
 plexities, but if we are courageous and are willing 
 to exercise faith, we need not fall into the abyss 
 of despair. From the beginning, religion has al- 
 ways been an adventure of the soul. It was so 
 with Abraham and with every member of the noble 
 galaxy who are immortalized in the eleventh chap- 
 ter of the Epistle to the Hebrews. Without faith 
 it is impossible to please God and faith always 
 demands high-spirited courage and a certain will- 
 ingness to stake one’s all on the reality of good- 
 ness and truth. As Professor Jacks says so 
 /admirably, Christianity does not pretend to free us * 
 
 | from our perplexities, but it does enable us to face 
 “them boldly and to triumph over them. Like the 
 ereat Apostle to the Gentiles, we are always per- 
 plexed, ‘‘but not unto despair.”’ 
 
 There is nothing in the history of either philoso- 
 phy or science which makes faith in the future life 
 as Christ taught it any more difficult today than it 
 has been in the past. Always there has been room 
 for doubt and disbelief and it does not appear that 
 this situation will vanish with earthly conditions 
 as they now are. On the other hand, there are 
 many things in the progress of knowledge which 
 lend encouragement to faith, while there is nothing 
 which forbids its exercise. 
 
134 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 On the memorial tablet to Frederic W. H. Myers 
 in the Protestant Cemetery at Rome, there is writ- 
 ten this quotation from the fourth verse of the 
 twenty-first Psalm: ‘‘He asked life of thee, and 
 thou gavest it him, even length of days forever 
 and ever.’’? Just beneath the tablet, which is fas- 
 tened to the old Roman wall, there is the marble 
 slab which covers the ashes of Shelley. On the 
 English poet’s tomb is engraved the well-known 
 quotation from The Tempest: 
 
 There is nothing that doth fade 
 But doth suffer a sea-change 
 Into something rich and strange. 
 
 The two epitaphs bear silent witness to the true 
 gospel of immortality. Our Father has given us 
 ‘‘leneth of days forever and forever’’ because we 
 are His children, but this new life will mean a 
 transition ‘‘into something rich and strange’’ after 
 the experience we call death. ‘‘It doth not yet ap- 
 pear what we shall be,’’ but we need not fear, for 
 we know that we shall live in His home where there 
 are many mansions and that through His gracious 
 love ‘‘we shall be like Him.’’ 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. G. E. Horr, The Christian’ Faith and Eternal Life, pp. 28, 
 29, 39, 51. 
 
 2. R. M. Jones, Religious Foundations, Chapter X. 
 
 3. G. T. Fechner, Life After Death. 
 
 4. L. P. Jacks, Religious Perplexities, Chapter IIT. 
 
 5. S. D. F. Salmond, The Christian Doctrine of Immortality, 
 Book 6. 
 
 6. Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality, Lecture 10. 
 
HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 PART II. CONSTRUCTIVE SUGGESTIONS 
 
 “Earth changes, but thy soul and God Stand sure” 
 
ESUS said unto her, I am the resurrec- 
 
 tion, and the life: he that believeth on 
 me, though he die, yet shall he live; and 
 whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall 
 never die. 
 
 —Jesus Christ 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 FAITH IN THE SOUL 
 
 Oe study up to the present point has been of a 
 
 purely historical character. We have out- 
 lined in the briefest possible fashion what men 
 have thought about the future life during the last 
 two thousand years. We have tried to reach cer- 
 tain critical conclusions as the result of this his- 
 torical survey. Doubtless these conclusions will 
 seem to many readers of a rather negative charac- 
 ter. They certainly do not justify us in asserting 
 that the future life can be regarded as a datum of 
 science. On the other hand, they assuredly do not 
 make it scientifically necessary for one to disbe- 
 lieve in immortality. The field is left open for the 
 exercise of the will to believe, or in other words, 
 the question remains in the realm of faith where it 
 has always been in the past. 
 
 The writer frankly confesses that he would like 
 to see the subject removed from the realm of faith 
 to the realm of science. He confesses thorough 
 sympathy with every effort which has been and is 
 being made to achieve this result. He believes that 
 if it could be scientifically demonstrated that hu- 
 man beings are immortal, such a discovery would 
 
 137 
 
138 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 be the most important that has thus far been made 
 in the history of the human race. Christianity 
 owed its success in the first place to the preaching 
 of the Resurrection. Now the Resurrection is 
 nothing more than a scientific demonstration of the 
 reality of the future life. From a theological point 
 of view, it is easy to understand why the unique 
 character of Jesus made his Resurrection a unique 
 event in world history, but this fact removes the 
 Resurrection from the field of scientific study as 
 we know it. While the Resurrection of Jesus be- 
 comes therefore a tremendous aid to faith in the 
 reality of a future life, it does not help to transfer 
 the problem from the realm of faith to the realm 
 of science. If this transfer could be made, it would 
 simply confirm the teaching of Jesus with regard 
 to the future, and confirm it in such a way that 
 there would be no possibility of doubting it. 
 
 If immortality could be scientifically demon- 
 strated, the fact would unquestionably produce 
 vast changes in all forms of human activity. Noth- 
 ing would tend to overthrow materialism in all of 
 its forms like such a demonstration. We are not 
 now concerned primarily with the question of eth- 
 ics. Opinions differ widely as to the value of a 
 belief in immortality in the realm of pure ethics. 
 We have already referred to the fact that Prof. 
 Pringle-Pattison, in common with many other 
 thinkers, regards such a belief as of no particular 
 ethical significance. People ought to be good 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 139 
 
 whether they are to live hereafter or not, and if 
 they are not good without the spur of future re- 
 wards or punishments, their goodness possesses 
 no real ethical value. On the other hand, many dis- 
 tinguished names including among others those of 
 Luther, Augustine, Wesley, Browning, Tennyson, 
 and Longfellow regard immortality as a distinct 
 ethical factor. Whatever position we take with 
 regard to its influence upon morals, there can be 
 no question about the fact that belief in a future 
 life has a profound bearing upon human behavior. 
 If the average man accepted immortality as a 
 scientific fact, it would introduce an item into the 
 calculations of his daily life which would pro- 
 foundly affect his actions. Professor Pringle- 
 Pattison himself would probably act somewhat dif- 
 ferently in the light of an assured immortality and 
 so would all the rest of us. Browning in his little 
 poem entitled ‘‘A Grammarian’s Funeral’’ has 
 shown how this assurance works out in the field of 
 pure scholarship. The hero of the poem is so con- 
 vineed that he will have eternity in which to con- 
 tinue his studies that he attacks small and insig- 
 nificant questions in this life, leaving the larger 
 issues for the period hereafter when he will have 
 more time to study them. If he had felt any doubt 
 concerning his personal immortality, he would have 
 acted very differently in choosing his studies. At 
 bottom, every human being is like the grammarian. 
 There is no important step in life which the assur- 
 
140 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 ance of immortality does not affect. Whether it be 
 in the field of education or business or of polities 
 or of social life, the knowledge that death does not 
 end all would necessarily have the most profound 
 influence upon behavior. So long as immortality 
 has not received scientific demonstration, it is of 
 the utmost significance that the strongest possible 
 faith in it should be developed. This faith may be- 
 come so strong as almost to pass over into the field 
 of assured demonstration. It is this kind of faith 
 to which Paul referred when he said, ‘‘I know 
 whom I have believed,’’ and it is this kind of faith 
 which the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 calls the substance of things hoped for, the evi- 
 dence, or assurance, of things not seen. When we 
 pass over from the realm of science into the realm 
 of faith, it is possible to possess all shades of con- 
 viction ranging from the practical certainty of 
 Paul to the half indefinite apprehension of the 
 modern materialist which is only one shade re- 
 moved from positive disbelief. The function of 
 religion is to strengthen faith, and there is no item 
 of faith which is more important than the belief in 
 a future life. Some devout souls have felt that to 
 remove this question from the realm of faith to 
 that of fact would mean a distinct loss. As al- 
 ready noted, we do not at all share this belief. 
 There will always be enough of material for the 
 exercise of faith even if this all important issue 
 should be included among the data of science. 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 141 
 
 The most important consideration in developing 
 real faith in personal immortality is the recogni- 
 tion of the value and reality of human personality. 
 It is useless to talk about the immortality of the 
 soul if there is no soul to be immortal. It is a 
 waste of time to argue in favor of the persistence 
 of the self if there is no self to persist. Hence, the 
 starting point of any real faith in the significance 
 of the future lies in building up a faith in the sig- 
 nificance of the present. There is a type of mecha- 
 nistic psychology which explains all human be- 
 havior in terms of physical reaction. Those who 
 accept this view do not of course believe in immor- 
 tality. Nevertheless, even the most cocksure rep- 
 resentatives of this school of thought will hardly 
 assert that their position represents anything more 
 than an hypothesis. The facts which this hypoth- 
 esis is intended to explain may be explained in 
 other ways and are thus explained by many psy- 
 chologists. Professor McDougall, for example, 
 although a thoroughgoing scientist, does not accept 
 the mechanistic interpretation. He is one of those 
 thinkers who, while not particularly desirous of 
 immortality, yet believes that the human self is of 
 such a character that immortality is inherently 
 probable. The fact is that while human behavior 
 has a distinctly mechanistic side, when it is consid- 
 ered in its larger aspects, it passes beyond the 
 mechanistic field. We doubt whether the most 
 frantic behaviorist does not occasionally have 
 
142 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 moments of sober reflection when he takes himself 
 more seriously than the strict logic of his theory 
 will permit. We shall have something more to say 
 about this feature of the situation a little later. 
 
 Nothing has helped to stimulate faith in the real 
 significance and value of the human soul during 
 recent years more than the development of the 
 comparatively new science known as the psychol- 
 ogy of religion. Starting out from a purely posi- 
 tivistic and mechanistic point of view, the psychol- 
 ogy of religion has developed to a point where it 
 has become a distinct adjunct to faith. The recent 
 works of Pratt, Thouless, Selbie, and Strickland 
 in this field all give encouragement to a belief in 
 the value of the human soul and in the probability 
 of its persistence after it has passed through the 
 experience we call death. It may be worth our 
 while to turn for a few moments to the testimony 
 of some of these later psychologists. Says Profes- 
 sor Pratt in Chapter XI of The Religious Con- 
 SCLOUSNESS: 
 
 If we analyze the emotional form of conviction concerning im- 
 mortality we shall, I think, find that in most cases it is based upon 
 a direct apprehension of the essential worth of the self; going back, 
 
 I suppose, to the instinct of self-assertion—if indeed it does not 
 go back farther than any instinct. 
 
 In another place in the same chapter he refers 
 to the Platonic emphasis upon the dignity of the 
 human soul as after all the surest basis of its con- 
 tinued existence. Professor Pratt does not think 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 148 
 
 that modern psychology has made it impossible for 
 one to believe in the absolute worth of the human 
 spirit. He says: 
 
 Probably the argument for immortality that is both most gen- 
 erally persuasive and logically the soundest consists in pointing out 
 the essential difference between consciousness and its processes on 
 the one hand, and the material world and its laws on the other. 
 
 This is, of course, the essence of the Platonic arguments, and noth- 
 ing better is likely ever to be suggested. 
 
 Principal Selbie in his recently published text on 
 The Psychology of Religion (Oxford, 1924), takes 
 substantially the same position as Professor Pratt. 
 He says among other things: 
 
 Leaving the religious question for the moment, we find that the 
 real ground for the persistence of the belief in immortality among 
 reflective men is to be found in the working of consciousness. The 
 primitive belief in spirits has its counterpart in civilized and more 
 sophisticated minds in a recoil from the merely mechanical view of 
 life, and a consciousness of the self as spiritual in the sense of 
 being independent and even master of the fleshly and material life. 
 
 Professor Strickland (Psychology of Religious 
 Experience, New York, 1924) gives two reasons 
 for believing that the soul survives after death. 
 These two reasons represent the culmination of 
 the concluding chapter of his book in which he 
 deals with the subject of immortality in its rela- 
 tion to psychology and religion: 
 
 First. The control of mind over organic process, which is in- 
 creasingly evident at certain levels of human experience, points to 
 
 the growing independence of mind and to the possibility of the self 
 surviving the organism. 
 
144 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Second. The capacity of the self to organize experience increas- 
 ingly in terms of the higher social values (as contrasted with mere 
 organic needs) points to the possibility of the self surviving the 
 organism. 
 
