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The Evolution of 
 Immortality 
 
WRITINGS BY C. T. STOCKWELL. 
 
 NEW MODES OF THOUGHT. 
 The New Materialism and The New Pantheism. Cloth, 
 gilt top, f 1.00 net (postage 7 cents). 
 
 ' ' Here we have presented, in the most concise and com- 
 prehensive shape, what has not hitherto come into print : 
 the momentous trend of chemistry, physics, and philos- 
 ophy to one and the same end."— Springfield Jiepiwlican. 
 " Here is a volume one should possess. Read the chap- 
 ter, 'Begotten, not Created,' and you will thank the 
 critic for calling your attention to the book."— Unity. 
 
 THE EVOLUTION OF IMMORTALITY. 
 Suggestions of an Individual Immortality based upon 
 our Organic and Life History. Fourth edition: re- 
 vised and extended. Cloth, gilt top, $1 .00 net (postage 
 8 cents). 
 
 " One of the most suggestive and best developed es- 
 says on personal immortality which later years have 
 produced."— ii*erary World. " A thoughtful and sug- 
 
 gestive treatise."— The Independent. «' well worthy of 
 study."— The Critic. " A thoughtful book worth read- 
 ing."— ^*Zan,tic Monthly. 
 
 JAMES H. WEST CO., Pubflshers, Boston. 
 
The Evolution of 
 Immortality 
 
 Suggestions of an Individual Immor- 
 tality Based upon Our Organic 
 AND Life History 
 
 BY 
 
 C. T. Stockwell 
 
 Author of " New Modes of Thought : The New Material- 
 ism and The New Pantheism," etc. 
 
 JFonrti; Eliitton: ISlebtseti anH ^xtenlieli 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 JAMES H. WEST COMPANY 
 
 1906 
 

 rr»'.EBMI 
 
 Copyright, 1887 
 By Charles H. Kerr & Company 
 
 Copyright, 1906 
 By James H. West Company 
 
tJTo 
 
 AMOS EMERSON DOLBEAR 
 
 M. E., PH.D., LL. D. 
 
 PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS IN TUFTS COLLEGE 
 
 LONG TIME FRIEND AND SYMPATHETIC CRITIC 
 
 WHOSE AGREEMENT I HOLD 
 
 TO MEET ME AFTER A THOUSAND YEARS 
 
 TO TALK OVER MORE FULLY THE GREAT MATTERS 
 
 TREATED OF IN THIS LITTLE BOOK. 
 
 1 r)5H5« 
 
Death has no power the immortal part to slay. 
 Which, when its present body turns to clay. 
 Seeks a fresh home, and with unminished might 
 Inspires another frame with life and light. 
 
 — Pythagoras. 
 
 All that is, at all. 
 
 Lasts ever, past recall ; 
 Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure : 
 
 What entered into thee. 
 
 That was, is, and shall be : 
 Time's wheel runs back or stops : Potter and clay 
 endure. 
 
 (8) 
 
Preface 
 
 DEING convinced that an individual 
 ^^ immortality lies outside of the realm 
 of demonstration ; that it is a conscious- 
 ness, a possession, an apprehension if any- 
 thing, the aim of the writer as embodied 
 in this little book is to make it merely 
 suggestive. Should his work, therefore, 
 prove helpful in this direction to any who 
 may read, it will have sufficiently accounted 
 for itself 
 
 There are two or three questions not 
 touched upon in the body of the volume 
 that will, quite likely, arise in the minds 
 of some who give this line of reasoning 
 careful thought, which I desire to mention 
 here: 
 
lo Preface 
 
 I. If, as is claimed, self-consciousness 
 is spirit birth, and the individual, from the 
 point of attaining self-consciousness, is an 
 immortal being, the question will very nat- 
 urally arise regarding the destiny of spirit- 
 ual embryos, or infants. In other words : 
 Must the continuity of development re- 
 main unbroken until the state of self- 
 consciousness is reached before it may be 
 said that an immortality is possible ? In 
 the case of infants, self-consciousness and 
 self-determining powers have not emerged 
 above the potential state. But as human 
 life as we know it is potential in the em- 
 bryo, so self-consciousness is potential in 
 the unconscious infant. And right here 
 is found a suggestion of an answer to the 
 question. If the embryo is viable human 
 life before actual birth, may we not believe 
 that the infant, even before self-conscious- 
 ness becomes an actual fact, has potential 
 viable spirit? If the normal period of 
 
Preface 1 1 
 
 physical gestation may be considerably 
 shortened, and still the potential life of 
 the embryo may be realized, why should 
 we not suppose that a like law relates to 
 the spiritual life ? 
 
 2. It will also be noted that, assuming 
 self-consciousness to be spirit birth, other 
 forms of life, below man, may not possess 
 viable spirit, and, consequently, do not 
 have the quality or property of immortality 
 common to man. Professor Le Conte, of 
 the University of California, has written 
 on this and similar points very strongly 
 and convincingly, under the head of 
 " Relation of Man to Nature," to which 
 reference may be had to tbe advantage of 
 such as are interested enough to pursue the 
 matter further. In this connection, how- 
 ever, it is an unimportant consideration. 
 
 3. If it should seem to some that the 
 element of a personal will has been over- 
 looked in the conclusions arrived at, this 
 
1 2 Preface 
 
 must result, as it appears to me, in conse- 
 quence of a failure on the part of such to 
 apprehend the full meaning of the term 
 used so often, viz. : environment. By this 
 term, in its largest sense, is meant the in- 
 finity of spiritual forces that press down 
 upon and around every human being with 
 the constancy of gravitation itself. In fact, 
 from the viewpoint of science to-day, all 
 forces are spiritual forces, and the order 
 and sequences of law are inseparable from 
 any clear concept of God. 
 
 The whole realm of morals lies between 
 the inheritance of imperfection, on the one 
 hand, and the perfection of the spiritual 
 nature and being, on the other. As God 
 — of whom by Gospel and by Law we are 
 taught to say " Our Father** — is superior 
 to any supposed devil ; as good is more 
 enduring than evil — an imperfect good ; 
 in short, as infinite spiritual forces are 
 stronger than the imperfections that come 
 
Preface 1 3 
 
 down to us by inheritance, so may our 
 faith be as regards the ultimate destiny of 
 that upon which these forces operate. We 
 are indeed self-determining beings ; we are 
 free to run counter to law ; not, however, 
 to the injury of the law, for it mercifully 
 and continually repays tithe by tithe, and 
 will claim the last farthing. But the whole 
 of life is an education, a discipline, which 
 is calculated to result in that choice, that 
 will, that action which is in harmony with 
 the laws of Nature, which are, in them- 
 selves, essentially spiritual. Law vindi- 
 cates itself by its power to save, not by 
 destroying. Law is our divinely appointed 
 schoolmaster, and it is capable of justifying 
 its appointment. It is appointed with a 
 purpose and for an end ; and the divine 
 ends are believed to be sure by the 
 
 Author. 
 
 Springfield, Mass., September, 1887. 
 
Contents 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface 9 
 
 I. Introductory 17 
 
 II. Of Embryological and Cell Life 20 
 
 III. Of Life and Matter 38 
 
 IV. Of Analogies 48 
 
 V. Of Law as Manifested in Organic Evolution 60 
 
 VI. Of the Fundamental Spiritual Identity be- 
 tween Man and God in Point of Essen- 
 tial Nature 71 
 
 VII. Of the Origin and Evolution of Consciousness 81 
 VIII. Of a Consciousness of Limitations .... 91 
 
 IX. The Forward Look 99 
 
 X. Discussion 106 
 
 XI. Aftermath 142 
 
The Evolution of 
 Immortality 
 
 Introductory 
 
 IT may be stated, with little fear of contra- 
 diction, that the two great questions ever 
 uppermost in the minds of men are concerning 
 God and Immortality. There never was a 
 time, however, in all the history of the world, 
 when the advanced or progressive thought of 
 man with reference to these questions came 
 so near centering upon a common plane as 
 to-day. The pioneers of theology, philosophy, 
 and science, having come up different sides 
 of the mountain of thought and research, are 
 
1 8 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 now looking each other squarely in the face 
 at the top. Each school is eagerly endeavor- 
 ing, as never before, to compass the whole 
 range of revelation. The time has come when 
 science even claims its inherent right to deal 
 with the questions. The age of strict materi- 
 alistic science has passed, and the world is 
 beginning to understand that there is a scien- 
 tific method in dealing with things that do not 
 pertain to matter alone ; that science, philos- 
 ophy, and religion are divine handmaids of 
 truth, with common aims and purposes, work- 
 ing for the evolution of the common brother- 
 hood of man. 
 
 So much has been said and written in re- 
 gard to the question of Immortality, that every 
 conceivable shade of thought or speculation 
 bearing upon it would seem to have been pre- 
 sented. There remains, however, one line of 
 suggestive thought which, so far as the au- 
 thor's personal observation extends, has not 
 been touched upon ; to briefly trace which is 
 the purpose of this study. 
 
 It would seem reasonable, at least, to sup- 
 
Introductory 19 
 
 pose that we may gain some reliable data upon 
 which to postulate a continued life by look- 
 ing backward along the line of the actual 
 past whence we came ; and, also, by a study 
 of life itself as manifested by phenomena. 
 " The history of the world," it has been said, 
 " is the true premise upon which to postulate 
 its future." If this be so, it would seem to 
 be equally true with reference to man as an 
 individual. If we may discover his organic 
 history and his trend, in a broad sense, we 
 shall come nearer an apprehension of his ulti- 
 mate destiny. 
 
 It is along this line of thought that atten- 
 tion is invited. Let us drop out of mind, in 
 the present work, all the commonly cited argu- 
 ments in favor of an immortal existence, and 
 thoughtfully observe any suggestive analogies 
 that may be found in physical science, espe- 
 cially in embryological and cell life, that may 
 justly be considered as prophetic of a con- 
 scious individual existence after what is called 
 death. 
 
II 
 
 Of Embryological and Cell Life 
 
 WHAT do we know of our own life his- 
 tory ? What do we know of its origin ? 
 It is not enough to say that we were born of 
 this or that parentage, or at a certain time or 
 place. This relates simply to an event, or to 
 particular events in our history, and only to 
 that part of it which appears at this stage of 
 our being, this world of our existence. We 
 have already lived in another stage or world, 
 the embryological, and have been brought 
 forth — born — from it into this. We, here, 
 awake to a consciousness of selfhood and, at 
 least, find ourselves related to an infinite past 
 by an uninterrupted connection. Looking 
 about us for further facts, we find that it may 
 fairly be assumed that life, or the life-principle. 
 
Of Embryo logical and Cell Life 21 
 
 is potentially and essentially the same in all 
 past stages of our being ; that it made its own 
 conditions and formed its own environments, 
 having asked no questions of us ; that to be 
 born or to die simply means, for the real iden- 
 tity, a change of worlds or environments ; that 
 birth and death are allied functions of life, 
 each the act or event of the emergence of an 
 identity from a lesser to a higher stage or 
 circle of existence ; that one possesses, or ex- 
 hibits, the quality of destruction no more than 
 the other ; that birth marks the beginning of 
 a definite stage of physical existence, while 
 death is its closing act — and also an intro- 
 duction to another and higher stage ; that the 
 only difference between the now and then, in 
 each successive stage, is that which results 
 from growth or development, " the unfold- 
 ment or evolution of a potentiality or germ- 
 ality that each preceding stage possessed, 
 although obscured from the sense perception 
 of finite beings." 
 
 These conclusions are based upon general 
 facts of physical science, and find very strong 
 
22 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 support in that part of our history that relates 
 to embryological and cell life. Hence it would 
 seem apparent that our life history affords a 
 reasonable premise upon which to postulate 
 future states. 
 
 It may be pardonable if it is here stated 
 that a personal study in this direction has led 
 to that apprehension of the real meaning of 
 life which is the true basis of a recognition of 
 its possessing the quality of immortality. I 
 do not think this too strong a statement. If, 
 however, "our perception of one object con- 
 tains a series of recognitions," we may not 
 hope to make clear to others the validity of 
 such recognition. Yet where demonstration is 
 impossible, suggestions are often fruitful, and 
 along this line it is proposed to notice here 
 a few prominent facts that seem to be charac- 
 teristic of antecedent stages, and which, in 
 accordance with the laws of analogy and con- 
 tinuity, seem to be prophetic in reference to 
 future states of being. 
 
 In order to understand the full import and 
 significance of the embryological period, we 
 
Of Emhryological and Cell Life 23 
 
 must trace it back to its inception ; to that 
 moment when it was " born." This occurred 
 at the moment of molecular union or coales- 
 cence of the nuclei of two simple cells ; sim- 
 ple, and yet unfathomable with divine mystery, 
 and containing the potency of all that we have 
 been, are, and shall be. 
 
 But have we reached here, in the union of 
 two cells, the origin of our life history } By 
 no means. We may have reached a point in it 
 when we can say that here begins our identity, 
 or personality, as an individual material organ- 
 ism ; but we have not reached the origin or 
 completed the history of our life. Back of 
 the emhryological stands the cell life ; and 
 back of the cell life stand the antecedents 
 of cell life. Whence came these cells } What 
 are their functions ? And what is the rela- 
 tion of one cell to the other } These are ques- 
 tions of very great importance. Especially is 
 this true of the last, for, in this field, as in all 
 others, " Knowledge is a perception of rela- 
 tions." 
 
 The emhryological life, it has been stated. 
 
24 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 owes its immediate origin to the union of two 
 living cells. Each of these cells, however, has 
 had a distinct antecedent life history, and is 
 capable of distinct functions. Neither of them 
 alone is capable of assuming that higher ex- 
 pression of life which is manifested by repro- 
 duction. Either cell, left to itself, enters upon 
 no higher form or stage of life. Let us, at 
 this point especially, reverently view the facts ; 
 for the histology, physiology, and functions of 
 these cells are intensely suggestive of divine 
 relations and creative power. Science has 
 positively determined so little, especially with 
 reference to the peculiar function of each of 
 the two cells, that a very large range is left to 
 mere inference. But in regard to the organic 
 structure of each we do know, approximately 
 at least, many things that, by the law of anal- 
 ogy, give more or less force to certain infer- 
 ences or conclusions. 
 
 The paternal cell, for instance, is highly 
 organized, and possesses the power of motion, 
 and of locomotion also, to an extent ; while 
 the maternal cell exhibits an organic structure 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 25 
 
 relatively minor in degree, and consequently a 
 motion less peculiar to organisms is manifested. 
 It presents rather the appearance, or more 
 nearly the appearance, of matter in the mass 
 or homogeneous state. The paternal cell is 
 active, energetic, and apparently capable of 
 acting upon the maternal cell and imparting 
 to it an impulse, a "mode of motion," or 
 power, that is inherently foreign to the latter, 
 or that would, at least, otherwise remain latent. 
 The maternal cell is, in many ways, suggestive 
 of that phenomenon that is called inorganic 
 matter ; while the paternal cell is equally sug- 
 gestive of the life-giving principle, called spirit. 
 In other words, the paternal cell seems to 
 be the organized, vitalizing, life-giving agent 
 which, acting upon the maternal cell, renders 
 it capable of the resultant phenomenon of a 
 higher form or expression of life. 
 
