The Assurance of Immortality (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1913. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER III The Assurance Of Immortality The bare possibility that after death we may continue to exist falls far short of satisfying the interest of men in immortality. There may be some, indeed, whose desires for life eternal are so strong that when the arguments against it are proved inconclusive, their hearts, like coiled springs released, leap out in confident affirmation that the possible is true. Such an attitude is not altogether unreasonable, for when a great life, pulsating with energy and hope, burdened with powers but half-expressed, aspiring with a reach that is larger than its grasp, suddenly passes from our sight, the responsibility of proof seems to rest with those, who, in the face of mankind's universal hope, assert that the life has been annihilated. If, therefore, such proof is quite impossible, if all the nooks and crannies of the mental universe hide not a single fact 94 that demonstrates the dissolution of the personality, a man may well feel the strong presumption of probability that the life goes on. More cautious minds, however, will not be greatly influenced by this consideration. If the bare possibility of life eternal is all that they can affirm, their resultant attitude will be not positive confidence but agnosticism. However much they may desire to be convinced of immortality, they will feel themselves in honor bound not to go beyond the evidence. Moreover, the bare possibility that man may live through death is insufficient, because the profoundest meanings which faith in immortality possesses for the lives of men cannot belong to one who, perceiving that existence beyond the grave is possible or even probable, is yet not positively convinced that it is true. If belief in personal permanence concerned only a mysterious fu...