 Until we can secure a greater weight of objec- 
 tive evidence for human survival, our argument 
 must always turn largely upon an appeal to the 
 consciousness of the individual. Plato’s feeling of 
 the native worth of the soul has about it a touch 
 of reality which defies skepticism. The argument 
 for immortality in the Phaedo while technically 
 outworn possesses a perennial freshness because 
 of its appeal to personal consciousness. Socrates 
 calmly looking upon the hemlock as a trivial inci- 
 dent in a career which is to be only triflingly inter- 
 rupted, represents, of course, the real argument of 
 the book. Nearly twenty-five centuries later, Mr. 
 Clement C. J. Webb in his second series of Gifford 
 Lectures writes of the soul in terms that are as 
 Socratic as our modern idiom will permit: 
 
 I speak in the text of ‘‘mind or soul’’ for the following reason. 
 It is the ‘‘mind’’ as the subject of experience which is thus so re- 
 markably distinguished from the body as including instead of ex- 
 cluding within its own unity that with which it is connected in a 
 system. If we attribute to the ‘‘soul’’ vital activities below the 
 level of consciousness, this may not seem to be true in the same 
 way of the ‘‘soul.’’ But, in the first place, the characteristic dif- 
 ference of organic growth from inorganic aggregation seems to lie 
 in a process of assimilation which anticipates, as it were, the proc- 
 ess of drawing within the unity of its own experience which is the 
 characteristic of ‘‘mind.’’ And in the second place, as was pointed 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 145 
 
 out in my previous course of Lectures, we may be said to have in 
 Life generally something which, as distinct from mere mechanism, 
 we interpret on the analogy of Mind. 
 
 Like Plato and Socrates, Kant and Hoffding find 
 immortality fundamentally a problem in the con- 
 servation of values. If personality is valuable and 
 there 1s any meaning in the universe, personality 
 must be preserved. Moreover, personal values 
 eannot be transferred because the very essence of 
 personality consists in its uniqueness. A man may 
 leave his thought and his works to posterity, but 
 if any worth attaches to the man himself, this 
 worth cannot be passed on to others. There is 
 something about the human consciousness which 
 seems to give the lie to mechanism. We may argue 
 ourselves into the belief that we are nothing but 
 physical reactions, but all the while there is a 
 subtle contradiction underlying our argument. The 
 self which knows and which knows that it knows 
 is a larger thing than the mechanism which it ana- 
 lyzes. Even those who have not accepted orthodox 
 religious views concerning the nature of the soul 
 have at times acknowledged their inability to get 
 away from the idea. One of the most notable illus- 
 trations of this fact is to be found in the often 
 quoted passage from Huxley’s Letters: 
 
 It is a curious thing that I find my dislike to the thought of 
 extinction increasing as I get older and nearer the goal. It flashes 
 
 across me at all sorts of times and with a sort of horror that in 
 1900 I shall probably know no more of what is going on than I 
 
146 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 did in 1800. I had sooner be in hell a good deal—at any rate in 
 one of the upper circles where the climate and company are not too 
 trying. 
 
 In much the same fashion Dr. Felix Adler, the 
 distinguished advocate of Ethical Culture, writes: 
 
 Only this I feel warranted in holding fast to, that the root of 
 my selfhood, the best that is in me, my true and only being, can- 
 not perish. In regard to that the notion of death seems to me to 
 be irrelevant. 
 
 It would be easy to multiply quotations of this 
 character. There are few thoughtful people who 
 do not at some time or other possess what may be 
 styled the consciousness of immortality. Of course 
 this consciousness may be regarded as an illusion 
 and may be dismissed summarily on this account. 
 On the other hand, it may be cherished and may 
 become a, definite ground of assurance to those who 
 possess it. Some years ago before a student meet- 
 ing at Princeton University, Dr. Robert E. Speer 
 in asserting his own consciousness of the reality 
 of the human spirit used this expression, ‘‘ Gentle- 
 men, I do not have a soul; I am a soul.’’ Among 
 modern philosophers, Bergson has seized upon this 
 primary consciousness of the reality of the self 
 and has made it the basis of his system. William 
 James also has called attention to the superior 
 value of this feeling of reality when contrasted 
 with the more subtle second-hand speculations of 
 metaphysics. There is therefore good warrant in 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 147 
 
 the realms of both science and philosophy for be- 
 lieving in the reality and the worth of human per- 
 sonality. Such belief will not always lead to a con- 
 viction that the self is immortal, but it is almost a 
 necessary presupposition of faith in a future life. 
 Moreover, it naturally leads to such a philosophy 
 of the world as makes immortality reasonable and 
 probable. 
 
 ‘*What shall a man give in exchange for his 
 soul?’’ Nothing at all, if our modern mechanists 
 are right, for according to them, the soul is a 
 chimera and one would be foolish to exchange any- 
 thing of value for it. Some of us, however, will 
 continue to believe that Jesus knew more about the 
 matter than the mechanists. In our daily experi- 
 ence, things are constantly happening which upset 
 the mechanistic hypothesis. A few years ago such 
 an event occurred in connection with that wild and 
 weird return journey of Captain Scott and his 
 companions from the South Pole. One of the 
 party, Captain Oates, had his feet frozen, and had 
 to be carried along through the blinding snow- 
 storm by his comrades. He begged them to leave 
 him behind so that they might have a chance to 
 save their own lives, but his proposal was met with 
 scorn. Finally, when they halted for the night, at 
 one of the last stations which the party was able 
 to make, Oates staggered out of the hut into the 
 storm with the remark, ‘‘I am just going outside, 
 and may be gone some time.’’? His comrades never 
 
148 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 saw him again, and when the party which had been 
 sent out to rescue Captain Scott found the dead 
 members of the band, Scott with his journal in his 
 hand, they were unable to locate the body of Oates. 
 In memory of his heroic action, they set up a cross 
 near the spot where he wandered out into the storm 
 and wrote this inscription upon it: ‘‘Hereabouts 
 died a very gallant gentleman.’’ Scott, in the last 
 entry of his diary, had written: ‘‘The Great God 
 has called me. Take comfort in that. I die at 
 peace with the world and myself and not afraid.’’ 
 He and his companions had taken as their motto 
 the words, ‘*To seek—to strive—to find and not to 
 yield.’’ 
 
 Frank Parker Stockbridge has written a poem 
 upon the epitaph of Oates which was published a 
 few years ago in Everybody’s Magazme. It is en- 
 titled ‘‘A Very Gallant Gentleman’’ and sums up 
 the argument of this chapter in such a clear and 
 forceful way that we quote it entire: 
 
 So that’s the answer, eh? We’re only lumps 
 
 Of ordinary chemicals—some salts, 
 
 Acids, and gases, accidently grouped 
 
 In cell-formation? There creation halts, 
 
 You say, and what comes next is just what comes 
 When you put this and that and t’other bit 
 
 Of inorganic matter in your tube 
 
 And watch the mixture swirl and seethe and spit 
 Till all its atoms find affinities. 
 
FAITH IN THE SOUL 149 
 
 That’s all, you say? Then life and love and hate, 
 Courage and hope and anguish and despair, 
 
 The will to strive, the pride of duty done, 
 
 The fear of shame that drives the coward to dare 
 The death he dreads—all these, you say, are one 
 With your reactions done in Jena glass? 
 
 O shrewd philosophers! Your simple plan 
 To shift the whole responsibility 
 For all we are and all we hope to be— 
 How easy! ‘‘Here’s a compound we call man, 
 And here’s one called a rock, and here’s a cliff. 
 The rock rolls off the cliff and kills the man; 
 But can you blame the rock? Nor can you if 
 The man obeys the natural laws that pull 
 All of us, always, down and ever down. 
 For if we sink ‘reactions’—that absolves, 
 And if we rise—‘reactions’—nothing more.’’ 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 Pardon me, gentlemen, but—‘‘it’s a lie.’’ 
 “‘Reactions,’’ eh? Well, what’s your formula 
 For one particular kind—I won’t insist 
 
 On proof of every theorem in the list; 
 
 But only one—what chemicals combine, 
 
 What CO, and H,SO,, 
 
 To cause such things as happened yesterday, 
 To send a very gallant gentleman 
 
 Into antarctic night, to perish there 
 
 Alone, not driv’n nor shamed nor cheered to die, 
 But fighting, as mankind has always fought, 
 His baser self, and conquering, as mankind 
 Down the long years has always conquered self. 
 
 What are your tests to prove a man’s a man? 
 Which of yowr compounds ever lightly threw 
 Its life away, as men have always done, 
 Spurr’d not by lust nor greed nor hope of fame 
 
150 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 But casting all aside on the bare chance 
 
 That it might somehow serve the Greater Good? 
 There’s a reaction—what’s its formula? 
 Produce that in your test tubes if you can! ’’ 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 . Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of Immortality, Chapter X. 
 
 R. Browning, A Grammarian’s Funeral. 
 
 W. McDougall, Body and Mind, earlier chapters. 
 
 J. B. Pratt, The Religious Consciousness, Chapters I, II, and 
 
 {ef 
 (O00 Fe go Pop 
 
 Strickland, The Psychology of Religious Experience, Chapter 
 
 is 
 
 . Selbie, The Psychology of Religion, Chapter XIV. 
 . Thouless, An Introduction to the Psychology of Religion. 
 . Plato, Dialogues, The Phaedo. 
 C. C. J. Webb, Divine Personality and Human Life, Chapter 
 X. 
 10. Huxley, Life and Letters, Vol. ii. 
 11. H. Bergson, Creative Evolution, Chapter I. 
 12. W. James, A Pluralistic Universe, Chapter V. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 FAITH IN GOD 
 
 N his recent volume of criticism entitled Mam- 
 monart, Mr. Upton Sinclair refers to God as 
 ‘‘the greatest of all auto-suggestions.’’ This def- 
 inition is not at all new, although it has not always 
 been stated in exactly the same way. Robert 
 Ingersoll expressed it facetiously when he referred 
 to God as having been created in the image of man 
 instead of man in the image of God. Quite a num- 
 ber of modern psychologists refer to the Deity as 
 purely a subjective idea or ideal without any ob- 
 jective existence. Such writers assert that the idea 
 has value and therefore should be retained. They 
 speak of themselves as Theists and frequently as 
 Christians. They believe in God, but the God in 
 whom they believe turns out to be nothing more 
 than an idea which they have themselves created. 
 Those who accept this subjective view of the 
 Deity of course have little use for the doctrine of 
 immortality. Long ago Kant saw that without the 
 reality of God, both freedom and immortality be- 
 come meaningless terms. If there is a moral uni- 
 verse there must be a God, and if there is a God, 
 there must be a hereafter for the human spirit. So 
 the Kénigsberg philosopher reasoned, and _ his 
 argument still holds. People who do not believe in 
 151 
 
£52 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 immortality do not usually believe in a personal 
 -God, while those who believe in such a Deity usu- 
 ally anticipate a life to come. There are of course 
 exceptions to the rule, but they are neither numer- 
 ous nor significant. The present day decline in 
 faith concerning the future life has been accom- 
 panied by a decline in faith in a personal God. 
 Professor Leuba’s questionnaire referred to in a 
 previous chapter is an illustration of this fact. 
 Belief in God and in immortality were lnked to- 
 gether in most of the responses which he received. 
 
 The theory which regards God as merely a sub- 
 jective creation always insists upon the necessity 
 of thinking and acting as though he were real. 
 Prayer from this point of view is of course nothing 
 but auto-suggestion and yet prayer is a good thing. 
 The difficulty about the theory is that it defeats its 
 own end. God is looked upon as a valuable and 
 serviceable idea, but when an individual comes to 
 regard God as nothing more than an idea, the idea 
 itself ceases to possess value. Assuming that 
 prayer is nothing but auto-suggestion, it soon loses 
 all value as prayer when this view of its nature 
 comes to be held by the one who prays. One may 
 logically suggest to himself desirable ends after 
 the fashion of M. Coué, but even M. Coué never 
 prays to himself. What prayer logically means to 
 a disciple of the subjective theory is vividly 
 brought out in the following petition which may be 
 called the model prayer of the Positivist: 
 
FAITH IN GOD 10D 
 
 O thou great Construct of our social aspirations! Thou who hast 
 arisen out of millennial attitudes and who in thyself, which art a 
 social personal self, dost enshrine all social personal virtues, thou 
 who wilt function in us who are social personal centres of sen- 
 tience in accordance with adjustments which we make in our social 
 strivings, thou who dost exist only in our own social consciousnesses, 
 we beseech thee for nothing, knowing that thou canst give us noth- 
 ing, thank thee for what we have ourselves achieved, and ask only 
 for the peace of relaxation which comes from auto-suggestion aris- 
 ing from our idea of Thee which we enlarge daily in our evolution. 
 