 Some of our scientists state as their opin- 
 ion, based upon a long and careful investiga- 
 tion, that the paternal cell is the differentiating 
 agent ; that the maternal cell represents the 
 conservative element, while the paternal gives 
 
26 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 the impulse to change, or differentiation. In 
 other words, the principle of inheritance — 
 the first in the trinity of forces that stand back 
 of and surround every individual being, gov- 
 erning and controlling its destiny — is vastly 
 stronger in the maternal element than in the 
 paternal ; while in the latter is found repre- 
 sented the second force of the above trinity, 
 — the impulse to differentiate, or the power 
 of adaptation to environment, which is the 
 third force alluded to ; a trinity of forces, but, 
 nevertheless, a unity. 
 
 And here, between inheritance on the one 
 hand and environment on the other, is, surely, 
 a tremendous demand for a quality of force 
 that, in its essence at least, shall be no less 
 than spiritual. If we regard environment in 
 its largest and deepest significance, as forms 
 of spiritual forces ever pressing down upon us, 
 then we may perceive a plan of immense prom- 
 ise to the individual in the fact that each pos- 
 sesses, as a primary endowment, that which is 
 designed to be responsive to the touch of a 
 universe of spiritual realities external to it. 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 27 
 
 We thus gain the high vantage ground of su- 
 supremacy over mere animal inheritance. It 
 is a divine way outward and upward that is 
 coeval with the beginning of the physical 
 organism. 
 
 Whatever the deeper law of unity may be 
 that runs throughout the universe of phenom- 
 ena, there seems to be, as an antecedent of 
 such phenomena, a duality. In tracing the 
 history of all phenomena we soon come to 
 apparent duality — spirit and matter. And 
 so this duality, or apparent duality, that stands 
 back of organized matter is represented in the 
 universe of organisms, and seems to stand 
 back of the reproduction of organisms. 
 
 At this point I should state the proposition 
 in this manner : In the realm of causation the 
 reproduction of organisms is dependent upon 
 the united forces of the male and female ele- 
 ments, in much the same manner as organized 
 matter is dependent upon the united forces of 
 — so called — spirit and matter. In other 
 words, the essential division of the universe 
 of organisms into male and female is in strict 
 
28 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 correspondence with the conception that posits 
 spirit and matter as standing back of organized 
 matter, or of organisms themselves. Thus 
 we have here, to a significant extent, the 
 poetical Genesis portraiture reproduced in the 
 realm of physical phenomena. The maternal 
 cell seems, largely at least, void of any form 
 or suggestion of a higher order of life until it 
 is " breathed upon " — quickened — by the 
 paternal cell. But when this occurs, a new 
 and higher form or expression of activity 
 begins, called the embryological life. 
 
 The history, therefore, of the present stage 
 of our life — not our organism — can be traced 
 back on a line of unbroken continuity to the 
 commencement of the embryological stage. 
 Here it seems to branch off into two distinct 
 channels, whence it has descended. But if 
 our analogy is true to the essential facts in 
 the case, the two channels are, on the one 
 hand, that of matter, and on the other, that of 
 life or spirit ; and it is in the latter, the spirit- 
 ual, that our true personality is to be found. 
 The life - principle or spirit always remains 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 29 
 
 potentially or in essence the same, while the 
 forms and combinations of matter, — the body, 
 — by which the life-principle expresses itself, 
 are constantly changing. It is never, any two 
 hours, or even two minutes, absolutely the 
 same. As a suit of clothes is to the body, so 
 is the body to the individuality or ego ; and it 
 should " have consideration only as a phenom- 
 enon which suits wants." " Body has its 
 proper consideration when measured simply 
 as a tool is viewed." Changing and change- 
 able forms of matter per se cannot constitute 
 personality. The " I Am " of any organism 
 is something else than mere matter, at least 
 as commonly understood. The simple ele- 
 ments of matter that constitute the organism 
 come and go continually, forming a current of 
 atoms through every part of our bodies, leav- 
 ing, however, the individuality untouched and 
 secure. The life-principle remains essentially 
 the same through all the varied changes and 
 stages of our life history, back as far as it is 
 possible to trace it. Hence, while the unity 
 or individuality of our present stage of exist- 
 
30 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 ence seemingly emerges from duality, I hope 
 to be able to add further evidence later on 
 that it is only seeming, and that in reality it 
 is, and also springs from, a unity. 
 
 Returning now to the two cells upon the 
 union of which the embryological stage de- 
 pends, let us inquire whence they came, and 
 what of their origin and antecedents. 
 
 One thing at least is clear. Each of these 
 cells has had a distinct life history. Each has 
 had an inception, an unfoldment, and a death 
 to preceding environments ; that death being 
 its birth into a new world or stage of exist- 
 ence. The maternal cell, for instance, was 
 once an inhabitant of the ovarian world, and 
 was bom from it into the uterine world. The 
 paternal cell has also a similar history. Thus 
 we see that even cell life is dependent upon 
 a pre-existing life. Trace cell life back as far 
 as it may be traced, and we are still con- 
 fronted by a pre-existing life. It should also 
 be noted that the farther it is traced at each 
 step, the evidences multiply that life — all life 
 — has its origin in the spiritual life, God. 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 31 
 
 The farther back we go, through one form of 
 organism after another, through each success 
 sive grade and system, we find life assuming, 
 to an ever increasing extent, a form which 
 declares its divine origin and essence. 
 
 In this connection, however, an important 
 fact should not be overlooked : The body, or 
 organism, which the life-principle inhabits, and 
 through which it manifests itself, is, in each 
 successive backward stage, of a lower order ; 
 and, furthermore, the manifestations of life are 
 limited by, and dependent upon, the structure 
 and complexity of the organism with which 
 the life-principle has environed itself. Hence 
 we catch a glimpse of the necessity of a con- 
 stant succession of births and deaths, so 
 called, if we are to progress endlessly, or have 
 already entered upon a continuous, progressive 
 existence. Viewed from the standpoint of 
 physical science, to die — that is, to change our 
 environment, to outgrow any given material 
 world of limitations — is as much a neces- 
 sity of growth as to be born. Death — a 
 natural death — is, in fact, the culmination, or 
 
32 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 culminating act, of a given stage of existence. 
 It is, in reality, simply a new birth ; a going 
 forth of our real selves from organic limita- 
 tions, or environments, that have become too 
 restricted and are no longer capable of admin- 
 istering to our real growth, into a new sphere, 
 a larger world, a higher and more complex 
 form of material organism, in which, and 
 through which, the life-principle within may 
 have a broader, deeper, and higher scope and 
 range of manifestation. It comes about as 
 the result of the inadequacy of the organism 
 to adapt itself to the demands of an unfolding 
 life. The same life-principle that wove into 
 form the individual organism, lays it down 
 again when it has served the purpose for 
 which it was summoned into existence. 
 
 " In death's unrobing room we strip from 'round us 
 The garments of mortality and earth ; 
 And, breaking from the embryo state that bound us, 
 Our day of dying is our day of birth." 
 
 This has been the course of the physical law 
 of birth and death thus far in our life's his- 
 tory. What reason then have we to suppose 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 33 
 
 or fear that we have reached a point in our 
 history when we are to pass under a new order 
 or system of laws entirely the opposite in 
 result ? Natural laws are not fickle or change- 
 able; they are, rather, continuous and uni- 
 form. 
 
 As in the past all the forms of physical 
 organization which our own life-principle has 
 evolved for itself have been invariably from a 
 lower to a higher, so we must infer that this 
 self-same life-principle is now engaged, as it 
 has always been engaged throughout the suc- 
 cessive stages of its past development, in evolv- 
 ing an organism through and by which it may 
 hereafter express itself more in harmony with 
 its own nature and essence. In other words, 
 our present physical body stands in similar 
 relation to the spiritual body to be, as does the 
 placenta to the embryo, the graafian vesicle to 
 the ovum, or the membranes of this cell to 
 its nuclear content. When the placenta, the 
 embryological body, dies, the embryo comes 
 forth into this, to it, new and strange world 
 of experience and unfoldment. When the 
 
34 l^f^^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 graafian vesicle reaches maturity or has com- 
 pleted its work, its product, the ovum, is born 
 into a new stage of existence and environment 
 in a manner strikingly analogous to the birth 
 of the embryo. And so, in accordance with 
 our analogy, when this physical body shall die, 
 the spiritual body, its nuclear content, will go 
 forth, freed from the limitations of its physi- 
 cal being, into a new sphere of greater possi- 
 bilities and larger scope, carrying with it the 
 same life-principle which it has inherited from 
 the great past, re-enforced and ennobled by its 
 legacy of human experience and acquired con- 
 sciousness, the priceless result of this stage 
 of our existence. 
 
 Let us now return to that point where it is 
 stated that our identity as an individual or- 
 ganism may be said to have commenced ; the 
 molecular union of the two parent cells. The 
 individual life of both cells is merged into a 
 single channel, and a new form of life com- 
 mences, namely, the embryological existence ; 
 the highest function of which is to evolve a new 
 and higher material organism or body. The 
 
Of Embryological a7id Cell Life 35 
 
 vivified or quickened maternal cell does this 
 work apparently unaided by any other than its 
 own and its newly acquired force or powers, 
 excepting that of environment, up to a certain 
 time, when it seeks for aid — nutrition — from 
 without itself. It first evolves for itself a 
 body, called the placenta, by the aid of which 
 the growth and elaboration of an embryological 
 organization is carried forward. When this 
 work is completed, or when a human body is 
 so far evolved as to render the placental world 
 too restricted, the body dies and //, the embryo, 
 is brought forth into this world of infinitely 
 larger scope and possibilities, relatively, than 
 its former environment. 
 
 Here death and birth are as essentially to 
 to be found as anywhere, and the inference is 
 plainly apparent. The body alone, having 
 served its purpose, dies ; but not until another 
 and more highly organized substitute is pre- 
 pared to take its place as the home of the life 
 or spirit that is undying and immortal. The 
 same life-principle prepares for itself another 
 and higher mode of expression. It is a unity 
 
36 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 or continuity of life. There never has been, 
 nor will there be, another life ; it is the same 
 life that has come down through the past, 
 appears in this phase of its manifestation, and 
 shall pass on into other and higher forms 
 of material organization or objective expres- 
 sion. ' 
 
 For an analogy in our physical history we 
 will return once more to the two cells, by the 
 union of which ensues the embryological stage 
 of our existence. The organic history of these 
 cells, both paternal and maternal, can be traced 
 back through what may be called a succession 
 of births and deaths, or a bringing forth of 
 the life-principle from one form of organization 
 to another. The ovum or maternal cell has 
 an inception, development, and maturity in the 
 graafian vesicle or follicular body. From this 
 body, when mature, it has a birth strikingly 
 analogous to the birth of the perfected embryo. 
 The graafian vesicle may therefore be termed 
 the external body, or formative world, of the 
 ovum, the ovum itself being the internal body, 
 or the seat, or center, of the life of the vesicle. 
 
Of Embryological and Cell Life 37 
 
 The graafian vesicle is, in turn, formed, devel- 
 oped, and matured within its ovarian environ- 
 ment. But the life-principle of each individual 
 cell precedes all forms of material organization 
 that can be traced. Back of each stage of 
 organization, or material expression, stands a 
 pre-existing organism that life has woven into 
 existence. In fact the life of these cells may 
 be traced back into the dim distance of infinite 
 time, beyond even the marriage, so to speak, 
 of spirit and matter. 
 
Ill 
 
 Of Life and Matter 
 
 THE larger object of this study being to 
 trace the history of our own individual 
 life, rather than of the organism, and to draw 
 conclusions therefrom, we must not rest con- 
 tent with following it back to a point where 
 it first expresses itself in organic form. We 
 can, however, merely glance at the general 
 thought of the origin and nature of life. 
 
 Were it possible for us to go back in imag- 
 ination to the time when a " speck " of proto- 
 plasm was first evolved from the long train of 
 antecedent modes of creative energy, could we 
 even then say that this is life ? By no means. 
 We have what is termed *' live " and " dead " 
 protoplasm. We have protoplasm, it is true, 
 wherever there is life ; but the most that can 
 
Of Life and Matter 39 
 
 be claimed for it is that *'it is the basis of 
 life " ; the form in which life is first manifested. 
 Life comes to it, and also leaves it. 
 
 Granting that the entire phenomena of 
 worlds and of the universe, the expression of 
 life in all forms, are the natural and orderly 
 sequence of matter set in motion, the question 
 of the origin of life would still remain unan- 
 swered. All that can be consistently claimed, 
 in view of phenomena, is that it is an evolu- 
 tion simply, or unfolding, of that which had 
 previously been subjected to an infolding, or 
 involution. Evolution implies an involution. 
 An infolding must, in the very nature of 
 things, precede an unfolding. And so, when 
 life is spoken of as being the result of the 
 evolution of matter, or of matter set in motion, 
 it would seem to be a manifest absurdity. It 
 would be nearer the truth to say that matter 
 had, at some far off point of time, been sub- 
 jected to an involution of life, and is now 
 engaged in the consequent process of evolu- 
 tion. 
 
 In other words, as the sun, with its radiancy 
 
40 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 of life-giving energies, the requisite of living 
 activities of all planetary life, is to this planet 
 of ours, so is Deity to the whole universe of 
 matter. Matter infolds, or involves, the Divine 
 radiancy and, therefore, evolves, or unfolds, 
 this stored radiancy ; the manifestations of 
 which process we have been in the habit of 
 calling life. I said that something like this 
 would seem to be nearer the truth than the 
 proposition that life is a property, or product, 
 of matter. But science and philosophy do not 
 allow us to-day to rest the matter here. The 
 veil has been pushed aside so as to permit of 
 a still deeper and more reasonable hypothesis 
 relative to the mysteries of life and Deity. 
 
