fate on the Alps with a cheerfulness which showed that he believed it.
The craving for mere survival, no matter under what conditions, is
natural to some persons, and those who have it not must not claim any
superiority over those who shudder at the idea of resigning this
'pleasing, anxious being.' Some brave and loyal men, like Samuel
Johnson, have feared death all their lives long; while others, even when
fortune smiles upon them, 'have a desire to depart and to be with
Christ, which is far better.' But the longing for survival, and the
anxious search for evidence which may satisfy it, have undoubtedly the
effect of binding us to earth and earthly conditions; they come between
us and faith in true immortality. They cannot restore to us what death
takes away. They cannot lay the spectre which made Claudio a craven.
'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 regions of thick-ribbed ice;
To be imprisoned in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence round about
The pendent world; or to be worse than worst
Of those that lawless and uncertain thoughts
Imagine howling! 'tis too horrible!
The weariest and most loathed earthly life
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment
Can lay on nature, is a paradise
To what we fear of death.'
We know now, if we did not know it three years ago, that the average man
can face death, and does face it in the majority of cases, with a
serenity which would be incomprehensible if he did not know in his
heart of hearts that it does not matter much. He may have no articulated
faith in immortality, but, like Spinoza, he has 'felt and experienced
that he is eternal.' Perhaps he only says to himself, 'Who dies if
England lives?' But the England that lives is his own larger self, the
life that is more his own life than the beating of his heart, which a
bullet may still for ever. And if the exaltation of noble patriotism can
'abolish death, and bring life and immortality to light' for almost any
unthinking lad from our factories and hedgerows, should not religion be
able to do as much for us all? And may it not be that some touch of
heroic self-abnegation is necessary before we can have a soul which
death cannot touch? When Christ said that those who are willing to lose
their souls shall save them, is not this what He meant? We must accustom
ourselves to breathe the air of the eternal values, if we desire to live
for ever. And a strong faith is not curious about details. 'Beloved, now
are we sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be. But we
know that when He is made manifest we shall be like Him, for we shall
see Him as He is.'
FOOTNOTES:
[93] Quoted by Professor Pringle-Pattison from an article by
me in the _Times_ Literary Supplement.
[94] _Study of Religion_, vol. i. 12.
[95] _Ennead_, v. 8, 4.
[96] From John Smith, the Cambridge Platonist.
THE END