 Perhaps few subjectivists ever use such a prayer 
 as this in actual experience, and yet it is just the 
 kind of prayer which the logic of their theory de- 
 mands. The fact that it is not used simply proves 
 that the idea of prayer like the idea of the Deity 
 no longer possesses value when it is regarded as 
 purely subjective. Prayer may be nothing more 
 than auto-suggestion, but we must believe it to be 
 something more if we are to continue to pray. The 
 attempt to hold on to it while at the same time ac- 
 cepting a theory of its nature which deprives it of 
 all meaning or value is simply an impossible com- 
 bination. 
 
 If modern subjectivism has undermined a vital 
 belief in God, it is also true that the older views 
 of orthodoxy are equally valueless for thoughtful 
 minds of the present age. It is impossible for us 
 to think of God just as Augustine or Calvin thought 
 of Him, or as He is defined in the older standards. 
 The doctrine of predestination which is indissol- 
 ubly associated with the older views of the Deity is 
 
154. HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 out of harmony with modern ethical conceptions 
 and if insisted upon can only add to the prevailing 
 skepticism. In our historical survey we have dealt 
 with these older conceptions at sufficient length and 
 need not refer to them further. What we wish to 
 emphasize is the fact that while we must believe 
 in a God who is real, He need not be the God of the 
 Augustinian theology. Modern subjectivism has 
 practically eliminated God entirely, but we shall 
 not meet its arguments by going back to outworn 
 dogmas. We must meet them by holding up the 
 God of the New Testament, and not the God of 
 later creedal formulations. As between a deity 
 who possesses the unethical attributes which we 
 find depicted in the pages of St. Augustine and the 
 shadowy ideal worshiped by modern Positivism, 
 many will prefer the latter. What is needed is a 
 concept of God which does not deprive Him of ob- 
 jectivity but which is also capable of intelligent 
 acceptance by the modern mind. 
 
 Such a concept we are constrained to believe is 
 to be found in the early Christian view of the reve- 
 lations of God in Jesus Christ. Professor MeGif- 
 fert in his recently published volume of lectures, 
 entitled The God of the Early Christians, has 
 shown with admirable clearness that it was this 
 conception of the Deity which dominated the think- 
 ing of the early Gentile Christian community. It 
 was not until later that the more highly speculative 
 theories embodied in the Nicene and Athanasian 
 
FAITH IN GOD 155 
 
 Creeds came to be accepted. The early Christians 
 looked upon Jesus as the highest embodiment of 
 God which men can understand or know. Jesus 
 was real to them, and therefore God was real. 
 Jesus had been raised from the dead and had 
 promised eternal life to his followers; therefore, 
 they believed unhesitatingly in personal immortal- 
 ity. This simple faith in a few short years con- 
 quered the world. There is nothing to indicate 
 that it has lost its power today. If people do not 
 believe in God at the present time, it is largely 
 because they no longer find it possible to infuse 
 reality into an outworn metaphysical concept. It 
 is still possible, however, to believe in a God who is 
 like Jesus Christ. Not that Jesus in His earthly 
 existence exhausted all of the fulness of the divine 
 nature, for He nowhere claims this, but simply that 
 He reveals to us as much of God as we are able to * 
 understand or to know. Having seen Him, we 
 have seen the Father. This is the tremendous 
 value of the doctrine of the deity of Christ. Not 
 only does this doctrine identify God with the high- 
 est ethical ideal which the world has ever seen or 
 known, but it also takes God out of the realm of 
 abstractions and subjective ideas and makes Him 
 supremely personal and real. 
 
 It is just such a concept of God which our mod- 
 ern age demands. The reality of the future life 
 
156 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 was never more vivid or more powerful than it was 
 in the early days of Christianity. Faith in it was 
 then so strong that it almost passed over into 
 knowledge. The basis of this faith was the idea of 
 God which was held by the early Christians. We 
 eannot hope to recover the one thing without re- 
 covering the other. When we can whole-heartedly 
 believe that God is real and not a mere idea or 
 subjective impression, and furthermore that in His 
 reality He is more like Jesus Christ than He is 
 like anyone else we know or can know, we shall 
 take a different attitude toward the future life. 
 
 It may be objected that such a conception of the 
 Deity as we have just outlined is inadequate and 
 incomplete. It says nothing about problems of 
 creation, omniscience, omnipresence, and a host of 
 other features dear to the theologians of all ages. 
 The advantage of the doctrine as we see it consists 
 precisely in the fact that it does not dogmatize 
 about such things. The God of the creeds is based 
 upon a monistic metaphysics which modern science 
 has sorely riddled. Under the assaults of men like 
 James, Ward, Schiller, Dewey, and other pluralists 
 and pragmatists, the old absolutism in philosophy 
 seems tottering to ruin. The early Christian con- 
 ception of God is not affected by the controversy 
 between monism and pluralism. As William 
 James has shown, the God of the gospels fits into 
 
FAITH IN GOD 157 
 
 a pluralistic scheme of the universe without the 
 slightest difficulty. The conception of God in 
 Christ is just as vital today as it ever was. This 
 is not true of any other view of the nature of God. 
 Humanity has always loved Jesus Christ and has 
 always believed in Him. To accept Him as God or 
 perbaps more correctly as the highest revelation of 
 God which we can know is the supreme need of our 
 own age as it has been of the ages past. With this 
 acceptance will come an ever deepening and in- 
 creasing faith in the reality of the future life. Like 
 the early Christians, we shall come to know that 
 for us as for them, death is swallowed up in vic- 
 tory. 
 
 Nothing in what has been written is intended to 
 destroy the faith of those who still cling to the old 
 theological interpretations of the Deity and find 
 them vital and satisfying. A man may have as 
 much theology as he pleases provided his theology 
 does not entirely obscure his God. The supreme 
 Teacher expressed what is needed when he said, 
 ‘‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
 heart and with all thy soul and with all thy 
 strength and with all thy mind.’’ Any conception 
 of the Deity which makes such a personal devotion 
 possible will lead to a more robust faith in immor- 
 tality. 
 
158 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 . U. Sinclair, Mammonart, Chapter LXXXIV. 
 
 J. B. Pratt, Religious Consciousness, Chapter I. 
 
 J. R. Leuba, Belief in God and Immortality. 
 
 C. Gore, Belief in God, Chapter I. 
 
 . A. C. MeGiffert, The God of the Early Christians, Chapters 
 EL etlicande ly. 
 
 . W. James, A Pluralistic Universe, Chapter VIII. 
 
 . J. Ward, The Realm of Ends, Chapter XX. 
 
 . F. C. 8. Schiller, Riddles of the Sphinx, Chapter X. 
 
 . H. G. Wells, God the Invisible King, Introduction. 
 
 Se 
 
 oono 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 THE TESTIMONY OF THE SEERS 
 
 HE poet is essentially a seer. The poets them- 
 
 selves have always recognized this fact, and 
 however devoted to the technique of their craft they 
 may have been, they have always left a large place 
 for inspiration in explaining their work. Words- 
 worth had a certain theory of art which he thought 
 important, but practically everybody who reads his 
 poems agrees that whatever value they possess was 
 produced in spite of the author’s theory, and not 
 on account of it. In like manner, Edgar Allan Poe 
 wrote an essay explaining the purely mechanical 
 character of his poetry, but no other person has 
 ever been able to write poetry hke The Raven 
 or The Bells by following Poe’s directions. We 
 may not be able to explain inspiration or genius, 
 but no one doubts that these words represent facts 
 and facts of tremendous importance to the human 
 race. The truth which comes by way of inspiration 
 is in fact first-hand material, while the truth ar- 
 rived at by logical processes is always second- 
 hand. It is the difference between genius and tal- 
 ent, between the artist and the pedant, between 
 insight and the mechanical accumulations of facts. 
 The common people of Judea understood the con- 
 
 159 
 
160 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 trast when they commented upon the messages of 
 Jesus by saying that He taught them as one having 
 authority, and not as the Scribes. To the scribal 
 group belong many modern representatives—crit- 
 ies, scientists, pedagogues, smart writers, doctors 
 of philosophy, of divinity, and of laws, dreary and 
 dry-as-dust authorities of every description. These 
 purveyors of second-hand knowledge bulk large in 
 questionnaires like those of Professor Leuba, him- 
 self an admirable representative of the group, and 
 in the catalogue of contributors to our technical 
 magazines. Such folk are useful after their fash- 
 ion, but the fires of faith always burn low in them. 
 They sit in judgment on their betters and find a 
 sort of sardonic satisfaction in pouring water upon 
 the divine fire which they themselves cannot kindle. 
 
 The poets have always had a good deal to say 
 about immortality. It is true that not all of them 
 have believed in it, but when one calls the roll of 
 the ages, it is astonishing how small is the number 
 of skeptics. The ancient Hebrews possessed a re- 
 ligion which was notoriously silent concerning the 
 future life, and yet the Hebrew poets frequently 
 rise above the level of thought of their people, and 
 at least touch the borders of eternal life. If there 
 is any doctrine of immortality at all in the Old 
 Testament, it is to be found in the writings of the 
 poet, and not in those of the historians or law- 
 givers. There are certain Psalms which assuredly 
 seem to hint at immortality, and our ordinary 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 161 
 
 burial service contains quotations from Job which 
 rightly or wrongly have been usually held to refer 
 to the resurrection from the dead. Such quotations 
 as ‘‘I know that my Redeemer liveth’’ and ‘‘ Thou 
 wilt not permit my soul to remain in Sheol’’ may 
 not directly refer to personal immortality, but 
 most people will agree that they at least look in 
 that direction. 
 
 The future life is discussed by nearly all the 
 Greek poets, and is regarded as almost axiomatic 
 in their pages. It is true that the Hellenic writers 
 do not agree in their pictures of the life beyond the 
 grave. Homer, as we have noted elsewhere, has 
 vividly described the future world in one of the 
 most dramatic passages of the Odyssey, a descrip- 
 tion which served as a model to Virgil for the sixth 
 book of the Atneid and of which Dante also made 
 good use. Homer, like most of his countrymen, 
 regarded the future world as a land of shadows 
 where existence is not at all as desirable or as real 
 as it is here. Nevertheless, this existence pos- 
 sesses a reality of its kind, and the ghostlike 
 shades of this nether world are gifted with mem- 
 ory, with emotions, and with imagination. When 
 one listens to the confused and puerile messages 
 which our modern mediums purport to bring us 
 from the spirit world, he secures an impression of 
 that state of existence which is not far removed 
 from the picture given in the pages of Homer. 
 
 The religions of the world have in the main fol- 
 
162 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 lowed three different conceptions in their interpre- 
 tations of the future life. In the East, the idea of 
 Nirvana or of complete absorption in the Infinite, 
 carrying with it the loss of individual existence, has 
 always prevailed. In the West, due chiefly to the 
 influence of Christianity, the future life has been 
 consistently pictured as superior to the present. 
 Individuality is not to be swallowed up in the Infin- 
 ite, but on the contrary, 1s to be heightened and 
 enriched. As the Apostle Paul expressed it, ‘‘It 
 doth not yet appear what we shall be.’’ Profes- 
 sor Selbie interprets the Western point of view 
 admirably when he says: ‘‘ From the point of view 
 of religion it must always be remembered that what 
 is anticipated in the future is not mere survival, 
 but a life of a higher and more desirable kind than 
 that of earth.’’ 
 
 The early Greek interpretation occupies a mid- 
 dle ground position between the Oriental and the 
 Western. Individuals live after death and pre- 
 serve their identity, but the future life is neither so 
 rich nor so desirable as the present existence. 
 This, at any rate, is the general point of view of 
 Homer and the poets who belong to his period. 
 