 We have traced, or may trace, our history 
 back — as all of life's phenomena must be 
 traced — to the united energies, or oneness 
 of God and Matter. I say oneness of God 
 and matter. I do not wish to be understood 
 as claiming that dualism is the ultimatum of 
 this or any view. In the ultimate analysis of 
 matter nothing will be found but Energy ; or, 
 in another and equivalent word, God. This, 
 
Of Life and Matter 41 
 
 at least, is a reasonable hypothesis, based upon 
 the scientific investigation and deduction of 
 the highest living authorities. If the entire 
 material universe is now reducible to about 
 seventy " simple elements," who shall say that 
 this number may not be further reduced, even 
 until the unit element is found ? A scientist 
 remarked, not long since, that "** the reduction 
 of all the chemical elements to one, is, to-day, 
 an entirely feasible hypothesis." All of our 
 leading scientists will, I think, agree that dif- 
 ferent forms of matter — so called in a popular 
 sense — are really but " modes of motion " of 
 energies, all of which are reducible finally to 
 one common energy; that the "elements" 
 will finally be found to be nothing but "a 
 mode of wave motion," an expression of Deity. 
 In other words, that "the elements are no 
 elements at all, being simply phenomena aris- 
 ing out of and going back into a primary or 
 noumenon." Matter per se — that is, matter 
 separated from, or independent of, its proper- 
 ties — is not apprehensible to physical sense. 
 Hence matter, as such, cannot reasonably be 
 
42 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 called a sensible substance. It is, as viewed 
 to-day, far more suggestive of a unity of all 
 being, than of a duality. The real would seem 
 to be a noumenon, that which sub stands — 
 stands under or back of — phenomena. But 
 in speaking of matter as simply phenomena, 
 we use words that are liable to be misunder- 
 stood. I prefer to use the word Oneness, 
 rather than any term that might imply that 
 matter and Deity are distinct entities, one 
 over against the other. The union or oneness 
 is so complete that, if we say matter is God's 
 organic body, or the form inhabited by Him, 
 through and by which he manifests Himself, 
 we should very nearly state the truth. The 
 same idea may, however, be stated as follows : 
 The universe of matter may be said to be God, 
 if we remember that the Universe per se is an 
 Infinite Organism, having an Ego, and that 
 the ego is the real of any organism ; the thing 
 itself behind phenomena. 
 
 The scientist, when looking with analytical 
 eyes at any form or combination of matter, be 
 
Of Life and Matter 43 
 
 it a drop of water or an ocean, one of the con- 
 stituents of air or the whole atmosphere that 
 envelops him, a grain of sand or a mountain, 
 an atom or wavelet of ether, or a star that 
 floats upon the bosom of a boundless etheric 
 sea, an asteroid or a universe of planets, sees, 
 as the result of his analysis, " motion," motion 
 of different kinds, degrees, " modes " ; but all, 
 all, quivering, pulsating, vibrating in answer 
 to an adequate touch. Where motion is found 
 there must be will behind it ; where will is, 
 there also intelligence is. And so there must 
 be behind, or in, this universe of infinite 
 motion an Infinite Will, an Infinite Intelli- 
 gence, an Infinite Life, that by and through 
 this infinite phenomenon of motion — life — 
 is expressing an Infinite Thought. The uni- 
 verse of matter then is, to us, a materializa- 
 tion of a thought of God. 
 
 If the scientist, awed by the immensity of 
 his vision, calls the primal source of this won- 
 derful manifestation an Infinite Energy, this 
 is so because of his special education. If 
 
44 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 another, considering the same phenonenon, 
 traces it to the same source and, in an ecstasy 
 of soul, exclaims : Behold an Infinite God ! 
 will the wise man intercept the current of 
 uplifting and ennobling emotions in each by 
 raising the insignificant question of terms to 
 be made use of in the attempt to give expres- 
 sion to that which is simply inexpressible? 
 If, as Goethe says, 
 
 "'Tis feeling all," 
 
 then let the dogmatists enshroud it in such 
 "cloud and smoke" as mere names imply. 
 The vibrating feeling in the finite is the 
 measure of his response to the motion of 
 Infinitude itself. 
 
 Let us recall attention, at this point, to 
 certain phenomena that relate to the embryo- 
 logical period, commencing with the molecular 
 union or vivification of the maternal cell. 
 Living, if we may so term it, for a time upon 
 the material resources of itself, a segmenta- 
 tion of cells takes place. Thus growth or 
 
Of Life and Matter 45 
 
 development occurs, and the time arrives when 
 external resources are necessary for the pur- 
 poses of nutrition and support of its work. 
 The supply is at hand, and is found in the 
 environing mother membrane, with which a 
 vital attachment is formed. Thus the embryo 
 gains such material substances as are required 
 to complete and perfect the material human 
 organism or body. No mother, therefore, is, 
 in reality, so entirely a mother, in a strictly 
 exact sense, as is popularly supposed. She 
 receives a life and, for a time, nourishes it, 
 modifies it somewhat, and, when it comes into 
 this world, environs it with her care, love, 
 training, and so forth, then gives it back to 
 itself and its author again, her work being 
 done. Its real father, we may say in an essen- 
 tial sense, is God ; while its real mother is, in 
 a relative sense, Nature. Human parentage, 
 then, is merely a channel through which for 
 a time an individual life courses its way. Its 
 lineage must inevitably be traced back to the 
 mysterious but absolute unity or oneness of 
 God and matter. 
 
46 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 "Art Thou the Life ? 
 To Thee, then, do I owe each beat and breath, 
 And wait Thy ordering of my hour of death 
 In peace or strife." 
 
 There is a more or less vivid recognition of 
 this fact in the soul of every man and woman. 
 From, the deeper consciousness of every one 
 there sooner or later arises a sense of sonship 
 to God. We come to see and feel, in early 
 life or later on, that human parentage is merely 
 an instrument. That "my Father" means 
 nothing less than God, and that " Mother " is 
 really another word for Nature. This con- 
 sciousness of ours is, therefore, in perfect har- 
 mony with the theory that traces life back to 
 Deity, while the organism is referred to Nature 
 or matter. This, however, does not necessarily 
 imply a duality of origin, nor a dual individual 
 nature, as may be apprehended by carefully 
 studying matter itself, in the light of the 
 scientific philosophy of to-day. 
 
 Thus viewed, matter is seen to be purely 
 phenomenal, arising out of and resolvable into 
 
Of Life and Matter 47 
 
 a primary universal energy. And so man's 
 present physical nature is transient, phenom- 
 enal, unreal. The only real, the essence of 
 being, is the spiritual. The spiritual sub- 
 stands the physical, and finally eventuates 
 itself as the ego, or soul, of the physical. 
 From this point on through this stage of 
 man's existence he has relations in a sense 
 dualistic in condition : physical needs and 
 spiritual needs. But in a larger sense there 
 is even here no duality, but a unity. 
 
 " All good things 
 Are ours, nior soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps 
 soul." 
 
IV 
 
 Of Analogies 
 
 -^ 
 
 IT is stated in Chapter II that the highest 
 function of the embryonic stage of our 
 being is to evolve a newer and higher material 
 organism or body, which should better express 
 the unfolding life - principle, the history of 
 which we have endeavored to very briefly 
 trace. If this be true, may we not, with con- 
 siderable logical confidence, assume that the 
 highest physical function of this stage of our 
 existence is to evolve a still higher and more 
 complex organism or body, in which and 
 through which the divine spirit or life — our 
 real personality — may become endowed with 
 the possibilities of a higher, broader, and 
 deeper expression of its own nature and in- 
 herent essence ? Let us see what data there 
 
Of Analogies 49 
 
 may be in our past history and present condition 
 or state to warrant such an assumption. 
 
 Attention is first called to an histological 
 and physiological analogy. All cells present 
 an external and an internal body ; an external 
 membranous body and an internal nuclear 
 body. The graafian follicle has a nucleus 
 which, being evolved, and after it reaches a 
 state independent of its follicular body, we 
 call an ovum. This, in turn, is found to pos- 
 sess an external and internal distinction or 
 body. Being vitalized, or quickened, by the 
 paternal life, its membranous, or external 
 body, develops along certain lines, indicating 
 a temporal existence, — placental, — while the 
 germ-center or nuclear body develops into a 
 state or form denominated a human embryo. 
 The placental body dying, it, the embryo, is 
 born into this stage of our existence, still 
 being — according to the latest histological 
 researches — a vaster cell, or a vitally con- 
 nected unity of cells. This being so, is it not 
 reasonable to suppose that our present external 
 bodies possess analogous nuclear bodies which. 
 
50 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 in turn, shall also evolve into forms suitable for 
 external bodies as we pass on one step more ? 
 
 This is my analogy, and I am desirous that 
 it be clearly understood. I will partially re- 
 peat it. The graafian cell has a membranous 
 external body and a nuclear inner body. The 
 inner or nuclear body develops and is finally 
 born from its internal environment — the 
 graafian cell — into an existence independent 
 of it. It is now called an ovum, and the 
 follicular body which constituted its former 
 external body dies and becomes entirely dis- 
 organized, the life-principle having been trans- 
 ferred to the ovum. The ovum, also, passes 
 through almost identically the same or an 
 analogous process of development in its or- 
 ganic evolution. Its nuclear or inner body 
 develops into an embryo, and leaves, finally, 
 its external body, the placenta, and comes 
 forth into a new environment, this world of 
 ours in which we now live. Now, unless 
 the laws of organic evolution cease to apply 
 further, this external body of ours has an 
 inner or nuclear body which is being, at this 
 
Of Analogies 5 1 
 
 moment, developed, and will ultimately pass 
 out of this external body which we see and 
 know so well, into an existence as independent 
 of it as we to-day are independent of our 
 former placental bodies. There would seem 
 to be left us but one of two inevitable conclu- 
 sions : Either we pass on to a higher stage of 
 organic evolution, independent of the present 
 physical state, or the uniformity and continuity 
 of Nature's laws no longer have application and 
 relation to us as individuals. Either we con- 
 tinue to live, or God's laws are mutable. 
 
 If evolution, as some have claimed, relates 
 simply to the perpetuation and gradual im- 
 provement of the race, ignoring the individ- 
 ual ; if, as the result of the infinite past which 
 relates to the physical development of man, 
 there is to be no spiritual consummation, 
 then "nothing but the Infinite pity is suffi- 
 cient for the infinite pathos of human life." 
 
 The prophetic eye of Emerson saw " the 
 Universe represented in an Atom, in a mo- 
 ment of time." We, assuredly, in the light 
 of scientific philosophy, ought to be able to 
 
52 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 see the race represented in the individual. 
 And if the same laws that relate to the uni- 
 verse relate also with equal force to the atom, 
 we must conclude that the operation of those 
 laws which result in the evolution of the race 
 applies as well to the units that compose the 
 race. It is now generally conceded that evo- 
 lution has reached the acme of physical devel- 
 opment ; that, in the very nature of things, 
 evolution, so far as man is concerned, must 
 hereafter proceed along the lines of mental 
 and spiritual growth. This is, therefore, an 
 age when not only the grandest and most far- 
 reaching thought and effort of man, but the 
 inherent forces of Nature as well, seem cen- 
 tered upon the problems of education and of 
 character building; of, in other words, im- 
 pressing upon and embodying in the individual 
 a conception of the phenomenality of the 
 physical and the reality of the spiritual. 
 
 Man to-day, as never before, is endeavoring 
 to work in harmony with the forces of Nature 
 which " make for Righteousness " ; and this 
 is secured for the race only as secured by and 
 
Of Analogies 5 3 
 
 for the individual. The individual is, there- 
 fore, the one essential fact and concern. " It 
 takes all mankind to make a man, and each 
 man when he dies takes a whole earth away 
 with him." " It is to the honor of human 
 nature, and what can be said of no other 
 creature, that the best fruits of all together 
 suffice for no more than to make each one 
 what he may be." Once apprehend the fact, 
 so prominently dawning upon the mind of 
 the world to-day, that the spiritual is the only 
 real substance in the universe ; that all phe- 
 nomena must be accounted for upon a spirit- 
 ual basis ; that the spiritual nature of man is, 
 therefore, potential in, and emerges from, the 
 physical ; that he is here undergoing a process 
 of education and development — not " proba- 
 tion and trial" — subject to the directing 
 agency of a measureless and beneficent spirit- 
 ual environment ; that Love, the very heart 
 of Deity, holds him in a grasp as strong as 
 the immeasurable sweep of gravitation, " the 
 very muscle of Omnipotence" — a spiritual 
 force, before the operation of which " no 
 
54 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 slightest rustle is stirred amid the quiet air " ; 
 that as the result of this environment the 
 spiritual nature of man is awakened and, 
 finally, learns to express itself in those qual- 
 ities of being that are termed " Godlike," 
 "spiritual," and so forth, more apparent in 
 some than others, but most common with 
 those men and women who have established 
 the most intimate connection with this real, 
 subtle, spiritual environment — when all of 
 these things are apprehended, the real sig- 
 nificance of life, our own personal individ- 
 ual lives, will be better understood, and the 
 clearer will appear the reasonableness of the 
 faith which holds that, apart from an immor- 
 tality, life has no divine meaning. 
 
 We see thus something of the possibilities 
 that open before the vision of our souls. We 
 have become self-conscious beings, and con- 
 sequently immortal. The amount of immor- 
 tality that we shall possess depends upon our 
 self - determining power. Immortality need 
 not be, is not, a question of time or place. 
 It is measured rather by the terms of quan- 
 
Of Analogies 55 
 
 tity and quality, and is to be in us if any- 
 where. In each individual man an immor- 
 tality is inherent. It was germal at the most 
 distant point of his physical history. It came 
 to birth at the moment of self -consciousness. 
 He is environed by an infinite immortality, 
 and can lay hold, here and now, upon all that 
 he will. " With man is power to make the 
 kind of a world in which he elects to live." 
 While content with the physical he necessarily 
 lives in the basement of being. But there is 
 sunshine and a purer atmosphere above him ; 
 and, within him, however latent it may be, 
 there is that which cannot permanently rest 
 satisfied with the darkness and pestilential 
 damps of a mere sense existence. 
 
 Besides the power of this environment to 
 drive him into the " upper stories," there comes 
 also the compelling influence of a great com- 
 pany of emerged souls who, having tasted of the 
 founts of a higher life, are impelled thereby to 
 go down into the highways and byways and 
 compel those therein to move on and upward. 
 
 Life is manifested by and through trans- 
 
56 The Evolutiort of Immortality 
 
 formation, and the transforming process we 
 mistakenly call death ; it is really the con- 
 dition of an evolving life. Look at Nature 
 all around and see if this be not so. As 
 with the contained germ of an acorn which, 
 properly conditioned, draws to itself and se- 
 lects that which it requires for its growth, 
 and in so doing breaks through and casts 
 off its former sheath or body, so the char- 
 acter of man and, consequently, the nature 
 of his immortality, is determined on the prin- 
 ciple of rejection and selection, by the ar- 
 rest and fixation, the crystallization and con- 
 version to use of those more than ethereal 
 currents of inspiration, aspiration, sentiment, 
 idealism, which so powerfully yet tenderly 
 appeal to us, " woo and court us from every 
 object in Nature, from every fact in life, from 
 every thought of the mind," from every in- 
 tuition of the soul. We must select and 
 appropriate, like the oak, from the earth be- 
 neath us and from the upper air of the invis- 
 ible and immaterial influences that emanate 
 from the all - pervading and all - environing 
 
Of Analogies 57 
 
 " Over-Soul." " The only way into Nature 
 is to enact our best insight." In doing this, 
 " instantly we are higher poets, and can speak 
 a deeper law." And thus also we are con- 
 stantly being transformed from a lower to a 
 higher life ; from a material to a spiritual 
 plane. In dying as to the physical and being 
 bom spiritually is found the nearest complete 
 solution of the problem of life as we know it 
 here and now. 
 
