" THE ADVENTURE OF DEATH."
[TO THE EDITOR Of TRII 'SPECTATOR."]
SIE,—In the very interesting article on "The Adventure of Death" in the Spectator of August 19th, Dr. McKenna' s reviewer makes a rather astounding statement. He says : "To be quite frank, the vast majority of men would be greatly relieved to know that they would never die, and a vast minority would welcome such knowledge as a deliverance from painful and recurrent alarm." That most people have a natural fear of death is true enough, but surely a greater terror would be the certainty of living on in this world for ever. The thought of an endless extension of mundane existence would be to most of us capable of thinking at all a veritable nightmare. Let a man imagine himself going on and on for always, the solo survivor of all whom he has ever known or loved. Or, taking it the other way, the whole present human race going on. The same people now existing here continuing to exist here for ever. Think of the increasing boredom it would bring about even when enlivened by the perpetually recurring quarrels, and jealousies, and hatreds we are already sick of. How deadly tired we should get of each other—of the same old people of stereotyped characteristics and futile performances! (Fresh genera- tions soon becoming impossible.) Would even love stand the irritating tests of a prosaic roundabout going on for ever? But it could not go on. We should all be raving maniacs before many centuries had passed.
The thought of an eternal existence in other spheres must some- times appal even the meat religious people. But that terror is modi- fied for those who believe in God, and in their own embryonic incapacity fer apprehending the spiritually remote. It does not terrify as the too-well-known can, and only terrified when we lose hold of a
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