 Among the Greek tragedians, Aeschylus, Sopho- 
 eles, and Euripides, the doctrine of the future life 
 progresses toward something more typically West- 
 ern than the earlier views of Homer. Greek trag- 
 edy is chiefly concerned with the power of the 
 Fates over human beings and this power extends to 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 163 
 
 the future as well as to the present. The picture 
 of the hereafter which Sophocles draws in The 
 Antigone is much like that given by Homer. Antig- 
 one gives up her own life in order that her broth- 
 er’s shade may rest in peace. Her action is not 
 made less tragic by any glorification of the reward 
 which she will receive hereafter for her piety. The 
 general impression of the future which one secures 
 from the play is gloomy and pessimistic. This 
 holds good in the main of the Greek tragedies 
 throughout, although there are occasional glimpses 
 of something better, especially in the later poets. 
 Euripides is a rebel and a good deal of a skeptic 
 whose eschatology is somewhat difficult to deter- 
 mine. It is in the writings of Plato, the philos- 
 opher-poet of the ages, that we secure the finest 
 idealization of the life to come. Plato looks upon 
 death as a liberating experience which frees the 
 soul from the shackles of material existence. We 
 are not really born until we die. The body is a 
 clog upon the soul and the latter cannot be free 
 and unhampered in our present material existence. 
 Plato makes Socrates say in the Phaedo: 
 
 For I am quite ready to acknowledge, Simmias and Cebes, that 
 I ought to be grieved at death, if I were not persuaded that I am 
 going to other gods who are wise and good and to men departed 
 who are better than those whom I leave behind; and therefore I do 
 not grieve as I might have done, for I have good hope that there 
 
 is yet something remaining for the dead, and as has been said of 
 old, some far better thing for the good than for the evil. 
 
164 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 In Roman poetry we find a distinct advance over 
 at least the earlier Hellenic views of immortality. 
 Lueretius, it is true, stands out as the one great 
 atheistical poet of the ages, but he is practically 
 alone among the poets of his own nation in his 
 skeptical views concerning the future life. Horace 
 was an Hpicurean and was vastly more concerned 
 with the pleasures of the present life than with any- 
 thing that might conceivably happen to him in the 
 future. Nevertheless, he had a tolerably wholesome 
 fear of the gods and seems to have entertained the 
 usual opinions of his countrymen with regard to 
 Tartarus and Elysium. It is in Virgil that we find 
 the most definite and specific eschatology of the 
 ancient world. The doctrine of future rewards and 
 punishments which had been slowly evolving from 
 the time of Homer, finds its most complete expres- 
 sion in the great epic stanzas of Virgil. So appeal- 
 ing was the Roman poet’s view of the future life 
 that it was in large measure taken over by the later 
 Christian theologians, and Dante appropriates it 
 almost bodily in the pages of his Inferno. Dante 
 looks upon Virgil as substantially a Christian, and 
 the older poet becomes his guide through the devi- 
 ous paths of the nether world. 
 
 The poetry of the Middle Ages is practically 
 incarnated in the writings of Dante. There are, 
 it is true, other great names, but they become 
 insignificant by comparison with the great gen- 
 
 ~ ius of Florence. The Divine Comedy is not 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 165 
 
 only a poem, but also an interpretation. It 
 pictures the spirit of the Middle Ages in the 
 most complete and unforgettable fashion. Cath- 
 olic Christianity as it existed in the days of 
 Anselm and Aquinas and Francis of Assisi was 
 interested much more in the future than in the 
 present. It was fundamentally other-worldly in 
 the full sense of that much abused word. Dante 
 reflects this spirit in thoroughgoing fashion in his 
 great epic. While Homer and Virgil had devoted 
 considerable space to the future world in their 
 poems, Dante makes the future life his sole object 
 of attention. There can be no doubt but that the 
 great Florentine was sincere in what he wrote. He 
 believed in immortality and considered it of greater 
 importance than any other theme. 
 
 It is impossible within the limitations of the 
 present chapter to discuss the contributions of even 
 the leading: modern poets to the subject of personal 
 immortality. We must confine ourselves to the lt- 
 erature of one country alone and to only a few rep- 
 resentative names from the galaxy which confronts 
 us. English literature begins properly with Chau- 
 cer, and from Chaucer to Tennyson and Robert 
 Browning English poetry has always taught the 
 doctrine of the immortality of the soul. There 
 have been a few exceptions of course, but they are 
 scarcely worth mentioning. Even Kit Marlowe 
 who was considered an atheist in his own day has 
 left behind some of the most vivid pictures of the 
 
166 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 future life in the pages of literature. One can 
 scarcely escape the conviction that in Mortimer’s 
 farewell words in the play Edward the Second, 
 Marlowe’s latest production, the poet is speaking 
 out of the depths of his own soul: 
 
 Base Fortune, now I see, that in thy wheel 
 
 There is a point, to which when men aspire, 
 
 They tumble headlong down; that point I touched, 
 And seeing there was no place to mount up higher, 
 Why should I grieve at my declining fall? 
 
 Farewell, fair queen; weep not for Mortimer, 
 That scorns the world, and, as a traveller, 
 
 Goes to discover countries yet unknown. 
 
 The Elizabethan dramatists in general echoed 
 similar sentiments. Shakespeare has sometimes 
 been cited as an agnostic with regard to the future 
 life, but such a view is based upon an incomplete 
 induction. For example, Prospero’s words in The 
 Tempest 
 
 We are such stuff 
 
 As dreams are made of, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep, 
 
 are mistakenly quoted as proving that their author 
 regarded death as an eternal sleep. Such critics 
 forget that Ariel in the same play says: 
 
 There is nothing that doth fade 
 
 But doth suffer a sea change 
 Into something rich and strange. 
 
 Both Jesus and Paul referred to death as a sleep 
 without either of them thinking of it as a sleep 
 which should never know an awakening. Shakes- 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 167 
 
 peare’s real attitude is brought out pretty thor- 
 oughly in Hamlet. Here again the famous third 
 soliloquy is quoted as proving that the great dra- 
 matist had doubts about the future. It is true that 
 Hamlet is pictured as weighing the question of 
 suicide and as rather expressing a desire that 
 death should be nothing more than an endless sleep. 
 Had he been able to bring his judgment into line 
 with his desires, he would no doubt have taken his 
 own life. The fact that he did not commit suicide 
 proves that he at least regarded future existence 
 as highly probable. Of course the whole play of 
 Hamlet is based upon the idea that there is a fu- 
 ture life. The appearances of the ghost of Ham- 
 let’s father, the numerous references to prayer 
 which the play contains, and the atmosphere of 
 the supernatural which envelops it throughout, all 
 bear witness to this fact. It is true that Shakes- 
 peare’s pictures of the future life are not always at- 
 tractive. Claudio, for example, in Measure for 
 Measure, says: 
 
 Ay, but to die, and go we know not where; 
 To lie in cold obstruction and to rot; 
 
 This sensible warm motion to become 
 
 A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit 
 
 To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside 
 
 In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice; 
 
 To be imprison’d in the viewless winds, 
 
 And blow with restless violence round about 
 The pendant world; or to be worse than worst 
 Of those that lawless and incertain thought 
 Imagine howling: ’tis too horrible! 
 
168 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 The weariest and most loathed worldly life 
 That age, ache, penury and imprisonment 
 Can lay on nature is a paradise 
 
 To what we fear of death. 
 
 It should always be remembered that the above 
 lines were spoken in character and that Claudio’s 
 life had been such as to justify him in anticipating 
 an unpleasant future if the ordinary teachings of 
 the church were accepted. The picture itself seems 
 to be drawn partly from Dante’s Inferno and 
 partly from the Odyssey of Homer. It is one of 
 the few illustrations in English literature of a con- 
 ception of the future which reinterprets the spirit 
 of the old Greek poets. 
 
 The Puritan poets who followed Shakespeare 
 were of course thoroughgoing believers in immor- 
 tality. Milton, the most outstanding figure of the 
 group, is aS much interested in the future life as is 
 Dante, although from a different point of view. 
 Paradise Lost, Paradise Regawmed and Samson 
 Agomstes constitute the great epic trilogy of 
 Protestantism as the Inferno, Purgatorio, and 
 Paradisio of Dante constitute the great epic of 
 Catholicism. Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton, 
 the four great epic writers of the world, were all 
 profoundly concerned with the problem of immor- 
 tality and were all unhesitating believers in a fu- 
 ture life. 
 
 English poetry of the Restoration period was 
 dominated by the Deistical philosophy of the eight- 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 169 
 
 eenth century to a large extent, and yet there is 
 no poet of the period who disputes the fact of per- 
 sonal immortality. This was true of Pope and 
 Dryden as well as of Goldsmith and Gray. Addi- 
 son’s Cato, perhaps the most popular tragedy of 
 the period, contains a poetical epitome of Plato’s 
 argument for immortality which is one of the most 
 
 famous interpretations of the doctrine: 
 The soul, secure in her existence, smiles 
 At the drawn dagger, and defies its point. 
 The stars shall fade away, the sun himself 
 Grow dim with age, and nature sink in years, 
 But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth, 
 Unhurt amidst the war of elements, 
 The wrecks of matter, and the crash of worlds. 
 
 Thomas Gray, in his Elegy Written m a Coun- 
 try Churchyard, has voiced the orthodox Chris- 
 tian views of death and immortality with such 
 power and pathos that this poem is sometimes re- 
 garded as the most popular poetical production in 
 the English language. The poem itself without 
 making any specific argument for personal survival 
 is steeped in the atmosphere of immortality to 
 which direct reference is made in the concluding 
 stanza: 
 
 No farther seek his merits to disclose, 
 Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, 
 (There they alike in trembling hope repose), 
 The bosom of his Father and his God. 
 
 The poets of the Romantic reaction including 
 among others Burns, Cowper, Southey, Coleridge, 
 
170 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 and Wordsworth were all firm believers in immor- 
 tality. Burns delighted in criticizing the foibles 
 of the clergy, but he was soundly religious at heart. 
 It would be easy to construct a complete eschatol- 
 ogy from his poems and there is no doubt about 
 his thoroughgoing belief in a future life. In one 
 of his best known letters he refers to the picture 
 of the redeemed in the concluding verses of the sev- 
 enth chapter of the Apocalypse as his favorite pas- 
 sage in the Bible. We do not have space to quote 
 specific passages from the poems of Burns, but any 
 one who will take the trouble to review his lyrics 
 will find abundant illustrations of his belief in a 
 future life. Wiliam Wordsworth was a disciple 
 of Plato and more than any other poet with the 
 possible exception of Emerson has embodied. the 
 Platonic philosophy in his writings. The most 
 popular of his shorter poems deals directly with 
 the subject under discussion. It is of course his 
 famous Ode on the Intimations of Immortality 
 in which he taught along with Plato the doctrine of 
 pre-existence as well as that of the future life: 
 Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; 
 The soul that rises with us, our life’s star, 
 Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
 And cometh from afar; 
 Not in entire forgetfulness, 
 And not in utter nakedness, 
 But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
 
 From God, who is our home: 
 Heaven lies about us in our infancy! 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 171 
 
 The poets of the French Revolution, Byron, 
 Shelley, and Keats, were all rebels, and yet their 
 poems contain many references to immortality. 
 Byron, like Burns, took a special delight in eriti- 
 cizing orthodox views of religion and morals, but 
 he frequently asserts his belief in the life to come. 
 For example, in Manfred, where most critics 
 agree he identifies his hero with himself, he uses 
 this language: 
 
 The mind which is immortal makes itself 
 Requital for its good or evil thoughts— 
 
 Is its own origin of ill and end, 
 
 And its own place and time: its innate sense, 
 When stripp’d of this mortality, derives 
 
 No color from the fleeting things without; 
 But is absorb’d in sufferance or in joy, 
 
 Born from the knowledge of its own desert. 
 
 Shelley, who was more unorthodox than Byron, 
 is usually regarded as a Pantheist and some of his 
 poems undoubtedly reflect Pantheistic sentiment. 
 He was such a devoted admirer of Plato, and Pla- 
 tonic allusions occur so often in his writings that 
 his Pantheism is not infrequently tinged with the 
 coloring of personal immortality. For example, 
 the Platonic conception of life as a sort of dream- 
 existence which is to be removed at death occurs 
 many times in the writings of Shelley in passages 
 like this: 
 
 I dare not guess; but in this life 
 Of error, ignorance, and strife, 
 
 Where nothing is, but all things seem, 
 And we the shadows of the dream, 
 
Lp HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 It is a modest creed, and yet 
 Pleasant if one considers it, 
 
 To own that death itself must be, 
 Like all the rest, a mockery. 
 
 Or in even more undisguised fashion: 
 
 Death is the veil which those who live call life. 
 We sleep, and it is lifted. 
 
 Keats was not so much of a philosopher as Shel- 
 ley, but on the contrary devoted his life to the wor- 
 ship of pure beauty. Beauty to him was immortal, 
 and he could not think of it as ever passing away. 
 His creed is expressed in the famous passage: 
 
 Beauty is truth, truth beauty—that is all 
 Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. 
 