 He who has lived the most ; who has gone 
 down the deepest and risen the highest in the 
 range of human possibilities, will be the last 
 to deny this assertion. Is it, then, within the 
 range of reason to suppose for a moment that 
 an Infinite Intelligence could plan and purpose 
 from the beginning to cut off the subjects of 
 his creation, and doom them to an extinction, 
 at the point when a clarified consciousness of 
 their being is just awakened t " It is," says 
 one, "related of an Arab chief, whose laws 
 forbade the rearing of his female offspring, 
 that the only tears he ever shed were when 
 his daughter brushed the dust from his beard 
 
 OF THE ^ 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 ^'FORWy 
 
58 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 as he buried her in a living grave. But where 
 are the tears of God as he thrusts back into 
 eternal stillness the hands that are stretched 
 out to him in dying faith ? If death ends life, 
 what is this world but an ever-yawning grave 
 in which the loving God buries his children 
 with hopeless sorrow ? " Whatever may be 
 said of the "inexorable logic of Love," in 
 reference to an individual immortality, any 
 human being who has arrived at that stage of 
 his unfoldment denominated self - conscious- 
 ness — "spirit birth" — and knows something 
 of the depth of meaning that is involved in 
 the term, may, tipon the moral basis of the 
 inexorable logic of justice , demand an immor- 
 tality. A human father is justly held account- 
 able to his children regarding their physical 
 wants. Is the All Father any less morally 
 bound to meet and satisfy the spiritual hunger 
 of his children, that spiritual hunger being the 
 acme and fruition of all their past history t 
 
 By the logic of Love, by the logic of 
 Justice, every self-conscious being must be 
 given an opportunity to realize the possibili- 
 
Of Analogies 59 
 
 ties of his nature, to satisfy those spiritual 
 aspirations and ideals which, independent of 
 personal volition, well up from his own inner 
 being ; a consummation which every one knows 
 demands an existence not vouchsafed in the 
 physical stage of our being. 
 
 But this conclusion may find a sufficient 
 basis upon a lower plane : that of " a supreme 
 act of faith in the reasonableness of God's 
 work." If God's work be reasonable, man 
 must be immortal. To our faith we may also 
 add the authority of science, if we adopt 
 Professor Huxley's definition of science. He 
 says : "To my mind, whatever doctrine pro- 
 fesses to be the result of the application of 
 the accepted rules of inductive and deductive 
 logic to its subject matter, and accepts, within 
 the limits which it sets to itself, the suprem- 
 acy of reason, is science." Professor Du Bois, 
 with a still deeper insight, asks : " May we 
 not define all science as the verification of 
 the ideal in Nature } " Can Nature have any 
 reasonable meaning independent of a spiritual 
 consummation ? 
 
V 
 
 Of Law as Manifested in Organic 
 Evolution 
 
 A FURTHER argument in favor of the 
 assumption stated at the outset of Chap- 
 ter IV is based upon the uniformity and con- 
 tinuity of law, — as manifested not only in 
 organic evolution, but in our own experiences 
 in a mental or psychological sense. This is 
 but the expression of, or name we give to, 
 another and higher law that stands behind 
 and above the more readily observed of 
 Nature's laws. 
 
 Let us apply this law to that made manifest 
 in organic evolution, as it is expressed in our 
 own life history in its various phases. 
 
 Organic evolution exhibits the phenomenon 
 of unity as the result of the process or career 
 
Of Law in Organic Evolution 6 1 
 
 of Nature's laws. In all organisms, primal 
 as well as ultimate, we find that the unit con- 
 sists of aggregations of individuals. The unit 
 cell is composed of molecules ; the molecules 
 of atoms, and so forth. The higher and more 
 complex organisms consist of an aggregation 
 of cells, and thus on until man is reached, who, 
 in an organic or physical sense, is simply an 
 aggregation of cells, vitally connected, and com- 
 posing, in this aggregation of units, a new and 
 higher unit or individual. And here, in man, we 
 have the organic ultimatum of that of which the 
 unit cell is the prototype or original model. 
 
 An aggregation does not destroy the indi- 
 viduality of the unit presence. In a block of 
 brick houses, for instance, the individuality of 
 each separate brick is not destroyed by the 
 aggregation or association which constitutes 
 a new individuality — a block of houses. A 
 unit brick is not a unit block ; and a unit 
 block is more than a unit brick. But the 
 larger unit does not destroy the smaller unit. 
 Again, an aggregation of blocks may consti- 
 tute another unit of a still superior kind — a 
 
62 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 city ; but the individuality of blocks, and of 
 bricks, is in no-wise interfered with. Each 
 unit or individuality serves its purpose and 
 performs its proper function. And so the 
 unity and individuality of each cell in man is 
 maintained. Each cell possesses a function, 
 an intelligence, a sense of need and a sense of 
 satisfaction, peculiar to itself. Their mutual 
 affinity, however, results in co-operative asso- 
 ciation, and this co-operative association re- 
 sults in, or composes, a higher and more 
 complex organism as individual in its char- 
 acter as the individuality of each single unit 
 cell. Complexity of physical form leads to 
 a higher manifestation of life, — intelligence, 
 — intellectual modes, — psychic life. So that 
 the essential difference between a monad 
 and a man may be accounted for upon the 
 basis of the difference in the complexity 
 of the organic structure of each. Wherever 
 there is organism there exists intelligence ; 
 and the higher and more complex the organ- 
 ism the greater is the intelligence — or mode 
 of psychic motion — manifested. 
 
Of Law in Organic Evolution 63 
 
 There can be no doubt that this is a gen- 
 eral law of Nature. Whence, then, the reason- 
 ableness of the supposition that this law of 
 organic evolution goes no farther in the as- 
 cending scale of our being? A given form 
 and combination of matter (speaking in the 
 gross sense) is canceled — dies — but no 
 matter and no energy is lost. Physical sci- 
 ence teaches this, if it teaches anything. 
 Both are simply transferred; and the trans- 
 ference of either, as we have seen in em- 
 bryology, does not affect the personality or 
 individuality of our real being, except as evo- 
 lution or growth affects it. The line of con- 
 tininty of being is not interfered with, or 
 destroyed. 
 
 A continued life implies, in the very nature 
 of things, growth ; growth in intelligence, 
 growth in the power of apprehension, of the 
 possibility of enjoyment and suffering ; growth 
 of insight, growth of outsight ; growth of 
 mind, growth of soul, growth of spirit. If all 
 of this is a calamity, then, in the light of 
 organic evolution, we are doomed to suffer it. 
 
64 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 But there is here implied a continual dying, 
 so called; a continual, incessant changing, 
 every day and every hour of our existence. 
 The only constant known to science is per- 
 petual change. 
 
 " Who thinks aught can begin to be which formerly was 
 
 not, 
 Or that aught which is can perish and utterly decay ? 
 Another truth I now unfold ; no natural birth 
 Is there of mortal things, nor death's destruction final ; 
 Nothing is there but a mingling, and then a separation of 
 
 the mingled, 
 Which are called a birth and a death by ignorant mortals." 
 
 Has it not always been so .? Does not our 
 conscious experience accord with this law ? 
 We all have had an existence in the embryo- 
 logical stage, and have died to it, and been 
 born from it into an infantile world. As 
 infants we have died, and have been born into 
 the world of childhood. We have died as 
 children and been born as youth. To the 
 youthful stage we have died, and most of us 
 find ourselves at present in that changeful 
 period of our existence denominated mature 
 physical Uf e ; while some are passing on into 
 
Of Law in Organic Evolution 65 
 
 that stage called the evening of human exist- 
 ence. Birth and death, or " a mingling, then 
 a separation of the mingled," surely marks 
 our entire conscious course from the begin- 
 ning. Some of us, who are parents, have 
 lost, irrevocably lost, our infants, our children, 
 our youth and, it may be, our young men and 
 maidens. The Jameses and Janes, the Johns 
 and Marys, as we call them still, are not what 
 they were. Neither are they to-day what they 
 will be to-morrow, next year, ten years hence. 
 Still we call them our children ; or, in a deeper 
 sense, ours. We scarcely notice that they 
 are constantly dying, day by day, and, also, 
 that they are as constantly being born again. 
 We are parents — not of stationary, mechan- 
 ical existences, but of processes of being; 
 parents — not of a single stage of existence, 
 but of potentialities, and of potentialities that 
 are constantly realizing, step by step, the un- 
 ending possibilities of being. 
 
 The same law also applies with reference 
 to parents, friends, and all with whom we 
 associate. Being absent from them, we carry 
 
66 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 their images in our memories. But in order 
 to be convinced that our mental processes, 
 called memories, are illusive and do not rep- 
 resent the real, we need only to meet them 
 again after a separation of a few years. Our 
 fond imagery is shattered by a mere glimpse 
 of the actual. Between the then and the 
 now, our friend, our parent, who was, is not, 
 and with him who is we must form a new 
 acquaintance, much as if we had never before 
 met. They are not what they were. We 
 are not as we were. They and we are of 
 what we were. The line of continuity is not 
 broken ; it is simply extended, developed. 
 The individuality is not lost, but, rather, has 
 taken on larger proportions, become more 
 individualized. 
 
 So all of us can look back upon an experi- 
 ence of a continual dying and a continual 
 becoming. " The world of phenomena " — 
 ourselves included — " is a flowing river, ever 
 changing, yet ever the same." This is a 
 matter of personal consciousness, or of self- 
 knowledge, and it is in harmony with that 
 
Of Law in Organic Evolution 67 
 
 part of our history which antedates our mem- 
 ory, as revealed by science. 
 
 Shall it continue in harmony with its past 
 and present, or has it reached its last stage 
 of development, and must it soon cease to be ? 
 In the light of the continuity and uniformity 
 of Nature's laws, we cannot believe it shall 
 cease. Professor Huxley states that "the 
 key of the past, as of the future, is to be 
 sought in the present." If this be true, and 
 we find that the one prominent feature of our 
 past, as well as of our present, is a continued 
 unfoldment of an inherent germal individu- 
 ality, we have at least a strong argument in 
 favor of the hypothesis that our future is not 
 to be retrogressive. Our individual river of 
 life came from the eternal beyond, on the one 
 hand, and is passing on to the eternal beyond, 
 on the other. It flows to-day; it did flow 
 yesterday. Shall it not flow to-morrow and 
 evermore? We can judge only by analogy 
 and by law ; fixed, immutable law. 
 
 This, however, we know : A law gave it 
 inception. A law gave it the power of flow- 
 
6S The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 ing. A law channeled it. A law, or laws, 
 shaped and modified its career, making it what 
 it is to-day. As the result of law we are 
 floating upon its bosom. Give this fact deep 
 thought. It is significant. We are floating 
 on, moving down our own personal life-stream 
 at the regnant behest of laws which are God's 
 own expression of himself to the universe of 
 mankind. Does not analogy, does not an 
 intelligent conception of law, of God himself, 
 declare that we must, that we shall, continue 
 to move on, being borne forward on this 
 current of life which constitutes our own 
 personal stream or line of continuity, over 
 which we have little power to change the 
 general course, which no power of ours can 
 stop, and to which we can successfully op- 
 pose no barrier.? 
 
 Yes, in organic evolution we discover a law, 
 or parallel laws, that may, and apparently do, 
 pass over from the material into the imma- 
 terial. Before physical birth, the activities of 
 life appear in the processes of perfecting the 
 structure and completing the harmony of 
 
Of Law in Organic Evolution 69 
 
 function. Consciousness and volition lie dor- 
 mant, or in an unawakened slumber. The 
 spiritual nature is, as yet, simply germal. But 
 at birth new forces are brought to bear upon 
 the latent potentialities, and a connection is 
 established between the child and spiritual en- 
 vironments — the first being that of parental 
 love — which are as immeasurable as the very 
 heart of God. Heretofore, physical laws have 
 held universal sway ; but now, spiritual laws 
 step in and contest the field with the physical, 
 asserting an ever increasing claim upon the 
 work of future development. Self-conscious- 
 ness is evolved, together with a knowledge of 
 other beings of like nature around us, and 
 of a Supreme Being over all. In short, the 
 spiritual nature is awakened — born — and 
 man is a new creature. He is no longer a 
 physical being simply, controlled by physical 
 laws and subject to a mere physical end. A 
 spiritual nature has emerged from the phys- 
 ical, and now becomes the center and focal 
 point of forces that are to constitute an ever 
 increasing control over the unfoldment and 
 
70 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 destiny of the individual. It is an evolution, 
 not a new creation. The dividing line be- 
 tween the physical and the spiritual can no 
 more be definitely drawn than can the exact 
 division between the animal and vegetable 
 kingdoms, between the " organic and inor- 
 ganic worlds." The physical merges into the 
 spiritual in a manner similar to the mergence 
 of childhood into the youthful stage, or of 
 youthhood into manhood. The various stages 
 of our being, from its inception to the pres- 
 ent, and from the present onward, come about 
 as the result of the ordinary working of laws 
 that have been constant in all the past history 
 of the world, and that cannot by any analogy 
 or principle be for a moment supposed to 
 cease to act as we pass on or out of this stage 
 of our existence to that of future stages. 
 
VI 
 
 Of the Fundamental Spiritual Identity 
 
 Between Man and God in Point 
 
 of Essential Nature 
 
 THE foregoing assumption, namely, that 
 the highest physical function of this 
 stage of our existence is to evolve a still 
 higher and more complex material organism, 
 — a spiritual body, — is further based upon 
 the utter impossibility of conceiving how mind 
 can have any existence independent of matter, 
 so called, in some form ; how consciousness 
 can be without organs of sense, how organs 
 of sense are possible separated from an organ- 
 ism ; how an organism can have any being, 
 however simple or complex, independent of 
 something to organize. We may as well 
 attempt to conceive of the existence of God 
 
72 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 independent of creative activities — that is, 
 independent of matter in some of its infinite 
 variety of forms ; or of intelligence without 
 thought, as to conceive of life separate from 
 some form of expression. The very term itself 
 implies activity, creative energy ; and " life as 
 manifested in the organism is seen to be only 
 a specialized form of the Universal Life." 
 
 Therefore, taking as our starting-point the 
 premise that life — our own life — had its 
 origin in God ; that its mode and method of 
 expression are dependent upon matter ; that 
 all phenomena connected with life's history 
 in the past are traceable directly and solely 
 to this mysterious oneness of God and matter, 
 we must inevitably conclude that the same 
 immutable law, ever evolving and widening in 
 its scope, is related as persistently to our 
 future as it has been to our past existence. 
 
