SHALL WE ALL LIVE AGAIN?
I.—THE NEGATIVE SIDE.
THE answer to the Comtist proposition that the immortality of the soul is only a misdescription of the posthumous life of man, contained in the last Spectaior, is a very strong one, but does not quite cover the whole case. There is a heresy subtler than Mr. Harrison's, and it may be more dangerous, which at present greatly attracts a few, and by-and-by will attract thou- sands, who, nevertheless, are not willing to place themselves entirely outside the Christian pale. It attracts me, I confess, very strongly, and though as yet it is not fairly entitled to be called a Faith, but only a working hypothesis, a theory that explains much, if not all, of the perplexing problem of existence, perhaps I may be permitted to state it, for the sake of con- venience, as if it were an absolute conviction. I hold, then, as a hypothesis, that some men, possibly very many men, a large propor- tion, live again, but that all men do not ; that the potentiality of continued existence, which we call Soul, is not an inherent quality or attribute of the human race, but an acquired or given quality of some portion of it only. My reasons for that belief are these. The existence of a Creator, of a sentient Being who is the ultimate cause of all material things, of which man has or can have cognisance, is assumed. If that is not granted, we are all thrown back upon a different and far deeper line of argument, into which to-day I have neither space nor inclination to enter, but that being granted, then it follows that the existence of man must have some purpose, some object which that Creator intends through man to serve. It is simply incredible that so marvellous an exertion of power, conscious and far-seeing power, as the development or crea- tion of man, could be meaningless, or could have a small meaning, could have been accomplished in sport, or for a purely temporary end. About the method of the work of creation I say nothing, and for the purpose of this argument, care nothing. Whether man is the result of direct creation, or of the slow development of an effective law, is a matter just now of very minor importance. The Being who could create out of nothing or out of Himself so efficient a material atom that out of it man had to spring ; the Legislator who could make a law so far-seeing, so wise, and so compelling, that under it, through endless centuries or cycles of centuries, the fittest must survive, and the unfit must perish; who could foresee Newton, and compel an Ascidian to such obedience that out of him Newton not only could come, but must come,—is a Being and a Legislator that is sufficient for me. Whether He is the ultimate God, the One of whom man strains so perpetually and fails so grievously to form a conception, or only a Demiurgus, a subordinate existence entrusted with delegated power, and capable, therefore, alike of mistake and of termination,—Ile is so utterly above me, that if I can only know His laws, I will obey them ; if I can only discover His will, I will do it ; .if I can only ascertain His purpose, I will do my best—as a dog would, and that analogy is far too lofty—to ensure their fulfil- ment. Whatever He is, the notion that if He exists Ho can have wasted the marvellous energy discernible in the making of man by creative fiat, or by vivifying law, is incredible, and indeed absurd. There must—that one hypothesis, the existence of a creating Mind being granted—be a purpose in the making of man. And if man, as a whOle, as an existence, dies with this life, that purpose has failed. Think of it as he will, regard it from any point of view, rack his brains till they are sick with thought, or doubt, or longing, and still the keenest intellectuality among us has only to acknowledge that man as a mortal being is a failure. He is not a fit object of love to a Creator, even if one could conceive of an object of love with the life of an ephemeris. He is not a contribution to the glory of God, whatever sense you may put upon that glory. He is not of any use, or rather the separate quality in him—the accumulating mind —is not of any use, for he and it and all its gains, vast as they may yet become, must, if he is mortal, pass into nothingness, nothing- ness so absolute that we may reverse even Emerson's tremendous sentence, and affirm that man is not even manure ; for within a period which even as mortals count is small, the world will be chilled beyond the vivifying effect of any guano man has yet dis- covered, or used, or can become. There is no purpose in man's existence ; or, to be more exact, no purpose in the existence of that in him which separates him from the brute, if he is not to endure.