 The question of personal immortality does not 
 appear to have concerned him aside from its bear- 
 ing upon the problem of the immortality of art. 
 Keats, like Shelley and Byron, died young, and his 
 views of life were no doubt immature. If we ac- 
 cept the idea that aesthetic values are heightened 
 by belief in God and immortality as Kant, Hoff- 
 ding, and quite recently Lord Balfour in his Gif- 
 ford Lectures all agree, then Keats, would assur- 
 edly have accepted the gospel of the higher values. 
 Certainly it can be said that, as things stand now, 
 the poetry of Keats in no way discourages a belief 
 in personal immortality. 
 
 The nineteenth century presents an imposing list 
 of English poets who were interested in the subject 
 of immortality. A few were doubtful or antago- 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 173 
 
 nistic in their attitude, but the vast majority 
 preached the gospel of faith and of optimism. On 
 the negative side, we must reckon with such names 
 as those of Matthew Arnold and Fitzgerald, the 
 latter by his remarkable translation of the quat- 
 rains of Omar Khayyam providing the greatest 
 glorification of materialistic agnosticism in all lit- 
 erature. Still more significantly, James Thomson 
 in his City of Dreadful Night and Thomas Hardy 
 in his shorter poetical productions have re-echoed 
 to the full the atheistical pessimism of Schopen- 
 hauer. Swinburne occasionally voices a negative 
 gospel in his poems. For example, in his melodi- 
 ous and beautiful Hymn to Proserpme: 
 
 I know 
 I shall die as my fathers died, and sleep as they sleep; even so. 
 For the glass of the years is brittle wherein we gaze for a span; 
 A little soul for a little bears up this corpse which is man. 
 So long I endure, no longer; and laugh not again, neither weep, 
 For there is no God found stronger than death; and death is a 
 sleep. 
 
 It should be remembered, however, that this pas- 
 sage is spoken in character, being represented as 
 the words of one of the priests of the old pagan 
 religion which was disappearing before the rapid 
 inroads of Christianity. George Eliot in The 
 Choir Invisible has illustrated the finest type of 
 Positivistic philosophy with its teaching concern- 
 ing the immortality of influence. Reference has 
 been made elsewhere to this poem and it need not 
 
174 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 further concern us here. On the whole, the nega- 
 tive side of the problem of immortality has had far 
 fewer advocates during the nineteenth century 
 than the positive. 
 
 When we turn to consider the champions of the 
 larger hope during this period, we are confronted 
 by a brillant array of names. One need only eata- 
 logue a few of them. In the list we find Elizabeth 
 Barrett Browning, Coventry Patmore, Dante Ga- 
 briel Rossetti, Jean Ingelow, William Morris, 
 George Macdonald, William Watson, Francis 
 Thompson, Sir Edwin Arnold, Adelaide Procter, 
 and the two supreme representatives of the cen- 
 tury, Alfred Tennyson and Robert Browning. All 
 of these writers have taught the doctrine of immor- 
 tality in one form or another. Our space limita- 
 tions will permit us to deal only with three repre- 
 sentatives of the group. The three whom we have 
 chosen to stand for the others and for the group 
 as a whole are Rossetti, Tennyson, and Browning. 
 
 Dante Gabriel Rossetti along with Coventry 
 Patmore and Francis Thompson illustrates what 
 may be styled the mystical interpretation of the 
 future life. It is the spirit of Dante and of the 
 best that is in the Catholic faith of the Middle 
 Ages. Patmore’s Lyrics, Francis Thompson’s 
 The Hound of Heaven, and Rossetti’s The Blessed 
 Damosel are all incarnations of this spirit. As an 
 illustration of this type of thinking we cite Ros- 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 175 
 
 setti’s sonnet from The House of Infe entitled 
 ‘*Lost Days’’: 
 
 The lost days of my life until today, 
 
 What were they, could I see them on the street 
 Lie as they fell? Would they be ears of wheat 
 Sown once for food but trodden into clay? 
 
 Or golden coins squandered and still to pay? 
 Or drops of blood dabbling the guilty feet? 
 
 Or such spilt water as in dreams must cheat 
 The throats of men in Hell, who thirst alway? 
 
 I do not see them here; but after death 
 
 God knows I know the faces I shall see, 
 
 Each one a murdered self, with low last breath. 
 ““T am thyself,—what hast thou done to me?’’ 
 ‘And J—and I—thyself,’’ (lo! each one saith), 
 ‘“And thou thyself to all eternity! ’’ 
 
 If Rossetti represents the mystical and medieval 
 attitude toward immortality, in the person of Al- 
 fred Tennyson we find a complete incarnation of 
 what may be styled orthodox critical Protestant- 
 ism. He was born and bred in the atmosphere of 
 the church and never wandered away from it dur- 
 ing his long lifetime. While this was true, he 
 never lived in the cloister-like seclusion of the 
 Catholic mystics, but on the contrary kept his mind 
 singularly open to every new current of thought. 
 He lived during a time of stress both in the scien- 
 tific and theological realm. He was a contempo- 
 rary of Darwin, Huxley, Spencer, Comte, and 
 Haeckel, and was familiar with their writings. It 
 was inevitable that a mind such as his should re- 
 
176 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 flect the cross currents of intellectual opinion in 
 his poems. There is scarcely one of his larger pro- 
 ductions which does not touch upon the subject of 
 immortality, but it is in his In Memoriam that we 
 find the most complete exposition of the poet’s 
 views. In Memoriam deals with all the current 
 scientific doubts which were raised in large meas- 
 ure by the publication of The Origin of Species 
 and endeavors to find a solution for them. The 
 poem has a direct personal reference, and yet it 
 is peculiarly typical of the thought of English 
 Protestantism as a whole. ‘Tennyson does not 
 shrink from the issue, but faces it through. Doubt- 
 less he has some sorrows when the battle is over, 
 but few reasonable people will deny that he comes 
 out a victor. Until immortality passes over from 
 the realm of faith to the realm of exact science, 
 stanzas like these will continue to be a part of the 
 mental furniture of every thoughtful advocate of 
 the future life: 
 Thou wilt not leave us in the dust: 
 Thou madest man, he knows not why, 
 He thinks he was not made to die; 
 
 And thou hast made him: thou art just. 
 
 * * * * * 
 My own dim life should teach me this, 
 That life shall live for evermore, 
 Else earth is darkness at the core, 
 
 And dust and ashes all that is. 
 
 From In Memoriam to Crossing the Bar, Tenny- 
 son held to his faith. He struggled hard at times 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 177 
 
 with doubt and there are occasional notes of pes- 
 simism in the two Locksley Halls, in Maud and 
 above all in The Idylls of the King, but he never 
 surrendered. The epitome of his long and battle- 
 scarred experience is found in the last word of his 
 old age: 
 For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place 
 The flood may bear me far, 
 
 I hope to see my Pilot face to face 
 When I have crost the bar. 
 
 As Tennyson represents the views of modern 
 orthodox Protestantism, so Robert Browning 
 stands out as the incarnation of Christianity in its 
 more liberal and broader philosophical aspects. 
 Browning was never precisely a churchman, and 
 yet he was a thoroughgoing believer in Christian- 
 ity. He was preeminently a philosopher and an 
 artist and he could see the good sides of the two 
 extremes embodied in Roman Catholic mysticism 
 and modern ultra-Protestant rationalism. His 
 doctrine of immortality is much more robust than 
 is that of Tennyson and is a more powerful ad- 
 junect to faith. Where Tennyson hopes for immor- 
 tality, Browning believes in it and refuses to en- 
 tertain any doubts upon the subject. There is no 
 theme which occupies his attention so often or 
 which is so emphatically dealt with in his poems as 
 the doctrine of personal immortality. Like Tenny- 
 son, there were times during his later middle life 
 when he concerned himself with agnosticism and 
 
178 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the current skepticism of his day, but there is noth- 
 ing to show that these studies caused any serious 
 change in his attitude toward the future life. 
 There is scarcely a possible phase of immortality 
 which Browning has not discussed somewhere in 
 his writings. We have space for only a few typ- 
 ical citations. For example, the problem of where 
 in this present life we are to start in the new 
 existence is dealt with in Cristina: 
 Such am I: the secret’s mine now! 
 She has lost me, I have gained her; 
 Her soul’s mine: and thus, grown perfect, 
 I shall pass my life’s remainder. 
 Life will just hold out the proving 
 Both our powers, alone and blended: 
 
 And then, come the next life quickly! 
 This world’s use will have been ended. 
 
 In other words, life in the world to come will 
 take its starting point from the highest rather than 
 from the latest point of our earthly existence. 
 
 What the experience we call death is like from 
 the standpoint of those who have passed through 
 it occupied Browning’s attention a good deal. He 
 pictures it in dramatic fashion in Prospice: 
 
 For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, 
 The black minute’s at end, 
 
 And the elements’ rage, the fiend-voices that rave, 
 Shall dwindle, shall blend, 
 
 Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, 
 Then a light, then thy breast, 
 
 O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, 
 And with God be the rest! 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 179 
 
 The problem of marriage in the future life which 
 so disturbed the reflections of the Sadducees 
 Browning answers in his own peculiar fashion in 
 the concluding words of the section entitled ‘‘ Pom- 
 pilia’’ in The Ring and the Book: 
 
 Marriage on earth seems such a counterfeit, 
 Mere imitation of the inimitable: 
 
 In heaven we have the real and true and sure. 
 ’Tis there they neither marry nor are given 
 
 In marriage but are as the angels: right, 
 
 Oh how right that is, how like Jesus Christ 
 
 To say that! Marriage-making for the earth, 
 With gold so much—birth, power, repute so much, 
 Or beauty, youth so much, in lack of these! 
 
 Be as the angels rather, who, apart, 
 
 Know themselves into one, are found at length 
 Married, but marry never, no, nor give 
 
 In marriage; they are man and wife at once 
 When the true time is: here we have to wait 
 Not so long neither! Could we by a wish 
 Have what we will and get the future now, 
 Would we wish aught done undone in the past? 
 So, let him wait God’s instant men call years; 
 Meantime hold hard by truth and his great soul, 
 Do out the duty! 
 
 The question as to what is to become of the bad 
 people after death is also dealt with in The Ring 
 and the Book. Browning did not accept the ortho- 
 dox teaching concerning hell, but looked with favor 
 upon Origen’s doctrine of the final purification and 
 restitution of the wicked. In the section entitled 
 ‘“The Pope”’ in The Ring and the Book he has this 
 to say concerning the fate of Guido, the villain of 
 
180 
 
 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 the poem, and the worst man Browning can con- 
 
 ceive: 
 
 For the main criminal I have no hope 
 
 Except in such a suddenness of fate. 
 
 I stood at Naples once, a night so dark 
 
 I could have scarce conjectured there was earth 
 Anywhere, sky or sea or world at all: 
 
 But the night’s black was burst through by a blaze— 
 Thunder struck blow on blow, earth groaned and bore, 
 Through her whole length of mountains visible: 
 There lay the city thick and plain with spires, 
 
 And, like a ghost disshrouded, white the sea. 
 
 So may the truth be flashed out by one blow, 
 
 And Guido see, one instant, and be saved. 
 
 Else I avert my face, nor follow him 
 
 Into that sad obscure sequestered state 
 
 Where God unmakes but to remake the soul 
 
 He else made first in vain; which must not be. 
 
 Will there be memory and recognition after 
 death? Browning says so unhesitatingly. Per- 
 haps the most picturesque fashion in which he has 
 answered the question is to be found in one of his 
 most popular poems, ‘**‘ Hivelyn Hope’’: 
 
 I loved you, Evelyn, all the while! 
 
 My heart seemed full as it could hold; 
 
 There was place and to spare for the frank young smile, 
 
 And the red young mouth, and the hair’s young gold. 
 
 So hush,—I will give you this leaf to keep: 
 
 See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand! 
 
 There, that is our secret: go to sleep! 
 
 You will wake, and remember, and understand. 
 
 The most complete expression of Browning’s 
 philosophy in its application both to the present 
 world and the world to come is to be found in 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 181 
 
 ‘‘Rabbi Ben Ezra.’’ This poem teaches the doc- 
 trine that the present life is intended solely as an 
 introduction to the larger and fuller life to come, 
 that all values created here will be preserved after 
 death, and that even the smallest good will never 
 be lost. This poem may be styled a poetical expo- 
 sition of Hoffding’s philosophy of religion, al- 
 though Browning appears to have had no direct 
 connection whatever with the Danish philosopher. 
 The underlying idea of both writers is that of the 
 absolute preservation of values. Let us note how 
 Browning teaches this doctrine in his poem: 
 
 And I shall thereupon 
 
 Take rest, ere I be gone 
 
 Once more on my adventure brave and new: 
 Fearless and unperplexed, 
 
 When I wage battle next, 
 
 What weapons to select, what armor to indue. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 He fixed thee ’mid this dance 
 
 Of plastic circumstance, 
 
 This Present, thou, forsooth, would fain arrest: 
 Machinery just meant 
 
 To give thy soul its bent, 
 
 Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 Fool! All that is, at all, 
 Lasts ever, past recall; 
 Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure. 
 