 Here, also, our hope and expectation of an 
 individual immortality finds further support. 
 We, as individuals, derive our life from the 
 Infinite Life and, consequently, constitute a 
 part of the Infinite Life. The relationship 
 
Of Identity Between Man and God 73 
 
 is thus seen to be, in reality, that of parent 
 and child. Our life also expresses itself, 
 as does the parent life, — the Infinite, — 
 through, and by means of, so called matter. 
 Herein is manifested something of our " Hke- 
 ness " to God ; and herein we, like Him, are 
 also a oneness of life and matter. That is, 
 the life-principle and the various combinations 
 of matter that constitute an organism, or 
 physical body, form, in reality, an individual 
 unity. Or, viewing matter as simply object- 
 ive, we, in the subjective sense are, solely and 
 simply, life, and a part of the Infinite Life. 
 It thus appears that there is a fundamental 
 spiritual identity between man and God in 
 point of essential nature. 
 
 Can Deity die, in the sense of becoming 
 extinct ? If so, then we can die. If He 
 cannot die, how can we } 
 
 But it is now not infrequently said that we 
 may return to the source of life like the con- 
 templated ultimate return of the planets to 
 their original source, and some one may ask : 
 What in this event becomes of our individu- 
 
74 l^he Evolution of Immortality 
 
 ality ? My reply is that the analogy is not a 
 true one. Planetary matter returning to its 
 source, sun-matter, may lose its individuality 
 as a material planet; but an individual life, 
 cycling through infinite time and space, is 
 quite another thing ; by this individual expe- 
 rience in time and space it gains at least an 
 immaterial individual consciousness. My con- 
 sciousness is not yours, and it can never be 
 yours. Each attains to a consciousness of 
 life, or self-knowledge, — that is, is individual- 
 ized by his own peculiar world of experience 
 and inheritance. We to-day are individuals, 
 possessing self-consciousness and self-deter- 
 mining powers ; and any one who looks deep 
 into the trend and course of the general life 
 of the human race must, it would seem, see 
 clearly that the universal tendency of life, in 
 its outlook at least, is, in the very nature of 
 things, in the direction of a greater individual- 
 ization of the individual. Externally the ten- 
 dency is, undoubtedly, toward the unity of 
 the race as a race ; but internally this simply 
 means a unity of aggregated individual units. 
 
Of Identity Between Man and God 75 
 
 *' Whoever lives is individual, 
 Without a copy or a precedent." 
 
 To illustrate : In the physical realm of 
 Nature we begin with the individual cell. 
 The next stage is that of a community of 
 individual cells. Finally, by the processes of 
 development, or evolution, an organism re- 
 sults, which consists of individual units vitally 
 connected so as to form a larger unit. With 
 the human race, we call this larger unit Man. 
 But this law of organic evolution does not 
 stop with the development of the physical. 
 It is the same throughout the entire realm of 
 phenomena. It passes over into the imma- 
 terial, and builds up political, social, and moral 
 institutions in almost precisely the same man- 
 ner as physical organisms are formed. 
 
 In the political aspect of the world the 
 start is also with the individual or unit. Then 
 follows a community of units ; the town, for 
 instance. The same law of development, or 
 community of vital interests, results in the 
 organization of counties, States, and Nations ; 
 each a political organism, with functions pe- 
 
'j6 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 culiar to its specific plane of being or place 
 in the body politic ; but all, when perfected, 
 working harmoniously together for the com- 
 mon good and the equal rights of the units, 
 the individual men and women that form the 
 organism or political body. This same law 
 of progressive development also foreshadows 
 the time when there shall be a confederacy 
 of nations, a political world-organism, a race- 
 unity, the highest function of which shall be 
 to secure to the race-unit — Man — the free- 
 dom of a fair chance in the exercise of his 
 inalienable right to preserve and enhance his 
 inherent individuality. 
 
 The same law applies in social, moral, and 
 religious realms. There is first the unit, the 
 individual man ; then a community of units. 
 These units come to feel that, in order to 
 preserve and enhance their individuality in 
 the social, moral, and religious aspect, it is 
 necessary to form a vital association, co-oper- 
 ative in its nature. Hence social, moral, and 
 religious organisms result. The unit finds 
 himself under the power of some external ad- 
 
Of Identity Between Man and God 77 
 
 verse conditions, or environments, and thus 
 seeks, or forms, an aggregate commensurate 
 to his need — an institution, a larger unity. 
 The unit institution is soon followed by an 
 aggregation of institutions, and thus a higher 
 plane of unity of institutions is reached. 
 Each institution becomes an integral part of a 
 larger institution, there being no end, nor shall 
 there be any, to this ascent from institution 
 to institution, from unity to unity, until an 
 "absolute institution" is reached that shall 
 embrace "an infinite community of souls, 
 including the inhabitants of all worlds that 
 have evolved human beings since the be- 
 ginning; an institution become perfect and 
 divine." "Thus immortality is presupposed 
 by all the instrumentalities of civilization " ; 
 and "the completion of spiritual life in the 
 communion of all souls is the final cause or 
 purpose of immortal life." "An institution 
 eliminates from itself the defects of the in- 
 dividuals composing it, and in turn helps 
 the individuals to free themselves of defect 
 through it." 
 
78 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 " A people is but the attempt of many 
 To. rise to the completer life of one ; 
 And those who live as models for the mass 
 Are singly of more value than they all." 
 
 And SO " each shall help all — a finite act ; 
 all shall help each — an infinite act. Each 
 one thus participating in the infinite, invisible 
 communion of souls shall thus be made infi- 
 nite and divine. Hence the Invisible Church 
 of all immortal spirits becomes the Institution 
 whose eternity is as divine as the Creator's." 
 Herein a glimpse may be caught of the out- 
 come of organic evolution, the fundamental 
 law of which is the co-operative association of 
 individual units, a law universal in its scope, 
 reaching from atoms to man. 
 
 Thus we trace our individual life history 
 back to its source, the Infinite Life. It mys- 
 teriously emanates, or is detached, therefrom, 
 and assumes particularity, in a physical sense, 
 in the cell organism — an individual unit. In 
 the ascending scale of the organic evolution 
 of this unit-life, we find an aggregation of cell 
 units, vitally connected, forming a larger unit. 
 
Of Identity Between Man and God 79 
 
 the human physical organism. We next find 
 this larger unit, man, the summit of phys- 
 ical creation, rising into a self-conscious, self- 
 determining being. As the next stage of 
 organic evolution, his consciousness of exter- 
 nal conditions and relationships results in the 
 " institution " ; which is " a unity of persons, 
 and endowed by them with personality." And 
 thus, in his progress, he passes over from the 
 material or physical into the mental and spir- 
 itual realms of his being, becoming an integral 
 part of the endless aggregation of institutions 
 which include " all intelligent beings through- 
 out the universe — an eternal stream of crea- 
 tion — especially after death has removed the 
 dividing limits that separate souls of one 
 planet from those of another." Life — your 
 life and mine — is thus seen to express itself 
 by the laws of evolution and continuity of 
 organisms, commencing with the physical, 
 passing over into the mental and spiritual, 
 resulting in an integral part of the Infinite 
 Organism, the universal Oneness of all be- 
 ing. 
 
8o The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 In this sense we may say : " As is the 
 atom to the universe of matter, so is man to 
 Deity." We also may thus recognize " self 
 as a part of a universal whole, yet a something 
 forever separate and individual." The indi- 
 viduality of experience, of consciousness, of 
 inheritance, of apprehension, remains, forming 
 a community and communion of individual 
 souls that shall constitute an immortal social 
 union of the universe of intelligences. From 
 God, to God, — by the only way known to 
 Law or Gospel : co-operative association — 
 each for all and all for each — the Golden 
 Rule. Here we touch the realm of ulti- 
 mates. 
 
VII 
 
 Of the Origin and Evolution of Con- 
 sciousness 
 
 RETURNING again to the embryological 
 stage of our history, and drawing upon 
 the two prominent composite physical facts 
 connected therewith for an analogy, we may 
 say that one of the composites, matter, is 
 divided into two more or less distinct classes ; 
 namely, the formed and the forming, or, more 
 properly, the evolved and the evolving bodies. 
 In the early stages of embryological life 
 the play of life's forces is chiefly engaged in 
 evolving the external body, — the placenta, 
 — which we term, later on, the formed or 
 evolved embryonic body. When this is ad- 
 vanced or largely accomplished, the forming 
 process more especially relates to the embryo 
 
82 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 itself. This process, so active before birth, 
 is not completed until long after birth ; until, 
 in fact, we have reached that period in our 
 present physical stage called maturity — mean- 
 ing, of course, only physical maturity, the 
 noon of the day for the human body. After 
 this, the afternoon sets in, and eternal night 
 is our fast approaching doom — unless our 
 analogy is significant ; unless life's forces, 
 which in all the past have never ceased to 
 work in a creative or evolving sense, shall con- 
 centrate their energies upon the higher work 
 of forming spiritual bodies, which shall serve 
 as the homes of the ever evolving, undying 
 spirits we call and know as our real selves. 
 
 Evolution is recognized to-day as the great 
 law that relates to the entire physical uni- 
 verse. " Why, in truth, should evolution pro- 
 ceed along the gross and palpable lines of 
 the visible, and not also be hard at work 
 upon the subtler elements which are behind — 
 molding, governing, and emancipating them ? '* 
 If by evolution we have come into the pres- 
 ent stage of existence, through successive 
 
Of Consciousness 83 
 
 stages of organic life from the great past, 
 why may we not, by the operations of the 
 same eternal law, continue to evolve or rise 
 through " succeeding phases of an endless 
 life " ? Unless this be true, the spark of life 
 — given of God, if indeed it be not a part of 
 God — goes out. Unless this be true, then 
 our highest aspirations and deepest conscious- 
 ness are deceptive and play us false. For, 
 as we approach, and, more especially, as we 
 pass, maturity in the physical sense, we be- 
 come progressively conscious of living more 
 exclusively in the mental and spiritual world 
 of our being and nature. We become more 
 and more conscious of the positive limitations 
 of our physical environment ; that by these 
 externals we are barred and fettered from the 
 full exercise of powers, and from the capabil- 
 ities of apprehension and enjoyment that well 
 up within our inmost selves at times when 
 the physical seems less dominant. We know 
 that our bodies are mortal, and that the weak- 
 nesses and ills that trouble them are prophetic 
 of " modes of exit." But great souls feel that 
 
84 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 they " can get on " without these physical 
 bodies ; that these hinder the full expression 
 and activity of their essential selves. 
 
 Somehow, for some reason inherent in hu- 
 man nature, the vast majority of the human 
 race feel, or sense, to a greater or less extent, 
 the existence of Deity, spiritual things, and 
 immortality. How is this fact to be ac- 
 counted for? for it is a fact as real as the 
 existence of the chemical elements of hydro- 
 gen, oxygen, carbon, and so forth. To very 
 many, the objective reality of the sun to their 
 own subjective consciousness is no more real 
 than are spiritual things, or facts. In the 
 light of physical science it seems to be per- 
 fectly legitimate to claim that all our senses, 
 both physical and spiritual, have a common 
 origin in environment. It appears to be a 
 reasonable scientific hypothesis that " environ- 
 ment so acts upon an undeveloped organism 
 as to produce first a feeling. This feeling, in 
 process of time, results in the evolution of 
 organs of sense. Through, or by means of, 
 these organs of sense sensation is evolved, 
 
Of Consciousness 85 
 
 and, in like manner, we finally become con- 
 scious beings, and know the reality of the 
 objectivity of our environment.** Herbert 
 Spencer forcibly shows the truth of this po- 
 sition regarding the origin and evolution of 
 sense organs. It is a law that can hardly 
 be denied. The eye, and all that' the organ 
 of sight reveals to our consciousness, is de- 
 pendent upon and directly due to the object- 
 ive reality of the sun. " The fact that fishes 
 in water that comes under the direct action 
 of the rays of the sun have well developed 
 eyes, and the other fact that fishes living in 
 the waters of the Mammoth Cave do not have 
 organs of sight, well illustrate this law.** 
 Change the environment, and the conditions 
 correspondingly change ; the first become 
 sightless and the latter sight-seeing. " Both 
 classes were primarily endowed with the pos- 
 sibility of seeing, but the reality of sight 
 depended upon environment." The fact that 
 any have sight is thus correlative proof of 
 the objective existence of the sun. The same 
 is true with reference to all the other sense 
 
86 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 organs. The primal organisms possessed 
 simply the possibilities of sense and con- 
 sciousness, but the evolution of sense organs 
 and, consequently, of consciousness, is due 
 solely to environment. Heredity, adaptation, 
 and environment — the trinity of forces be- 
 fore alluded to — " seem to be the creative 
 forces that result in man's present physical 
 condition. In other words, certain objective 
 forces operating through vast periods of time 
 have determined man to be what we see him 
 to be at present." 
 
 The significance of this physical fact, in 
 this connection, is that "for every fact in 
 the physical constitution of man, there is a 
 corresponding creative fact or force in the 
 environment which has been for countless 
 ages operating upon him and making him 
 what he is." If he sees, there must be 
 "light." If he hears, there must be vibra- 
 tions that produce " sound." If he is capable 
 of being impressed through any of the phys- 
 ical sense organs, then he is, and must have 
 been, for long ages, touched by an objective 
 
Of Consciousness 87 
 
 reality outside of himself. In other terms, 
 the " seeing " and " feeling " prove the ex- 
 istence of corresponding objective realities. 
 " Men know nothing and can know nothing 
 of what does not touch them." 
 
 Now, if this be true in regard to man's 
 physical nature, have we not here a glimpse 
 of the laws that result in the origin and evo- 
 lution of his spiritual nature? Do not the 
 physical and spiritual laws run in parallel 
 lines } Are they not, rather, one law .? Were 
 there no real spiritual objective forces, is it 
 reasonable, even in the light of physical laws, 
 to suppose that man would have developed 
 any spiritual apprehension of Deity, of spirit- 
 ual things, of immortality } No one who 
 at all carefully investigates the histories of 
 the evolution of man's physical and spiritual 
 natures can fail to see that both run along 
 perfectly parallel lines. Environing realities, 
 outside^ of him, so act and react upon him 
 as to awaken sensation, and sensation finally 
 results in a consciousness of the objective 
 realities. It is true that we may " feel " with- 
 
88 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 out possessing a knowledge of what produces 
 the feeling. But the fact nevertheless re- 
 mains, " that for every essential fact in man's 
 nature (both physical and spiritual) we have 
 a corresponding creative fact or force in his 
 environment." We may hear without under- 
 standing all the intricacies of wave-currents 
 or vibratory motion ; but we could not hear 
 did not wave-currents exist as an objective 
 reality. The same is true of seeing, smelling, 
 tasting, and feeling ; each sense has a corre- 
 sponding reality of environment adequate to 
 its development ; and the development of 
 these sense possibilities of the embryo clearly 
 reveals "the nature of the forces that act 
 upon it." 
 