There may be, doubtless there are, minds to which the idea of God is always present, yet to which that argument seems weak. So be it. I am stating an opinion, not pronouncing a dogma, when 1 say that to me it is unanswerable, that my mind, though capable of holding doubts on all things, even the Hindoo doubt whether all is not illusion, and capable of at least comprehending absolutely negative thought, refuses to dissociate the existence'of God and the continued existence of man ; is incapable of perceiving that Deism and Materialism are not direct contradictions in terms, unworthy, when the con-
ditions are once perceived, of simultaneous discussion. But the belief that the existence of man has a purpose which is not fulfilled if ho dies like a flower, does not carry with it the belief that the existence of every man has equally a purpose which must always be fulfilled. The purpose may be general,—something which the whole race of man may fulfil, and not the individual. In every other department of life we see, or think we see, the operation of the grand law, the survival of the fittest. Why not in this department of living after death ? In everything else the practice of the governing Mind is the pro- fusest waste. Why not in the creation of man? Stars, we know, perish. Entire species of living creatures have died out unknown. Whole races of men, some of them of high mental qualities, have passed to the abyss. No matter perishes ; but the being into which matter is formed, the tree, the flower, the statue, perishes irretrievably every day. Why should not the man in whom that which his Creator desires, or it may be needs—for I have carefully avoided rejection of the possibility that man's Creator may not be the ultimate Ruler who is self-sufficient and perfect—also perish irretrievably ? Is not the probability so great as to amount to certainty—many Churches affirm it —that the stillborn child perishes like a plucked bud ; and why should there not be still-born spiritualities, persons in whom the anima—the something, whatever it is, which has force sufficient to survive death—never reaches maturity? Why should the congenital idiot continue ? Or why the bad man, if lie is bad not as the world reckons badness, but as the Author of life reckons it. Granted a Creator, and granted a purpose in his creation, why should that which does not fulfil the purpose not be cast away like the still-born child, the undeveloped acorn, the carbon half-hardened, but not wholly hardened into diamond ? That would be waste, for some spiritual essence must have perished ? Nay, the spiritual essence must be, if it exists at all, as imperishable as matter, but like matter may, in its dissolution, be but the material for new forms. If there were but a remanet left which fulfilled the purpose, or helped to carry it on, the object of creation would be accomplished, and man's mind have its visible and sufficient place in the great scheme. If only those survived who were the fittest for the work to be achieved, the law that to all seeming governs the universe, would be all the more perfectly unbroken. Where is the depravation of the idea of Deity, or of the idea of man, in that conception?
But what, then, constitutes fitness ? Who shall tell ? It may be force of will, base as that idea seems, for the one quality which cannot be in a perfect being, and can be in an imperfect one, the quality of capacity for effort, would seem at first sight the quality likely to be most worthy of survival. It may be intellectual power, for that seems to be the quality differentiating man from creatures otherwise as finely organised by nature as himself. It may be goodness, the moral harmony which brings man nearest to the Being who created Lim, and which, when found in man, always suggests to men of all creeds that in him there is something other than himself, scene prevenient grace, as the theologians say. It may be even, as many heretics hold, belief in Christ ; for though it is difficult to conceive that in the fact of the absence of that belief, which may be involuntary, there is guilt, yet it is certain that from the presence of that belief, once full and complete, arises in man a new and distinctive force—call it Love, Charity, Benevolence, Sympathy, what you will—which, if the purpose of man's creation is to make of him an agent who can suffer and strive for the sake of others, may be the very force he was created to develope. But that the fitness must exist is certain, that it cannot and does not exist in all men is equally certain, and I find it difficult to understand why unfitness should survive. Why should a Digger Indian live for ever, any more than a Newfoundland dog? Out of the notion that it does survive have arisen the worst half of theo- logical ideas, the beliefs in sacrifices necessary to appease an angry God, in excessive and almost revolting punishment, in the necessity for accuracy about dogma under eternal penalties, and in the incurability except by a miracle of the badness in man.
The bad consequences which, owing to human perversity, may spring out of any Faith furnish no proof whatever that that faith is false. Many scientific truths, absolute truths, would, if popularly known to an otherwise uneducated world, be extremely mischievous. But it is not certain, though it is often alleged, that the consequences of this faith would ultimately be bad. As the world advances in intelligence, the dread of extinction may become as powerful a deterrent as that dread of hell which has been so fearful an addition to human suffering, and has done so little to check human crime. To cease to be is not to sleep, whatever Mirabeau might say ; and in the universal reluctance to commit suicide as a mode of escaping suffering, we have a partial measure of the reluctance with which the majority of human beings would look forward to annihilation. A few might resolve that life was pleasant and sleep restful, and the hope of future life distracting, and so become mere intellectual swine; but on the other hand, a few would, if they could but hold this faith with any certainty, gain from it a new motive for exertion, for self-sacrifice, and for that "missionary work" among men which, often as it is derided, is still the highest manifestation of altruism, —the work which whoso does in singleness of heart and perfect self-subjugation comes nearest among mankind to the apostolic life.
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