 Browning retained his faith in personal immor~ 
 tality throughout his life. It is interesting to com- 
 pare his epilogue written only a few days before 
 
182 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 his death with Tennyson’s ‘‘Crossing the Bar,’’ 
 which was produced under similar circumstances. 
 Both poems are magnificent contributions to what 
 may be styled the literature of immortality, but 
 there can scarcely be any question that Browning’s 
 confession is the more positive and robust of the 
 two. Tennyson hopes to meet his Pilot, but Brown- | 
 ing calls the opponents of immortality fools and 
 never doubts that when he shall fall asleep, it will 
 be to wake. To quote his own language: 
 
 One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, 
 Never doubted clouds would break, 
 Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, 
 Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, 
 Sleep to wake. 
 
 No, at noonday in the bustle of man’s work-time 
 Greet the unseen with a cheer! 
 Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, 
 ‘Strive and thrive!’’ ery ‘‘Speed,—fight on, fare ever 
 There as here! ’’ 
 
 This chapter is already too lengthy to permit any 
 discussion of the subject from the standpoint of 
 American literature. It would be an easy and alto- 
 gether delightful task to show how the American 
 poets have emphasized the future life in their writ- 
 ings. From ‘‘Thanatopsis’’ to ‘‘General William 
 Booth Enters Heaven’’ the subject has received at- 
 tention. Bryant, Longfellow, Whittier, Lowell, 
 Alice Cary, Poe, Lanier, and a host of others have 
 expressed sentiments similar to those of Tennyson 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF SEERS 183 
 
 and Browning. There is scarcely a dissenting note 
 unless it be in the work of Walt Whitman, and 
 there are passages in Whitman which seem to sup- 
 port the doctrine. The unanimity of opinion upon 
 the subject is even more noticeable in American 
 literature than it is on the other side of the Atlan- 
 tic. 
 
 As we stated at the beginning of this chapter, 
 the poets are seers. In the nature of the case, they 
 deal more with faith than with scientific fact. 
 Their confidence in the permanent existence of the 
 human spirit should encourage the rest of us to 
 share in their faith. To believe that throughout 
 the ages they have been so universally mistaken, 
 that they have been false prophets concerning the 
 future, and that therefore their messages have 
 been untrustworthy and vain assuredly requires a 
 degree of pessimism which is neither necessary nor 
 natural. Over against the testimony of the agnos- 
 tics and skeptics of the ages we place the experi- 
 ence of the forward looking seers and prophets of 
 the world. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 . Book of Job. 
 
 . Homer, Odyssey, Chapter XIII. 
 
 Sophocles, Antigone. 
 
 Plato, Dialogs, translated by Jowett, Vol. I. 
 
 Virgil, Aeneid, Book VI. 
 
 Dante, Divine Comedy. 
 
 . Marlowe, Edward II, Act V. 
 
 . Shakespeare, The Tempest, Hamlet, Measure for Measure. 
 
 Go IS OTA PO 
 
184 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 9. Milton, Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, Samson Agonistes, 
 Lycidas. 
 
 10. Gray, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard. 
 
 11. Wordsworth, Ode on the Intimations of Immortality. 
 
 12. Byron, Manfred, Act V. 
 
 13. Shelley, The Sensitive Plant. 
 
 14. D. G. Rossetti, The House of Life. 
 
 15. F. Thompson, The Hound of Heaven. 
 
 16. Tennyson, In Memoriam, Crossing the Bar. 
 
 17. R. Browning, Cristina, The Ring and the Book, Evelyn 
 Hope, Prospice, Epilogue, Rabbi Ben Ezra. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 
 
 LT was at one time asserted that the belief in 
 
 immortality is a universal heritage of mankind. 
 Obviously such an assertion is not in harmony with 
 the facts. Multitudes of people especially in the 
 far Kast do not possess such a belief, and appar- 
 ently do not desire continued personal existence 
 beyond the grave. Some of the great religious 
 leaders of the world have not believed in personal 
 immortality. The founder of Buddhism ig gener- 
 ally regarded as belonging to this class. Confucius 
 also had very little to say about the future life. 
 There is a good deal of divergence concerning the 
 meaning of Nirvana. It is true that in a recent 
 article in the Hibbert Journal of January, 1925, by 
 Mr. Edmund Holmes, the position is taken that the 
 idea of Nirvana does not at all involve the thought 
 of personal annihilation. On the contrary, Mr. 
 Holmes asserts that it meant a clarification and 
 expansion of the individual spirit closely akin to 
 the Christian conception. If this interpretation is 
 correct, and Mr. Holmes is not alone in accepting 
 it, then the religions of the East cannot be re- 
 garded as antagonistic to the doctrine of personal 
 
 survival. 
 185 
 
186 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Whatever view may be taken concerning the 
 meaning of Nirvana, it is obvious that practically 
 all of the religious leaders of the world who came 
 from the nations west of India believed in the im- 
 mortality of the soul. Zoroaster, Socrates, Plato, 
 and the religious leaders of Egypt, Rome, and 
 other western countries are all included in this 
 class. The one exception appears to be in the case 
 of the Hebrews, and this exception is dubious. To 
 assert that Moses and the prophets who followed 
 him did not believe in personal immortality is 
 scarcely justified in view of the statements of Jesus 
 and the New Testament attitude in general. It 
 appears to be true that the Jewish people as a 
 whole did not accept the doctrine of immortality in 
 the earlier periods of their history, but the prevail- 
 ing religious party of the nation came to accept 
 this view later, and there is nothing to prove that 
 the forward looking leaders of the nation did not 
 believe in a future life long before such a belief 
 became a part of the spiritual possessions of the 
 rank and file. In any event, Christianity, which 
 sprang out of Judaism, has championed the doc- 
 trine of immortality with an enthusiasm equalled 
 by the advocates of no other religion save that of 
 Mahomet. Many of the advocates of modern 
 Judaism are firm believers in immortality, al- 
 though it is only fair to say that others do not 
 accept the doctrine. The chief difficulty in the way 
 of a belief in the future life on the part of the 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 187 
 
 ancient Hebrews appears to have been their in- 
 tense glorification of Yahweh which did not permit 
 human beings to aspire to immortality along with 
 Him. There is a certain sense in which there are 
 affinities at this point between the Hebrew and the 
 Hindu faiths, although we ordinarily think of them 
 as incarnating the opposite poles of extreme reli- 
 gious transcendence and immanence. Moreover, 
 as we have already observed, the Hebrews even far 
 back in their history did have a sort of shadowy 
 belief in another world which they denominated 
 Sheol, the place of the departed spirits. Perhaps 
 the average Hebrew of the early centuries thought 
 of Sheol much as Homer and his contemporaries 
 thought of Hades. If this be true, we can under- 
 stand why the Hebrew writers placed such little 
 emphasis upon the future life. Existence in Sheol, 
 as Homer pictured existence in Hades, was to be 
 dreaded rather than to be desired, and it was pref- 
 erable to refer to it as little as possible. There 
 may have been a feeling of this kind back of the 
 aversion of Confucius to any discussion of the fu- 
 ture life. While an attitude of this kind does not 
 represent a satisfactory view of immortality from 
 the Christian standpoint, it can hardly be said to 
 be a denial of the doctrine. It is scarcely fair, 
 therefore, to cite religious teachers who accepted 
 this view, and for this reason said little about im- 
 mortality as being opposed to the doctrine. 
 
 Making all allowances for exceptional skeptics 
 
188 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 and unbelievers, it is certainly no exaggeration to 
 say that the overwhelming majority of the world’s 
 religious teachers and saints have been firm be- 
 hevers in a future life. Not only is this true, but 
 it has been characteristic of their faith in immor- 
 tality that it has in most cases passed over into 
 the realm of assurance and has become almost as 
 strong as their consciousness of the ordinary facts 
 of experience. This vital faith in the hereafter on 
 the part of so many people is a phenomenon with 
 which modern science can no longer refuse to deal. 
 The new science of the psychology of religion ree- 
 ognizes this situation fully, and deals with it in 
 accordance with scientific methods. Of course, no 
 one would assert that because a large number of 
 people, or for that matter all people believed in a 
 certain doctrine, that this fact would prove the doc- 
 trine to be true. It is quite conceivable that every- 
 body may hold or may have held to erroneous 
 views. The chief difference in the present instance 
 consists in the fact that the mystical experience of 
 immortality which the saints claim to have pos- 
 sessed is not at all of the same type as a mere intel- 
 lectual hypothesis or opinion. The saints believed 
 in immortality not because of logical arguments in 
 its favor, but because of an inward conviction of 
 its reality. Here we touch upon the whole subject 
 of mysticism which our modern psychologists, in- 
 cluding especially James, Starbuck, Pratt, and 
 Thouless have treated so extensively. Whatever 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 189 
 
 interpretation of mystical experience we may ac- 
 cept, the facts involved can scarcely be dismissed 
 as inconsequential. It is with some of these facts 
 that the present chapter has to deal. It is con- 
 ceded that they do not furnish scientific proof of 
 the reality of the future life, but it can scarcely be 
 denied that they do supply evidence which should 
 help to strengthen one’s belief in immortality. 
 Doubtless the most obvious illustration of a con- 
 scious realization of immortality in the present 
 life is to be found in the experience of Jesus Him- 
 self. Nothing seems clearer than the fact that He 
 regarded the present life as a mere interlude in the 
 larger life of the spirit. His constant effort was to 
 induce His followers to accept the eternal view- 
 points as a guide to their daily actions instead of 
 looking at things from the ordinary temporal point 
 of view. Even more than Spinoza, who interpreted 
 the idea in a different way, he insisted upon seeing 
 everything under the form of eternity. Men were 
 to strive to lay up treasures in heaven rather than 
 upon earth because the heavenly life is of more sig- 
 nificance than the earthly. Jesus himself never 
 worried much about material things, and literally 
 embodied Harnack’s definition of religion as eter- 
 nal life in the midst of time. He was in the world, 
 and yet not of the world because He knew that His 
 life was not to be cut short by death. In the Johan- 
 nine writings, this idea of conscious immortality 
 on the part of Jesus is brought out in the greatest 
 
190 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 detail, but it is not absent from the Synopties. 
 Jesus possessed such a complete consciousness of 
 His own immortality that a realization of this fact 
 is essential to any proper understanding of His 
 teaching and work. 
 
 Paul, next to his Master, possessed perhaps the 
 most thoroughgoing consciousness of immortality. 
 Paul’s conviction of the reality of the future life 
 was based in part, it is true, upon logic and philos- 
 ophy, but in the last analysis he fell back upon his 
 mystical experience as the final proof of the doc- 
 trine. He is so sure of the future life that, like 
 Browning’s grammarian again, he is willing to 
 stake everything upon it. He counts everything 
 but loss provided he ean be sure of eternal life. 
 This is the supreme treasure, and he has no doubt 
 about its reality. At the very last, he stands firm, 
 and there is no tinge of regret in his farewell mes- 
 sage to the world. There is a crown of righteous- 
 ness laid up for him, and he is quite sure that he 
 will receive it. 
 
 John and the other apostles bear testimony sim- 
 ilar to that of Paul concerning their assurance of 
 personal immortality. With John, as we have 
 noted elsewhere, it is the certainty of union with 
 the divine life which is primarily back of this as- 
 surance. The Johannine writings throughout the 
 ages have been regarded quite properly as the 
 most valuable sources of mystical inspiration and 
 conviction, There is a quiet assurance of the real- 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 191 
 
 ity of eternal life which pervades these documents 
 and which carries conviction to those who are not 
 too skeptically minded to recognize its presence. 
 Mr. W. K. Fleming in dealing with this question in 
 his volume on Mysticism m Christianity says of the 
 fourth gospel that it has been styled ‘‘the charter 
 of mysticism.’’ The symbolism with which it 
 abounds is fundamentally mystical, and the logos 
 doctrine which it stresses is of the same type. In 
 the Johannine writings, immortality is assumed so 
 completely and unhesitatingly that no logical argu- 
 ments are advanced in its favor. Paul occasionally 
 debates the question, as for example in First Co- 
 rinthians, chapter 15, but John does not argue 
 about it. He is concerned about proving the iden- 
 tity of Jesus with the Divine Logos, and is quite 
 sure that if he can do this, everything else follows 
 as a matter of course. 
 