 Admitting this to be a universal law of 
 organic and sense development, it necessarily 
 follows that the almost universal sense of 
 aspiration for, and confidence in, the realities 
 of a continued spiritual existence beyond the 
 realm of physical limitations, " has come into 
 existence as the correlate of certain spiritual 
 realities, and that it has been made to be what 
 
Of Consciousness 89 
 
 it is, rather than something different, by the 
 facts of environment." That is, our spiritual 
 sense is as really the result of spiritual object- 
 ive realities that environ us, as is the sense of 
 sight the result of the objective reality of 
 the sun. Thus, in the light of science, the 
 "feeling," or subjective consciousness, may 
 be cited as reasonable proof of the existence 
 of an objective reality which is the counter- 
 part of such feeling or consciousness. The 
 office of physical sense organs in man is to 
 reveal to the ego the relation it sustains to 
 the material universe. They are "the eyes 
 of the soul as it looks earthward upon the 
 phenomena of Nature " ; and they have no 
 relation with things external to his physical 
 nature. They all pertain to the organism 
 that soon or late breaks up and disappears 
 from the realm of sense. They are of the 
 external alone, the cerebro-spinal system of 
 nerves that " knows nothing but what it 
 collects to itself from the outside." Not so 
 with the spiritual system of perceptions. It, 
 like the ganglionic nervous system, "has its 
 
90 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 meaning entirely within itself." It reveals to 
 the ego — the selfhood of man — its relation 
 to the immaterial. 
 
 This point might be elaborated to an indef- 
 inite extent ; but I have said enough to make 
 it sufficiently prominent in this connection. 
 I wish to recall, however, right here, Professor 
 Du Bois' definition of science : " The verifica- 
 tion of the ideal in Nature." It certainly has 
 to be considered with facts and their relations, 
 — which is science. 
 
VIII 
 Of a Consciousness of Limitations 
 
 1 SHALL refer to only one other significant 
 fact connected with our embryonic history ; 
 but it is one that seems immensely suggestive 
 if taken in connection with its counterpart in 
 our present stage of being. I allude to what 
 may be called a consciousness of limitations 
 on the part of the embryo during the latter 
 stages of its embryonic existence. I need 
 not enter into details to define what is here 
 meant. Those who have given the subject of 
 embryolo^ any study, or even a little thought, 
 must know to what phenomena reference is 
 made. The peeping of a chick, for instance, 
 together with the greater or less exercise of 
 other newly found organs or members, for 
 days prior to its rupture of its shell and its 
 
92 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 passage out of its restricted and confining 
 environment into this new and infinitely larger 
 world which surrounded and included the old, 
 has its counterpart in all embryological life, 
 and especially so of the human race. What 
 is this if it be not the sure evidence of an 
 awakening consciousness, on the part of the 
 embryo, of the possession of powers and 
 capabilities that require a freer range and 
 scope than the Hmitations of its present en- 
 vironment render possible ? We now know, 
 as the result of a larger measure of apprehen- 
 sion of the totality of things, that this con- 
 sciousness of limitations, manifested by the 
 embryo, is but the merest suggestion of the 
 reality that awaits it when it shall emerge from 
 the old placental body, that can no longer con- 
 tribute to the evolution of the inherent powers 
 and forces that constitute its life — the real 
 personality from the beginning. 
 
 This embryonic consciousness of limitation 
 has its counterpart, I claim, in our present 
 stage of being. Emerson's quiet reply to the 
 Second Adventist : " Well, suppose the world 
 
Of a Consciousness of Limitations 93 
 
 does come to an end; it would not trouble 
 me any. I think I can get on without it," 
 is the same consciousness — in kind — as the 
 peep of an unborn chick. The difference is 
 simply one of degree. Both are prophetic of 
 that which is to be. 
 
 If it be claimed that this is not conscious- 
 ness, in any true sense of the term, because 
 we have no memory of our embryonic state, 
 the reply may be made that consciousness is 
 something else than mere mechanical mem- 
 ory. Who can remember anything of his 
 first year of physical existence } What, it 
 may be asked, is the difference between the 
 consciousness of a child a week before birth 
 and a week after birth .? or, even, six months 
 before and six months after birth? Con- 
 sciousness, like everything else, is a matter 
 of growth, of evolution. Who of us can tell 
 when it began in his own case.? Who is 
 ready to say that he is as conscious as he 
 ever will be ; that his consciousness is not to 
 continue to grow and unfold endlessly.? If 
 the term ** embryonic instinct" should suit 
 
94 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 any possible critic better than embryonic con- 
 sciousness, I would ask : What is instinct if 
 it be not slumbering memories, or an unawak- 
 ened consciousness that comes down to us as 
 the result of an inheritance out of all the life 
 that has been lived before us, to which no 
 age, no human being, has failed to add his 
 contribution ? 
 
 " Our finest hope is finest memory." 
 
 Up to the point of physical birth the results 
 of all this experience and life of the ages 
 before us lie slumbering in that state we term 
 " instinct " ; or, rather, before birth, it does 
 not emerge above it. But at birth our inher- 
 itance begins to crystallize into consciousness 
 and self-determining power, a point whence 
 an individual immortality becomes possible, if 
 not indeed inevitable. If the Eternal Source 
 of phenomena is the same as that "which in 
 ourselves wells up under the form of con- 
 sciousness," as Herbert Spencer puts it, we 
 surely have arrived at a point in our unfold- 
 ment when we possess that which is, in its 
 
Of a Consciousness of Limitations 95 
 
 very nature, immortal. Consciousness, then, 
 is "a graduated scale without a zero, having 
 no starting-point from which a reckoning can 
 be made," unless we say that it was potential 
 in the absolute beginning of our existence, 
 and is the fruition of all that has preceded 
 our present stage of being. As the rose is 
 potential in the germ, so self-consciousness 
 and the spiritual nature of man must be the 
 result of an unfoldment of that which, from 
 the first, was inherently and potentially pres- 
 ent. If a great past precedes its present 
 state, then, according to the laws of evolution 
 and continuity, a great future is before it, 
 toward which it ever reaches forth and act- 
 ively and unceasingly proceeds. The con- 
 sciousness of the temporal nature of this 
 stage of our existence prompts and impels 
 an effort to subordinate the physical to the 
 mental and spiritual, and keeps prominently 
 before the mind the fact that the realities of 
 life, in a relative sense at least, lie beyond the 
 physical. 
 
 Rightly and broadly viewed, both physically 
 
g6 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 and metaphysically, this consciousness of lim- 
 itations is a sure and sufficient evidence of an 
 ultimate broader and deeper realization of life 
 beyond this stage of our existence. It is 
 more than the first faint flush of the morning 
 that precedes each new day. In embryonic 
 life any marked manifestations of a conscious- 
 ness of limitations do not appear until the 
 later stages of that life. The same is true 
 in this stage also, to a greater or less extent. 
 In childhood, youth, and early maturity life's 
 vital forces find full play in perfecting the 
 material organism and preparing it to perform 
 its full function as an organism. At these 
 various stages the consciousness of limita- 
 tions relates to an undeveloped physical or- 
 ganism. We look forward to the time when 
 we may hope to possess better developed 
 bodies, brains, and so forth, through and by 
 which to realize our ideals and give expres- 
 sion to the true inner life that continually 
 asserts itself, crying for more room and a 
 larger scope and range of activities. But as 
 we pass physical maturity, and the evening 
 
Of a Consciousness of Limitations 97 
 
 twilight of this stage of life sets in, " Nature 
 relaxes the bonds and pressure of vitality, in 
 order to reconcile her children to the pros- 
 pects of the coming change." We then begin 
 to realize that even a slight approximation 
 toward a full realization of life's highest 
 ideals — ideals that in our best moments 
 seem native to our inner being — implies a 
 continued life, a more perfect organism, a 
 state of being freed from many things that 
 now seem to be, in a very decided sense, 
 limitations. 
 
 If we may reasonably conclude that this 
 sense of physical limitations, of which we are 
 so often conscious, is but the magnified coun- 
 terpart of a like consciousness that is charac- 
 teristic of the later stages of all embryological 
 existence, we may as reasonably believe that 
 it is now, in our own case, no less prophetic 
 of future realities ; that it, also, is but the 
 merest suggestion of the nature and scope 
 of possibilities and unfoldment that await us. 
 That our present embryonic spiritual being 
 shall, also, when the physical can no longer 
 
98 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 serve it nor longer be conducive to its devel- 
 opment, pass out from physical restrictions — 
 whose domination now hampers its free scope 
 and range of inherent possibilities — endowed 
 with an organism better suited to its new 
 environment and more commensurate with an 
 unfolding of its divine nature and essence, — 
 this surely is a reasonable deduction from the 
 laws and processes of Nature. 
 What shall be 
 
 " When eternity affirms the conception of an hour " ? 
 
 The fact that we cannot now apprehend or 
 know is, of itself, "an immense promise of 
 coming enlightenment." We may rest as- 
 sured, however, that " the things not seen are 
 eternal." But because they are now unseen 
 they need not be called supernatural. The 
 spiritual must be the fruition or flowering of 
 the physical, not only real but substantial to 
 adequate perceptions. And so we may wisely 
 and confidently exclaim, with the poet : 
 
 " He that hath led me hither 
 Will lead me hence." 
 
IX 
 The Forward Look 
 
 -^ 
 
 FROM this viewpoint, we are not to sup- 
 pose that, as we pass on to the next stage 
 of progressive existence, we have reached the 
 consummation. Standing here and looking 
 back with all the aids at our command, along 
 the line whence we came, we fail to discover 
 the beginning or the successive stages through 
 which we have already passed ; so, in looking 
 forward, we fail to catch even a glimpse of 
 the end. 
 
 The spiritual body being, however, a unit 
 organism, composed of some form of matter, 
 — a mode of motion, — it also must be change- 
 ful in form and combination, in accordance 
 with laws pertaining to matter. Should it be 
 composed of the elements of universal ether, 
 
100 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 or should the external organism which our 
 life - principle, or spirit, is to inhabit in the 
 next stage be composed of a higher or finer 
 quality, arrangement, or mode of motion of 
 matter than that of which our present bodies 
 are composed, it would simply pass under 
 higher and more complex laws than any that 
 we now know as pertaining to the grosser 
 forms of substance ; and it would carry with 
 itself the adequate senses of perception of 
 objective realities external to itself. "Birth 
 gave to each of us much." Why then may 
 we not reasonably assume that "death may 
 give us very much more, in the way of subtler 
 senses to behold colors we cannot here see, 
 to catch sounds we do not now hear, and to 
 be aware of bodies and objects impalpable at 
 present to us, but perfectly real, intelligibly 
 constructed, and constituting an organized 
 society and a governed, multiformed State " 1 
 
 Edwin Arnold has written that which so 
 well harmonizes with this thought, it seems 
 fitting and appropriate to quote. He says : 
 " Where does Nature show signs of breaking 
 
The Forward Look lOi 
 
 off her magic, that she should stop at the five 
 organs and the sixty-odd elements ? Are we 
 free to spread over the face of this little 
 earth, and never freed to spread through 
 the solar system and beyond it ? Nay, the 
 heavenly bodies are, to the ether which con- 
 tains them, as mere spores of sea-weed floating 
 in the ocean. Are only the specks filled with 
 life, and not the space ? What does Nature 
 possess more valuable iur all she has wrought 
 here than the wisdom of the sage, the tender- 
 ness of the mother, the devotion of the lover, 
 and the opulent imagination of the poet, that 
 she should let these priceless things be utterly 
 lost by a quinsy or a flux ? It is a hundred 
 times more reasonable to believe that she 
 commences afresh with such delicately devel- 
 oped treasures, making them the groundwork 
 and stuff for splendid further living by the 
 process of death, which, even when it seems 
 accidental or premature, is probably as natural 
 and gentle as birth ; and wherefrom, it may 
 well be, the new-bom dead arises to find a 
 fresh world ready for his pleasant and novel 
 
102 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 body, with gracious and willing kindred min- 
 istrations awaiting it, like those which provided 
 for the human babe the guarding arms and 
 nourishing breasts of its mother. As the 
 babe's eyes opened to strange sunlight here, 
 so may the eyes of the dead lift glad and sur- 
 prised lids to ' a light that never was on sea 
 or land ' ; and so may his delighted ears hear 
 speech and music proper to the spheres be- 
 yond, while he laughs contentedly to find how 
 touch and taste and smell had all been fore- 
 casts of faculties accurately following upon 
 the lowly lessons of this earthly nursery ! It 
 is really just as easy and logical to think such 
 will be the outcome of the * life which now is,* 
 as to terrify weak souls into wickedness by 
 medieval hells, or to wither the bright instincts 
 of youth or love with horizons of black annihi- 
 lation. 
 
 " Moreover those new materials and sur- 
 roundings of the farther being would bring a 
 •more intense and verified as well as a higher 
 existence. Man is less superior to the sensi- 
 tive-plant now than his re -embodied spirit 
 
The Forward Look 103 
 
 would probably then be to his present person- 
 ality. Nor does anything except ignorance 
 and despondency forbid the belief that the 
 senses so etherealized and enhanced, and so 
 fitly adapted to the fine combinations of ad- 
 vanced entity, would discover without much 
 amazement sweet and friendly societies spring- 
 ing from, but proportionately upraised above, 
 the old associations ; art divinely elevated ; 
 science splendidly expanding ; bygone loves 
 and sympathies explaining and obtaining their 
 purpose ; activities set free for vaster cosmic 
 service ; abandoned hopes realized at last ; 
 despaired-of joys come magically within ready 
 reach ; regrets and repentances softened by 
 wider knowledge, surer foresight, and the dis- 
 covery that though in this universe nothing 
 can be * forgiven,' everything may be repaid 
 and repaired. In such a stage, though little 
 removed relatively from this, the widening of 
 faith, delight, and love (and therefore of virtue 
 which depends on these) would be very large. 
 Everywhere would be discerned the fact, if 
 not the full mystery, of continuity, of evolu- 
 
104 T^h^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 tion, and of the never ending progress in all 
 that lives towards beauty, happiness, and use 
 without limit. To call such a life * Heaven ' 
 or the * Hereafter,' is a concession to the 
 illusions of speech and thought, for these 
 words imply locality and time, which are but 
 provisional conceptions. It would rather be 
 a state, a plane of faculties, to expand again 
 into other and higher states or planes; the 
 slowest and the lowest in the race of life 
 coming in last, but each — everywhere — 
 finally attaining. After all, as Shakespeare 
 so merrily hints, * That that is, is ! ' and when 
 we look into the blue of the sky we actually 
 see visible Infinity. When we regard the 
 stars of midnight we veritably perceive the 
 mansions of Nature, countless and illimitable ; 
 so that even our narrow senses reprove our 
 timid minds. 
 
 " If such shadows of the future be ever so 
 faintly cast from real existences, fear and care 
 might, at one word, pass from the minds of 
 men, as evil dreams depart from little children 
 waking to their mother's kiss ; and all might 
 
The Forward Look 105 
 
 feel how subtly wise the poet was who wrote 
 of that first mysterious night on earth, which 
 showed the unexpected stars : when — 
 
 ♦' ' Hesperus, with the hosts of heaven came, 
 And lo, Creation widened on man's view ! 
 