 The early Christians accepted the doctrine of 
 immortality in much the same fashion as John and 
 Paul. Better than any historical documents, those 
 rude inscriptions in the Catacombs tell the story 
 of triumphant faith. Many of those whose names 
 are recorded in these underground tombs were 
 martyrs during the stormy years of persecution 
 and sealed their faith with their blood. The ab- 
 solute assurance of immortality which they pos- 
 sessed and which enabled them to go to the stake 
 and to the cross with triumphant joy remains as 
 an evidence of the reality of Christian experience 
 
192 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 in these early centuries. There would have been 
 few martyrs if these early Christians had felt any 
 doubt concerning the reality of the future life. 
 They triumphed over death and torture because 
 they were sure that the sufferings of this present 
 life are not to be compared with the glory that shall 
 be revealed hereafter. Of course they may have 
 been mistaken; every cause, true or false, has had 
 its martyrs, but the unanimity of their experience 
 should possess corroborative value along with other 
 evidence in favor of the Christian doctrine of im- 
 mortality. 
 
 Among these early martyrs, one of the most 
 notable was Ignatius who according to tradition 
 was thrown to the lions at Rome about 115 A.D. 
 In the Epistle of Ignatius to the Romans he begs 
 his fellow Christians not to prevent his martyrdom, 
 as by so doing they will deprive him of the glorious 
 reward which awaits him in eternity. He says: 
 
 But I fear your love, lest it do me an injury. For it is easy 
 
 for you to do what you please; but it will be hard for me to attain 
 
 unto God, if you spare me. 
 
 But I would not that ye should please men, but God, whom also 
 ye do please. For neither shall I ever hereafter have such an 
 opportunity of going unto God; nor will you, if ye shall now be 
 silent, ever be entitled to a better work. For if you shall be 
 silent in my behalf, I shall be made partaker of God. 
 
 But if you shall love my body, I shall have my course again to 
 run. Wherefore ye cannot do me a greater kindness, than to suffer 
 me to be sacrificed unto God, now that the altar is already pre- 
 pared: 
 
 That when ye shall be gathered together in love, ye may give 
 thanks to the Father through Christ Jesus. 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 193 
 
 St. Augustine is usually regarded as the greatest 
 figure in Catholic theology. From the standpoint 
 of present day thought most of the dogmas which 
 he advocated appear singularly unreal and impos- 
 sible. Nevertheless, Augustine will always be an 
 appealing figure because of the strangely personal 
 mysticism which he has enshrined in his Confes- 
 stons. The theology of this famous volume is its 
 least significant feature. It is its mysticism which 
 remains fresh and vital after the lapse of centuries. 
 Augustine felt personally conscious both of the 
 presence of God and of the certainty of eternal 
 life. The heart of his experience is disclosed in the 
 famous quotation from the Confessions: ‘‘We have 
 come from Thee, O God, and our souls shall find no 
 rest until we return to Thee again.”’ 
 
 One of the most notable passages in the book 
 deals with his farewell conversation with his 
 mother: 
 
 As now the day drew nigh, when she should depart out of this 
 life * * * * together we held converse very sweet and ‘‘for- 
 getting those things which were behind and reaching forth unto 
 those things which were before’’ we were discussing between us 
 in the presence of the truth, which Thou art, of what kind would 
 be that eternal life of the Saints, which ‘‘eye hath not seen nor 
 ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man’’ * * * * 
 And further still we climbed, in inner speech and thought, and 
 in the wonder of Thy works, and we reached to our own minds 
 and passed beyond them, so as to touch the realm of plenty, where 
 Thou feedest Israel for ever in the pasture of the truth, and where 
 life is that Wisdom, by which all things are made, both those 
 which have been, and those which shall be; and Itself is not made, 
 but is now as it was, and ever shall be; or rather it is eternal. 
 
194 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 Along with the Confessions of St. Augustine, 
 The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis still 
 holds its place as one of the great devotional 
 classics of the ages. The author, whose identity 
 is more or less uncertain, was evidently a man of 
 profound religious experience who felt personally 
 conscious of the reality of the future life. We have 
 space for only a few brief quotations from his 
 
 pages: 
 
 Direct thither day by day your sighs, your prayers, your tears, 
 that your spirit after death may be worthy to pass with joy into 
 the presence of your Lord. 
 
 You shall not say then, ‘‘Who shall deliver me from the body 
 of this death?’’ neither shall you cry, ‘‘Woe is me, that my 
 sojourning is prolonged’’ for death shall be swallowed up in 
 victory, and health shall be unfailing and there shall be no more 
 anxiety, but blessed joy, and sweet and lovely companionship. 
 
 In all things look to the end, and remember that you will have 
 to stand before a strict Judge, from Whom nothing is hidden, Who 
 is not to be bribed by gifts, and Who will admit no excuses, but 
 will judge according to that which is right. 
 
 It would be easy to multiply quotations like these 
 from the pages of all the great mystics. As Augus- 
 tine and a Kempis wrote and taught, so taught 
 Bernard, and Francis and Kckhart and Tauler and 
 Suso and Ruysbroek and Rolle and Catherine of 
 Sienna and St. John of the Cross and Traherne and 
 Crashaw and Bunyan and Behmen and Fox and 
 Wesley and Coventry Patmore and all the other 
 names which are associated with what William 
 James calls the twice-born type of religious ex- 
 perience. All these men and countless others who 
 
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SAINTS 195 
 
 have enjoyed similar experiences testify to the 
 reality of their convictions concerning a future life. 
 No one of them believed for a moment that this 
 earthly experience is all that pertaing to the life 
 of a Christian. Like the author of the Epistle to 
 the Hebrews, they all felt sure that they had no 
 abiding city here, but they sought one to come. 
 Again we say, the saints of the ages, like the seers, 
 by the joyous and confident testimony which they 
 have borne to the reality of the eternal hope should 
 help to inspire faith within us. One thing is cer- 
 tain, and that is that if we accept the doctrine of 
 immortality, we shall always be in good company. 
 
 The writer believes that at some time, perhaps 
 in the not too distant future, the fact of personal 
 immortality will be scientifically demonstrated. 
 When that time comes, it will no longer be possible 
 to east aspersions upon the daring souls who 
 through the power of faith laid hold of the treasures 
 of eternity. The great value of religion consists 
 in the fact that it enables us to appropriate real- 
 ities which science cannot reach. These realities 
 are of supreme importance for the daily ordering of 
 our lives. The conviction of life beyond the grave 
 belongs to this group. Some day it will be recog- 
 nized as a fact which no one can dispute. For the 
 present, it is simply a datum of faith. Through the 
 power of the will to believe, we may reject it if 
 we so desire, but we take this step in opposition to 
 a mass of evidence which should give us pause. 
 
196 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 After all, what do we gain by willing to disbelieve 
 in immortality? The heritage of the beast of the 
 field and the chosen refuge of those who have failed 
 in life’s battle and who are afraid to face the 
 future. Is it not better like Robert Browning to 
 ‘‘oreet the unseen with a cheer’’ in full and joyous 
 expectation of that higher and nobler existence 
 which is our true birthright and heritage? 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. W. K. Fleming, Mysticism in Christianity, Chapters I-III. 
 
 2. St. Augustine, Confessions. 
 
 3. Thomas & Kempis, The Imitation of Christ. 
 
 4. St. Ignatius, The Epistle to the Romans. 
 
 5. George Fox, Journal. 
 
 6. John Wesley, Journal. 
 
 7. Madame Guyon, Letters. 
 
 8. John Bunyan, Grace Abounding. 
 
 9. E. Underhill, Mysticism. 
 
 10. E. Holmes, Our Debt to the Ancient Wisdom of India (Hib- 
 bert Journal, Jan., 1925). 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 
 
 EK have discussed earlier in this book the his- 
 
 torical aspects of the Christian idea of immor- 
 tality. We have tried to indicate something con- 
 cerning the nature of the doctrine as it is to be 
 found in the gospel record and in the early Pauline 
 and Johannine writings. In the historical sketch 
 which we have attempted to draw, no special ref- 
 erence has been made to the significance of the res- 
 urrection teaching as a vital feature of Christian 
 doctrine. It would be altogether unfair to bring a 
 book like this to its close without stating the facts 
 concerning the Christian gospel of the resurrection 
 and the part which that gospel has played in the 
 world-wide expansion of Christianity. 
 
 The early Christian message was made up of two 
 fundamental characteristics. Beyond any question 
 it taught a new ethic, the way of love. The Sermon 
 on the Mount and the Kingdom teaching of Jesus 
 in general bear abundant testimony to the signif- 
 icance of this side of the new teaching. Neverthe- 
 less, it appears clear that if the gospel proclaimed 
 by the early apostles had contained nothing more 
 than the ethical message of Jesus it would never 
 have conquered the world. Important as that mes- 
 
 197 
 
198 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 sage is and was, it does not contain, nor did it ever 
 contain, the dynamic which is necessary to explain 
 the rapid expansion of Christianity during the sec- 
 ond and third centuries, A.D. Gibbon, in his De- 
 cline and Fall of the Roman Empire, has elaborated 
 the causes which, in his judgment, were responsible 
 for the triumph of the new religion over the time- 
 honored cults of the ancient world. Without at- 
 tempting to analyze the carefully developed ex- 
 planation which he has given, it may suffice to say 
 that the primary cause is easy to deduce from the 
 pages of the New Testament itself. The gospel 
 conquered the world because it delivered men from 
 the fear of death and from the power of the grave. 
 This explanation may be drawn from all of the 
 Pauline writings, and it requires only the most 
 casual reflection for one to see that it is the only 
 adequate solution of the problem. 
 
 The ancient world, when Christianity was born, 
 was weary and careworn and sated with sensual 
 pleasure and metaphysical speculation. Men had 
 tried every new avenue of material enjoyment and 
 had discovered that in the end all of them led to 
 ennui or despair. They had sought by philosophy, 
 and it must be conceded that their speculations 
 were of the most brilliant and fascinating charac- 
 ter, to find out God and to penetrate the mystery of 
 death with the result that all their efforts had 
 achieved only a mocking failure. Everywhere 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 199 
 
 there was the shadow of the grave. Epicurus and 
 his followers tried to make little of the fear of 
 death, but it is doubtful whether even the philos- 
 opher himself succeeded in extracting comfort 
 from his own arguments. The Stoics tried to steel 
 themselves against death by rising superior to it, 
 but the best they could do was to practice the glori- 
 fication of suicide as a token of victory. While the 
 teaching of men lke Epictetus and Marcus Aure- 
 hus possesses marvelous sublimity and certain feat- 
 ures which may be justly styled heroic, it is in 
 substance a gospel of despair, and it produces an 
 atmosphere of despondency and gloom wherever it 
 is accepted. The pictures of life during the early 
 Roman Empire which have come down to us fully 
 justify these conclusions. The cultured classes 
 were either Stoics or Epicureans in their thinking, 
 and to whichever group they belonged, life was 
 equally tedious and unbearable. In their pessi- 
 mism and despair the Roman nobles plunged into 
 the worst sort of excesses and thereby hastened 
 the doom of their civilization. 
 
 Among the common people the situation was 
 even worse. Most of them were slaves, and the lot 
 of a slave in ancient times was wretched beyond 
 the power of imagination. Torture and death were 
 constantly before him, his life was a season of un- 
 ending toil, and he had no hope of anything better 
 after the present life had come to an end. The 
 
200 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 situation in Rome was more serious at this time 
 than it had been in the early years of the Republic. 
 Then, at least, men believed in the gods and in 
 some sort of existence hereafter. Now the old 
 mythologies of the past had become obsolete, and 
 there was nothing but philosophy to take their 
 place. Philosophy the man on the street could not 
 understand, and when he saw that it brought no 
 comfort to his master who could understand it he 
 had no desire to probe its secrets. On all sides 
 there were only weariness, despair, and death. It 
 was no wonder that suicide became so prevalent 
 throughout the empire. Life was difficult to bear 
 under such appalling circumstances. In spite of 
 the fact that the ancient world was swept by pesti- 
 lence and war to such an extent that the average 
 span of existence was much below what it is today, 
 multitudes could not endure life to its natural and 
 normal end. One needs only to read the dismal 
 pages of Suetonius or Tacitus to realize how dark 
 was the horizon which confronted practically every 
 citizen of the empire during the age of its most 
 splendid civilization. 
 