 Who could have thought such marvels lay concealed 
 Within thy beams, O Sun ? or who could find — 
 
 Whilst flower and leaf and insect stood revealed — 
 That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind ? 
 
 Why do we, then, shun Death with anxious strife ? 
 
 If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life ? ' " 
 
X 
 
 Discussion* 
 
 T^HERE are one or two points in the fore- 
 ^ going pages where a fuller elaboration of 
 the general line of the main argument may 
 be advisable, especially because, from two or 
 three sources, there have come questionings 
 regarding the validity of some of the conclu- 
 sions drawn from the basal analogy presented 
 in the earlier chapters. 
 
 Let it be understood at the outset that the 
 analogies themselves are not called in ques- 
 tion by these writers of high scientific attain- 
 ment. The queries arise as to the validity of 
 the full extent of the conclusions that have 
 been drawn therefrom, relating especially to 
 the matter of the continuity of self-conscious- 
 
 * Appendix to the Third Edition (1890). 
 
Discussion 107 
 
 ness and the connection that exists between 
 what are called the " first " and " second " 
 parts of the book ; the " first " part ending, 
 from this view, with Chapter IV. 
 
 Says one : " The continuity of self -con- 
 sciousness is, of course, the whole point. 
 Without that there is no immortality. Your 
 argument I would state thus : Our life history 
 shows us that every entrance to a new stage 
 is preceded by a death ; shall not, then, the 
 death of the present envelope also be the 
 prelude to another stage } This can only be 
 answered in the affirmative. The analogy 
 seems sound and, as you enforce it, most con- 
 vincing. Now, then, — and here is the point, 
 — shall we take over our consciousness into 
 that new stage without break of continuity .? 
 Here the analogy breaks down. We have 
 not done this in the previous stage. There 
 has been no such continuity of consciousness 
 in the past. Why should there be in the 
 future } But you would reply, I take it, 
 there has been no self-consciousness to take 
 over heretofore. That I admit is a sufficient 
 
io8 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 answer. But, that being the case, what help 
 does the analogy give us ? As in past changes 
 we have left behind many, if not all, of the 
 things which belong to the past stage, why in 
 the coming change should we take with us 
 anything of this, and why should self-con- 
 sciousness be the exception ? If we leave all 
 else, why not that ? Please note, I do not 
 deny the conclusion ; I think it is sound, and 
 you make a strong case for it. But I think 
 your most convincing reasons are not due to 
 your analogy ; are not much reinforced by 
 it even. The connection between first and 
 second parts is not, to my mind, very cogent. 
 To me the convincing part of your argument 
 begins where your analogy ends. The life 
 history has passed from stage to stage with 
 a * death * at each threshold ; but with us self- 
 consciousness, mind, moral responsibility, have 
 come into the field, and they mean something. 
 The tendency has been always toward the 
 supremacy of mind, and at last self-conscious 
 mind has become embodied in matter. Here 
 we recognize development under purpose to 
 
Discussion 1 09 
 
 a certain end, and we see the end, — self- 
 conscious individuality. Thus we see that the 
 development is to proceed along this line. 
 The physical development has gone to the 
 rear. Now all of this, I think, is in your 
 book, or to be read between the lines. But 
 as I read it I did not find myself deriving any 
 help from your analog}', or even referring to 
 it. I had cut loose from it. It seems to me, 
 then, that the whole point at issue, whether 
 self-consciousness is to endure, is not touched 
 by your analogy, because in past stages such 
 consciousness did not exist. All we can say 
 upon that basis is that certainly this stage 
 cannot be the end. There must be another. 
 There it leaves us. To go further we need 
 other views. These other views you use and 
 use well, but you leave your analogy behind." 
 
 From another writer — a man who for 
 many years has been a most devoted and con- 
 scientious student and teacher of the physical 
 sciences — comes a statement, much of which 
 so nearly coincides with the above that to 
 quote would be superfluous. The main point 
 
no The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 of significance in this letter, as in the other, 
 is the agreement that man, judging from his 
 Hfe history, " may have various modified exist- 
 ences " in the future as in the past, including 
 the plainly implied intimation that such exist- 
 ences are to be progressive. 
 
 If in this connection freedom were permis- 
 sible to speak of personal opinions, motives, 
 and so forth, it might be stated that, to the 
 mind of the writer, the analogy referred to 
 does not seem to be the strongest nor the 
 most convincing part of the argument or sug- 
 gestions embodied in this little volume. To 
 his apprehension, there are other parts as 
 suggestive, if not more so. Chapters VI and 
 VII, " Of the Fundamental Identity of Man 
 and God " and " Of the Origin and Evolution 
 of Consciousness," are considered as, at least, 
 equally suggestive. No proof was attempted. 
 All that was claimed for any part was that of 
 suggestion merely. And so this friendly crit- 
 icism, coming as it does from such high 
 sources, and in this frank and kindly spirit, 
 is most highly appreciated. This is especially 
 
Discussion 1 1 1 
 
 true inasmuch as it expresses more fully what 
 has been less clearly indicated by a few re- 
 views, suggestive of a slight misapprehension 
 of the purpose and purport of the argument 
 as a whole. 
 
 It is freely admitted that one may stand on 
 higher ground than that of a mere analogy or 
 series of analogies ; that, to many, such may 
 seem almost a hindrance. There are those, 
 however, and perhaps a larger number, who 
 are impressed most by such views. They are 
 thus, it may be, led to catch a hint of the 
 underlying purpose in Nature. But with the 
 intuitionist, the conditions are otherwise. He 
 stands upon a plane of being where the 
 master - word of science — evolution — does 
 not mean as much as it does to many. 
 
 One of the objects aimed at in the volume 
 was to yoke the analogies and intuitions to- 
 gether, in the belief that true analogies and 
 true intuitions are not antagonistic. There 
 should be harmony, and, it is believed, there 
 is harmony, and relationship, between all the 
 facts of human history and present being. 
 
112 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 More than this ; it is assumed that our ideals 
 are real forecasts and foreshadowings, the 
 evidence and assurance that proclaim the 
 evolution of the future. This must seem all 
 the more clear, however, if it can be demon- 
 strated that these ideals are in harmony with 
 science and based upon its foundation facts ; 
 if it can be made apparent that these ideals 
 are in accord with ''such a trend and ten- 
 dency in the past as bespeak a greater and 
 illimitable future." 
 
 Certain biological students, who confine 
 themselves strictly to the immediate facts of 
 organic evolution, seem to see more that is 
 convincing in the analogies. And so, — to 
 quote from a reviewer, — the " strength " of 
 the whole argument, to such, " is in its foun- 
 dation upon accurate knowledge of the phys- 
 iology of man, and its construction upon that 
 basis of the spiritual edifice of the aspiring 
 human soul, made for life evermore." 
 
 So much with reference to the " connection 
 between the first and second parts." 
 
 In turning now to the most important as- 
 
Discussion 113 
 
 pact of the question proper, let us first note 
 a significant point of agreement between the 
 two scientific teachers and writers who have 
 just been quoted. One says, " He [the indi- 
 vidual man] may have various modified exist- 
 ences." The other writes, — referring to the 
 analogy, — " All we can say upon that point 
 is that certainly this stage cannot be the end. 
 There must be another." 
 
 If it be conceded that we " may have vari- 
 ous modified existences " in the future, or even 
 " another," why not an endless series of stages .? 
 and also always, as in the past, an ever ex- 
 panding and more complex state or form suc- 
 ceeding each preceding stage > The analogy 
 referred to certainly indicates that this is to 
 be the case ; and here also we as certainly 
 have a hint of an ever-unfolding purpose, and 
 also of the direction of the unfolding. 
 
 This conviction is strengthened when we 
 catch even a glimpse of the result of the op- 
 eration of those methods of force that are 
 termed involution and evolution, and still more 
 so as we begin to apprehend the process of 
 
114 1^^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 the action of these two sources or channels 
 of divine energy. 
 
 In relation to the question of the continuity 
 of consciousness, it must be conceded that we 
 did bring into this stage all the consciousness 
 that had been acquired or evolved during the 
 embryonic period. Only a biologist, perhaps, 
 can apprehend the nature or quality of con- 
 sciousness here alluded to. Once recognize, 
 however, that, "Inherent in every atom of 
 matter there is the Eternal Force, the Divinity 
 which carries it on and up " ; that " power and 
 purpose ride upon matter to the last atom," 
 and it will be easier to perceive that each cell 
 that constitutes an organism of any kind pos- 
 sesses a degree of independent psychic life or 
 sentiency that may be considered as the sub- 
 stratum of the consciousness that is manifested 
 by the aggregation of cells composing the em- 
 bryo. The wonderful and complex manifesta- 
 tions of psychic life in even micro-organic forms 
 fall little short of, and are hard to distinguish 
 from, consciousness. But if we admit the 
 necessity of dividing the process of develop- 
 
Discussion 1 1 $ 
 
 ment of consciousness into a series of stages 
 consistent with present powers of apprehend- 
 ing phenomena, the classification may be stated 
 as follows : living matter, psychic life, con- 
 sciousness, which in turn becomes the substra- 
 tum of self-consciousness. Here we have a 
 glimpse of the various steps of our own his- 
 tory, connecting the present stage with that 
 represented or expressed in the germal state. 
 But it should be remembered that these divis- 
 ions are more arbitrary than real ; that no act- 
 ual or exact lines of separation can be traced. 
 It is rather a growth, a merging of each into 
 the succeeding. 
 
 Sentiency is first manifest in free proto- 
 plasm. Reference is here made to the germ- 
 plasma of the primitive cell or ovum ; in other 
 words, to young or forming ova before fertiliza- 
 tion, and even before it may be said that they 
 have evolved for themselves " bodies." In this 
 stage they present the general features of amoe- 
 boid cells. But even here, sentiency appears, 
 constituting a foreshadowing, a prophecy of 
 what we recognize as consciousness and ego- 
 
Ii6 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 istic individuality. It will be noticed, also, 
 that the expression used, a sentence or two 
 back, is manifest^ not origin. For sensation, 
 wherever found, is, in the last analysis, an in- 
 ward effect of external causes ; the subjective 
 state resulting from creative objective realities. 
 " Universal spirit is cause, universal matter is 
 effect." But it will be essentially correct to 
 say that protoplasm is the seat of conscious- 
 ness. The nervous structure^ were it void of 
 protoplasm, would manifest no sentiency. The 
 nerves embody the sentient agent — the pro- 
 toplasm. Or, rather, it would be more accu- 
 rate to say that they become the body through 
 which, later on in the process of protoplasmic 
 evolution, sentiency and consciousness are man- 
 ifested ; for in the earlier stages of the history 
 of ova, before any nervous structure is evolved, 
 the germ-plasma of the nucleus of the cell rep- 
 resents in itself a very intricate microcosm, 
 the distinctive constituents of which are the 
 chromatin elements, a system of strands, coils, 
 or loops which preserve a very thorough defi- 
 niteness and whose essential behavior is — 
 
Discussion 1 1 7 
 
 mark the fact — like that of minute individ- 
 ualities, exhibiting, strangely enough, " an alto- 
 gether marvelous architectural function." 
 
 A further very striking fact is that, in this 
 state, there is manifest in the protoplasm a 
 freedom of movement and a sentient activity 
 which do not exist after it has built for itself 
 a body. It may be said that it seems to de- 
 scend into matter for the purpose of repro- 
 ducing itself, or for self-amplification, in order 
 to rise to a higher plane of life that stretches 
 away before its inherent potentialities. To 
 quote late joint authors : " So it is with ova, 
 which though at first often resembling various 
 forms of amoeboid cells, tend more or less 
 quickly to pass into the encysted phase. The 
 protoplasm no longer flows out in irregular 
 ever-changing processes, but is gathered up 
 into a sphere, rounded off, and surrounded by 
 a more or less definite envelope. This tran- 
 sition, from a state of relative equilibrium be- 
 tween activity and passivity, to one in which 
 passivity undoubtedly preponderates, is asso- 
 ciated with an increase of nutriment and re- 
 
Ii8 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 serve products. The ovum feeds, becomes 
 heavy with stored capital, becomes less active, 
 and in consequence more encysted." 
 
 Among the first phenomena exhibited by 
 the fertilized germ-cells, or ova, is that of a 
 division into two main lines of developments, 
 — that of body-building and that of reproduc- 
 tion ; or, in other words, that of body cells and 
 that of reproductive cells. Hence we have, at 
 the very outset, a wonderfully suggestive fact 
 relative to the probabilities of individual as well 
 as of racial evolution. As the result of recent 
 biological investigations, observers seem to be 
 rapidly coming to the conclusion that the germ- 
 cells are not the product of the body, as has 
 been supposed, — " at least not in their most 
 essential part, the specific germ plasma." On 
 the other hand there exists almost conclusive 
 evidence that there is an immortal chain of 
 sex-elements from generation to generation, in 
 all essential ways not unlike that found in the 
 life of protozoa, where there is no body, and 
 consequently no death. " Natural death occurs 
 only among multicellular organisms, the single- 
 
Discussion 119 
 
 celled forms escape it." " Death, we may thus 
 say, is the price paid for a body." Neverthe- 
 less, it is to the body-forming process of organic 
 evolution that we are to look for biological 
 evidence of individual persistence. 
 
 In human development the process has been 
 " from undifferentiated protoplasm on the one 
 hand to undifferentiated protoplasm on the 
 other " ; from the germ-plasma of the germ- 
 cell to the gray matter of the brain, on the 
 material side, and from cell sentiency to self- 
 consciousness, on the spiritual side of being. 
 Hence the higher state of egoistic life and con- 
 sciousness comes to birth in and through the 
 evolved protoplasm found in the human brain, 
 the gray matter. The original germ-plasma 
 feeds on, or appropriates, nutrient matter, thus 
 segmenting or amplifying itself, and storing up 
 the product in the brain cavity of the body 
 which it has evolved. And here, like a plate 
 of metal prepared for the storage of electricity, 
 the elaborated protoplasm is capable of appro- 
 priating, storing, individuating from those spir- 
 itual qualities which environ it on every side 
 
I20 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 and which press down upon it with the con- 
 stancy of a Divine Love. Thus protoplasm 
 per se, not " bodies," would seem to be the 
 matrix, the womb, in which the inherent resi- 
 dent forces of the sex-elements, supplemented 
 by environing influences, elaborate and bring 
 to birth ego. Marvelous as is cell sentiency, 
 more marvelous still is egoistic- or self-con- 
 sciousness. If, before the phenomena exhib- 
 ited by the former, we stand in awe and wonder, 
 here we are speechless. 
 