 Into this atmosphere of doubt and despair, of 
 suicide and of death, came the clear note of the res- 
 urrection gospel. It was something altogether 
 new, something which had power to drive away 
 despair and to put in its place life and hope. The 
 sionificant thing about the resurrection preaching 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 201 
 
 was its appeal to plain facts. Greeks and Romans 
 alike were surfeited with argument and had come 
 to realize its utter futility as a means of consola- 
 tion. Plato and Socrates and Aristotle had pro- 
 duced the best of reasons why the soul should be 
 immortal, but their reasons were all theoretical and 
 nobody could show that the facts corresponded to 
 their speculations. To prove that the soul ought to 
 be immortal and that it actually is immortal are 
 two different things. Plato did the one and Jesus 
 Christ the other. In the last analysis it was the 
 Christian demonstration which counted. The 
 proofs of the resurrection were not philosophical 
 or speculative but scientific and practical. The 
 gospel preachers were either witnesses of the fact 
 or so intimately acquainted with the actual wit- 
 nesses that their testimony amounted to the same 
 thing. It was this note of assurance, this certainty 
 of conviction, which carried the gospel into the 
 very heart of the ancient world. Men did not want 
 to die—they wanted to live, and here alone eternal 
 life was offered to them. Was it any wonder that 
 they grasped it, held to it, and rejoiced in the privi- 
 lege of going to the arena or to the cross rather 
 than to give it up? It was the gospel of the resur- 
 rection and not the gospel of the Kingdom, using 
 the latter term in its ordinary social and ethical 
 significance, which broke down the battlements of 
 heathenism in the Graeco-Roman world. 
 
202 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 The men who preached this gospel believed in it. 
 Of this fact there can be no doubt. The fifteenth 
 chapter of First Corinthians represents one of 
 the earliest documents of the New Testament, and 
 no one can read the vivid and eloquent passages 
 which it contains*without realizing that the man 
 who wrote these words was terribly in earnest. 
 Paul undoubtedly believed in the social gospel, as 
 the thirteenth chapter of this same epistle abun- 
 dantly proves. It was not the social gospel, how- 
 ever, which made him willing to give his body to 
 be burned. He says in the most direct fashion that 
 if the dead rise not, he and his followers are of all 
 men most pitiable. Nothing could be more striking 
 than his emphasis upon the cardinal place which 
 the resurrection teaching occupies in his gospel. 
 The gospel itself is nothing more than the death, 
 burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, with, of 
 course, the consequent corollary that these facts 
 guarantee our own resurrection from the grave. If 
 the gospel of the resurrection be not true, then 
 Paul characterizes his own preaching as folly, and 
 the position of his converts as hopeless. The res- 
 urrection is not an incident but is rather the cor- 
 ner stone of the entire gospel. Assuredly conelu- 
 sions such as these represent the Pauline temper 
 not only in this but in practically all of the other 
 epistles which are ascribed to him in the New Tes- 
 tament. In Philippians, written some years after, 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 203 
 
 and presumably near the close of his life, he con- 
 siders death as gain not because it will bring sur- 
 cease of sorrow or pain, but because it will mean 
 the beginning of a new and more glorious exist- 
 ence. It would be quite futile to quote similar pas- 
 sages from the other epistles inasmuch as this atti- 
 tude may be said to be one of the few undisputed 
 characteristics in the life of the great Apostle. 
 Paul was of course familiar with the stock ob- 
 jections to his position. These objections were 
 apparently much the same two thousand years ago 
 as they are today. They relate chiefly to the man- 
 ner and character of the resurrection. ‘*‘How are 
 the dead raised up, and with what body do they 
 rise?’’ represents the skeptical criticism of Hume 
 no less than the incredulity of all modern mate- 
 rialism. It is when one attempts to image the life 
 beyond that the difficulties begin. Obviously we 
 are here attempting the impossible, and should not 
 be disappointed when we fail to secure satisfactory 
 results. The life beyond is not like life here, at 
 least in the sense that our earthly categories fail 
 to interpret it, and inasmuch as the higher cate- 
 gories are not as yet in our possession we are help- 
 less in our efforts to image the future. Paul under- 
 stood this, and yet it did not disturb his faith. The 
 objection, in fact, seemed to him so unwarranted 
 that he uses rather strong language in meeting it. 
 ‘‘Thou fool,’’ he replies to the objectors, and then 
 
204 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 proceeds to justify his using the epithet. In sub- 
 stance his argument is that lfe in this world 
 is dependent upon death, and even here there are 
 multitudinous varieties of bodies, all of them ap- 
 propriate to the uses of life. If the lower life of 
 the plant and the animal finds appropriate bodily 
 expression, how improbable, nay, how absurd it is 
 to think of the higher life of the spirit as incapable 
 of securing an appropriate body. Paul nowhere 
 teaches the doctrine of discarnate spirits. The 
 soul has its body in this world, and it will have a 
 body in the world to come. This body will be of a 
 different and higher kind, but it will be a body. 
 The word itself is of course unsatisfactory inas- 
 much as it seems to carry with it a distinctly mate- 
 rial or physical connotation. And yet there ap- 
 pears to be nothing more satisfactory at our 
 command. Paul attempts to get rid of the diff- 
 culty by using the phrase, ‘‘a spiritual body,’’ and 
 contrasts it with the natural body known to our 
 present senses. The term ‘‘spiritual body”’ is, 
 however, in itself contradictory so the difficulty is 
 not entirely removed by using it. 
 
 Modern psychologists and philosophers like 
 Count Keyserling and Professor Broad are quite 
 Pauline in their emphasis upon the reality of the 
 thinking spirit. The former, with Bergson, would 
 have us believe that it is the spirit which creates 
 the body rather than the opposite, and that the 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 205 
 
 process which really goes on in the present world 
 simply repeats itself on a higher scale and in more 
 wonderful fashion in the world to come. If the 
 spirit can create its own body here, surely it can 
 do no less hereafter. It is not the body which 
 grows the spirit but it is the spirit which grows 
 the body. After all, there is little difference be- 
 tween this view and the eschatology of the fifteenth 
 chapter of First Corinthians. Professor Broad 
 too thinks that the mind survives the physical 
 structure after the latter passes away, but does not 
 believe that it can create another body. It remains 
 for an indefinite time without a home, occasionally 
 returning to earth in the form of mediumistic pos- 
 session, and eventually appears to dissolve into 
 nothingness. If it could be furnished with a body 
 appropriate to its needs, apparently it might go on 
 living in the future world just as it previously 
 lived in this one. Professor Broad refuses to ac- 
 cept the Christian hypothesis that such a body is 
 provided for those who fall asleep in the hope of 
 the resurrection. The difference between him and 
 the orthodox Christian at this point is simply a 
 matter of faith. He refuses to believe that a body 
 will be provided for the spirit when the latter 
 passes into eternity. He does not dispute the fact 
 that the spirit exists as a real entity, and the fur- 
 ther fact that it actually passes into the unseen 
 world. These things he regards as scientifically 
 
206 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 demonstrated. It is doubtful whether any Chris- 
 tian ought to ask more from science than Dr. Broad 
 has granted. Obviously the only way in which we 
 can reach conclusions, at present at least, concern- 
 ing the resurrection of the body is upon the basis 
 of faith in God and especially of faith in Jesus 
 Christ. The most we can ask of science at present 
 is that it shall not make this faith impossible or 
 exceptionally difficult. Certainly it is doing neither 
 today. If we do not believe in the resurrection gos- 
 pel it is only because for some reason or other we 
 are incapable of putting forth the moral energy 
 which is essential for a true act of faith. Science 
 has made the fact of the resurrection more intelligi- 
 ble and more probable from its own viewpoint than 
 has been true at any time since the miracle of the 
 empty tomb. There is more justification for faith 
 in immortality today than at any other period in 
 the history of the world. Why then is there per- 
 haps less actual faith in the power and reality of 
 the life beyond than at any previous time in human 
 history? 
 
 The answer to the question is after all not diffi- 
 cult to give. Our modern civilization has become 
 so engrossed with purely material interests that it 
 has ceased to care for spiritual preservation. We 
 have discovered so much and have invented so 
 many things and have so multiplied our human 
 interests that we cannot think of any other type of 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 207 
 
 life as possessing reality of value aside from the 
 one which we have ourselves created. We have 
 become intoxicated with our own material gran- 
 deur, and we have sacrificed the higher life of the 
 spirit upon the altar of our crude and crass phys- 
 ical reality. As a result of this misdirected inter- 
 est, the life of our civilization, as Keyserling puts 
 it, is dying out and civilization itself will disap- 
 pear unless we change our point of view. It is 
 not the creation of material things which has un- 
 done us but it is the fact that we have allowed our- 
 selves to be mastered and dominated by our own 
 creations. We have fashioned a beautiful image 
 of stone or marble or steel and have then bowed 
 down and worshiped it. We must get back our 
 soul or else even the body of our civilization will 
 perish. Once we do this we shall again find it easy 
 to possess the simple and unhesitating conscious- 
 ness of eternal life which characterized the early 
 Christian communities. We need to ponder in seri- 
 ous fashion the question of our Master, ‘‘What 
 shall it profit a man,’’ or we may add, a nation or 
 a civilization, ‘‘if he gain the whole world and lose 
 his own soul?’’ This exchange our modern age is 
 in serious danger of making. We have recreated 
 the world from a material point of view, but in the 
 process we have almost if not quite lost our soul. 
 Life begins and ends for us in this material world. 
 It has no larger vista. It is cireumscribed wholly 
 
208 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 by temporal and spacial conditions. We no longer 
 even dream of heaven or paradise. By our own 
 confession we have allowed ourselves to commit 
 spiritual suicide. 
 
 In the midst of all the confusion and turmoil of 
 our modern materialistic civilization we find the 
 same uneasiness and unrest which characterized 
 the days of the Caesars. Once more the shadow of 
 death begins to weary us and our machine-made 
 pleasures to pall upon us. In spite of multiplied 
 material comforts we are not satisfied but are for- 
 ever demanding more. No matter how large our 
 incomes may be they are always a little less than 
 the amount we would like to spend. As our mate- 
 rial wants multiply our spiritual horizon tends to 
 shrink. Hence our interest in things spiritual con- 
 tinues to decline. In such an atmosphere virtue 
 becomes palsied while vice and crime grow strong 
 and flourish. When religious people no longer con- 
 cern themselves about the world to come the in- 
 habitants of the underworld will not think about 
 - it. Eternal life means added responsibility for 
 present behavior, and no one knows this better 
 than the so-called man of the street. What is 
 wrong with our present civilization is simply that 
 it lacks life. It has mechanism in plenty, but it no 
 longer possesses vitality. The spirit has gone out 
 of it. 
 
 It is time for the church to recapture the gospel 
 
THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION 209 
 
 of the resurrection. The ministry must realize its 
 significance as the very corner stone of the Chris- 
 tian religion. Church leaders must believe it, 
 preach it, live it, and manifest it in an age which 
 needs it more than any other since the days of the 
 Caesars. If it be said that this is hard to do we 
 must remember that our Master himself asked the 
 question, ‘‘ When the Son of Man cometh, shall he 
 find faith upon the earth.’’ Lord Bacon was much 
 impressed by this question, and made it the text for 
 one of his best known essays. It is, after all, a lack 
 of faith which is at the heart of our trouble. The 
 difficulties in the way of immortality appear stag- 
 gering to us because we have such little faith. We 
 ean discern no hope of salvation for our age unless 
 it can somehow increase its faith. A recent writer 
 tells us that mankind has reacted farther during 
 the last two decades in the direction of barbarism 
 than at any period since the beginning of the 
 Renaissance. Probably this is true. It will require 
 a reaction in favor of spiritual things before the 
 pendulum can swing in the other direction. Let 
 us hope that we are soon to witness the turn of the 
 tide. 
 
 But now is Christ risen from the dead, and he- 
 come the firstfruits of them that slept. 
 
 REFERENCES 
 
 1. Glover, Paul of Tarsus, later chapters. 
 2. Broad, The Mind and Its Place in Nature. 
 3. Keyserling, Creative Perception. 
 
210 HORIZONS OF IMMORTALITY 
 
 . Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars. 
 . Tacitus, Annals. 
 . Epicurus, Letters. 
 Bergson, Creative Evolution. 
 . Schiller, Problems of Belief. 
 . Tolstoi, My Confession. 
 10. Leach, in The Forum, Vol. LXXV, No. 3, The Next Forty 
 Years. 
 
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