 True it is that, during the embryonic period, 
 self-consciousness had not become a part of 
 our being. It had not awakened from its sub- 
 merged, prenatal, gestative slumbering in the 
 great womb of Nature. It had not and did 
 not come to birth for some years after physical 
 birth. It may, however, be assumed with great 
 positiveness that the various manifestations 
 that are characteristic of the later stages of 
 embryonic life, and which I have termed em- 
 bryonic consciousness, constitute a forecast of 
 the advent of ego ; and that when it came we 
 experienced spiritual if irtk, a.nd began to live 
 
Discussion 121 
 
 in a spiritual world. We then, for the first 
 time, apprehended or discovered our own per- 
 sonal identity, and began to " retire into our- 
 selves and become conscious of our own nature 
 and of its high destiny." Before this event 
 every sense of want or need related simply and 
 solely to the physical. 
 
 Up to self-conscious man, development was 
 guided purely by the sense of physical needs. 
 No animal had an instinct, a passion, a propen- 
 sity, or appetite which did not have reference 
 to physical sustenance, defense, or propaga- 
 tion. But with man as a self-conscious being 
 comes an enormous over-plus of powers, if for 
 the accomplishment of such ends only. This 
 fact should have recognition and be accorded its 
 full weight of suggestion and significance. It 
 not only introduces one into a new and hereto- 
 fore unrealized world of being, but points out 
 the course of future development. Heretofore 
 consciousness was directed outward. Now, to 
 the external world is added the internal, and 
 he finds that the latter is, really, his own world. 
 He learns that " consciousness is subjective ; 
 
122 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 knowledge is objective." He begins to realize 
 the significance and grandeur of the thought 
 of the seer and poet, which led him to exclaim : 
 
 " Oh, mighty love I man is one world, 
 And hath another to attend him." 
 
 At the moment of self-consciousness our 
 separation from the merely physical began. 
 Before that moment we were the subjects, 
 chiefly, of such physical forces as relate to 
 the mineral and vegetable kingdoms, and 
 were spiritual beings only in a potential sense. 
 From that moment our destiny, to an extent 
 that never existed before, rested in our own 
 hands. We then became responsible beings, 
 and could choose our environment, or, at least, 
 react upon it, and make it subservient to our 
 own conscious ends. We could then select — 
 a function transcending physical nature, and 
 peculiar solely to those organisms which have 
 risen above the merely physical ; we could se- 
 lect forms of sustenance that are conducive to 
 either the lower or higher life, the material or 
 spiritual states of being. 
 
 At that very moment we became " new 
 
Disciission 123 
 
 creatures," indeed and in fact. If " old things " 
 had not altogether "passed away," a new ele- 
 ment, a new force, came to birth in our being, 
 — that of self-will, the power of self-determina- 
 tion, the sense of relationship and responsibil- 
 ity. " The moment the first trace of conscious 
 intelligence is introduced, we have a set of 
 phenomena which materialism can in nowise 
 account for," says John Fiske. With self-con- 
 sciousness awakened in our being, a new day, 
 a new world, broke upon our almost affrighted 
 vision. The momentous realities of our being 
 began to dawn upon us, engrossing the mind 
 with fitful images of Hfe's true meaning. It 
 then began to dawn upon our minds that we 
 had come from the eternal past ; that into eter- 
 nity we could trace our inheritance. We dis- 
 covered with amazement that, potentially or in 
 embryonic form, we existed in the fire-mist or 
 nebula, in even that " oneness " of ethereal sub- 
 stance before differentiation began. But now 
 at last our hour strikes and we stand, in awe 
 and wonder, an " I," a j^^-conscious individ- 
 uality, trying to discern the nature of the re- 
 
124 '^^^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 lationship we sustain to the wondrous forces 
 and kindred associations that encompass us 
 on every side. 
 
 What is this if not a new birth, the vestibule 
 into the world of spiritual being ? The process 
 of development is seen to have been from 
 homogeneity to heterogeneity ; from oneness 
 to an infinite variety of forms of expression and 
 states of being ; through crude form and a low 
 order of life in the primitive mineral world, to 
 form, intelligence, and conscious activity in 
 the organic, culminating, in the genus homOy in 
 self-conscious individuality as the pinnacle of 
 progress. During the long ages of the past, 
 preceding the advent of man, all forms of or- 
 ganic life were largely, if not entirely, passive, 
 subject to creative external forces. But now 
 at last an organism appears that is self-assert- 
 ive, possessing creative powers and energies 
 which distinguish it from all preceding forms, 
 thus miniaturing in its own being, in some de- 
 gree at least, those qualities which character- 
 ize the Source from which it sprang. 
 
 More than this. Man not only recognizes 
 
Discussion 125 
 
 that he has acquired these powers and quali- 
 ties, but he also conceives and ever aspires to 
 the possession of still larger, of even unlimited 
 capabilities. He has already, in a mental sense, 
 risen to an infinite number of material worlds 
 which inhabit space, analyzing their physical 
 elements and qualities, measuring their move- 
 ments, and noting mutual relations to other 
 worlds. Nor is this all. He is peering into 
 the occult, into the noumenal, the subjective, 
 the spiritual world. And pressing close upon 
 his dreams and visions, he has made and is 
 making marvelous progress in gaining the 
 mastery of those material forces which, un- 
 mastered, impede his onward march, and is 
 demonstrating more and ever more the possi- 
 bility of mind rising to the plane of complete 
 supremacy over matter, thus indicating the 
 course, purpose, and end of his being. 
 
 But here, if not before, critics may say : 
 " What has this to do with your analogy ? We 
 admit that the stage of self-conscious individ- 
 uality has been reached ; but in past stages 
 such consciousness did not exist. What right. 
 
126 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 therefore, have we to infer that we shall take 
 over, into the next stage, this consciousness 
 without break of continuity ? We have left 
 behind many, if not all, of the things which 
 belonged to the past stage. Why, in the com- 
 ing change, should we take with us anything 
 of this, and why should self-consciousness be 
 the exception ? " 
 
 I reply that a right to such inference is based 
 upon the analogy in question. In tracing the 
 history of personal consciousness we must not 
 overlook its antecedent stages, nor the relation 
 of consciousness to the sense organs, which are 
 evolved during the embryonic stage. The eye, 
 the ear, and all the other sense organs of an 
 embryo certainly have no explanation of being 
 if they are not to be considered a prophecy of 
 an existence beyond the embryo state. They 
 are of no sort of use to the embryo as an em- 
 bryo. Their real significance is made plain 
 only as we perceive the relationship that exists 
 between their function and the present realiza- 
 tion of a higher form of life and consciousness 
 in this stage of development. They are now 
 
Discussion 127 
 
 seen to be the medium by which the facts of 
 the universe are transmuted into individual 
 consciousness. 
 
 Recall the fact, and bear in mind its true 
 import, that we brought these sense organs 
 with us when we came from the embryonic 
 state into this; also that, before this event, 
 they had begun in a vague and indefinite man- 
 ner to indicate their function, and to hint at 
 a larger consciousness as a result of their joint 
 functional activity. Had we not done so, where 
 would have been the possibility of self-con- 
 sciousness for us in this stage } In proto- 
 organic life, where recent investigations bring 
 to view such wonderful phenomena, there is no 
 central nervous structure whatever, and the 
 subtratum of powers of perception and voli- 
 tional activity (actual movements) seem to be 
 simply undifferentiated protoplasm. 
 
 This is true also of the primitive cell stage 
 of our own life history. It possessed and man- 
 ifested a psychic life, a sentiency, which is the 
 more or less common attribute of all protoplas- 
 mic bodies, powers of perception, and volitional 
 
128 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 activities that are based upon this perceptive 
 quality. These may be the result of simple 
 physiological processes, but if so, they must 
 even then be considered as, at least, the sub- 
 stratum of consciousness, the preceding step 
 in the organic series which moves on to con- 
 sciousness, finally ending or eventuating in self- 
 consciousness, — a difference in degree and not 
 of kind. But if we confine our attention to 
 the protoplasm or germ-plasma of the cell 
 simply, we shall find little enough, surely, to 
 indicate or foretell sense organs and the ac- 
 companying manifestations of consciousness as 
 the crowning result of embryonic evolution. 
 
 But these significant results nevertheless 
 came about, being evolved from the germal 
 protoplasm, and are pregnant with promise, 
 bespeaking still more wonderful facts yet to 
 come. Mysterious and far reaching are the 
 forces that are involved therein ! But there 
 can be, surely, no "break of continuity" in 
 the process that connects the cell life even 
 with that of the self-conscious individual in 
 the present stage of existence. 
 
Discussion 1 29 
 
 If man to-day does not possess, or is not 
 evolving, spiritual sense organs, he certainly 
 has developed significant powers of spiritual 
 apprehension that are not essential to him as 
 a physical being merely ! This being the case, 
 why should not the fact be recognized as cor- 
 responding to the fact of sense organs in the 
 embryonic state, and be accorded the same 
 import ? For what purpose are these spiritual 
 powers evolved to this point in our being if 
 they are not to realize a full fruition in some 
 good time ahead ? They surely have no neces- 
 essary explanation in any fact of physical 
 existence alone. We find in our organism 
 numerous rudimentary organs that relate to 
 the history of our organic evolution, way-marks 
 by the road up which we have come. In ad- 
 dition, there is this other fact that can be 
 understood or explained only as it is conceived 
 to be an index-board pointing out the way of 
 future progress. 
 
 There is surely no " break " in the chain of 
 continuity that exists between the sense organs 
 of the embryonic state and self-consciotisness 
 
130 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 as now existing in this stage. Consciousness 
 of a certain form existed, or was evolved, dur- 
 ing the past existence, — the prenatal, — and 
 was brought with us into this one, without loss 
 or immediate change. This consciousness has 
 now developed into self-consciousness. Why, 
 in truth, should it be left behind, when we pass 
 on to the next stage .? Would not analogy im- 
 ply that it is to go with us, as the sense organs 
 and embryonic consciousness came with us 
 from that stage of life into this.? 
 
 Again, does it appear that we really '* lost " 
 or " left behind " anything that relates to our 
 essential identity, in coming from the past 
 stage into this } The vehicle is changing con- 
 stantly, it is true. But the vehicle, or form 
 merely, does not constitute the individual. 
 Individuality is allied with form and expresses 
 itself through form, but itself must be appre- 
 hended as something else than form. And 
 so an endless series of forms, or the disap- 
 pearance of it altogether, does not dispose 
 of individuality. When the law of change 
 results in new forms, something goes on. Is 
 
Discussion 131 
 
 it not the life-principle ? The vital principle 
 within may be traced back in an unbroken 
 line of continuity into an infinite past. It 
 is identical with that which is apparent in the 
 earliest geological ages. It is identical with 
 the force that builds up the inorganic crystal. 
 " Its constant tendency is toward the produc- 
 tion of more complex and highly organized and 
 differentiated forms of life." Life is the man- 
 ifestation of the divine upward impulse that 
 inheres in Nature, constituting its organic 
 energy. It is, throughout the whole organic 
 series, the determining cause or antecedent 
 of form, as function precedes and determines 
 the formation of organs. In the primitive or- 
 ganic world, — micro-organic life, — the func- 
 tions of locomotion, prehension, nutrition, 
 propagation, perception, and so forth, were 
 exhibited long before special organs were dif- 
 ferentiated for the purpose of a more extended 
 achievement along these various lines. The 
 acquirement of these special organs was cer- 
 tainly no loss. They were the means, rather, 
 of a larger life. 
 
132 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 There is relation here to consciousness . The 
 upward impulse still manifests itself. We are 
 constantly aspiring and struggling to acquire 
 new powers, new experiences, new elements of 
 being as a means of enlarging and expanding 
 our consciousness. Thus the present is larger 
 than the past. But the present moment in- 
 cludes and enwraps all of the past. The past 
 is lost only in the sense that it is swallowed 
 up by the present. It has entered into new 
 combinations of experience, resulting in new 
 forms of consciousness, it is true. But it is 
 all here in the now. If to H2O we add an- 
 other molecule of oxygen, we have a new chem- 
 ical combination, H2O2 ; but the water, or the 
 former combination, is not lost ; it is simply 
 merged into, and becomes a part of, a new 
 form, which is termed hydrogen per-oxide. It 
 is water still, but with a plus. So with our 
 consciousness. A plus is ever being added. 
 Every new experience, every new observation, 
 adds a new element to our consciousness, mod- 
 ifying it, enlarging it, giving it new powers 
 and forms. 
 
Discussion 133 
 
 If it is suggested here that this is practical 
 annihilation, I can only say that it does not 
 appear, to my own mind at least, to be so any 
 further than as it may be regarded an annihi- 
 lation of any given rigidly fixed state or stage 
 of being. It surely implies an ever changing 
 form of existence, but no annihilation of the 
 principle that determines and controls the 
 changes in form, nor of the consciousness tJiat 
 is allied with^ and is the cottstant and most 
 marked expression of, this living, determining 
 force or power. 
 
 The real meaning of life, as of evolution, 
 is, "continuous progressive change." Asso- 
 ciated with life is not only a passion of being, 
 but of forever becoming. 
 
 And would we have it otherwise.? If an 
 embryo might be considered as wishing to 
 remain always an embryo, or a child always 
 a child, we should say that this was because 
 of a limited vision or range of perception of 
 the real meaning and grandeur of life. Shall 
 a man, then, whose apprehension of the pos- 
 sibilities of his being has passed beyond the 
 
134 ^'^^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 embryonic and childish stage, wish to remain 
 always simply a man ? Or should he rather, 
 looking back along the line of his ascent and 
 noting its constantly expanding life from the 
 first moment of its faintest tracing, bravely 
 and manfully, trustingly and confidently face 
 the future, resting in the conviction — based 
 upon the manifest purpose as indicated in his 
 life history — that " the earnest expectation 
 of the creation waiteth for the revealing of 
 the sons of God " ? 
 
 It will thus appear that, at least to the ap- 
 prehension of the author, we do take over into 
 each new stage all the consciousness that has 
 accrued in these past stages, " without break 
 of continuity." And as we have done this in 
 the past, so we are still doing now, day by day, 
 from one period of our present life to another, 
 — as from youth to early manhood and woman- 
 hood, and from that point to mature life. And 
 just here is where the "analogy" possesses 
 force and promise. It is the consciousness of 
 our younger life — our yesterdays — that alone 
 remains with us and is a part of us to-day. 
 
Discussion 135 
 
 Everything else, save the life-principle and the 
 potencies enwrapped therein, is gone. The 
 form and the material combinations that com- 
 posed it are not here to-day ; but the conscious- 
 ness, the personality, the individuality, remains. 
 There is no break of continuity in it. This 
 remains and is ever taking on larger propor- 
 tions and new accruing elements, as the result 
 of the ongoing life of conscious act, experience, 
 and observation. Even more than this may 
 be claimed. This consciousness is not only the 
 result of our own past experience, but of the 
 experience of the whole human race, conscious 
 and otherwise, as well. This is all stored up 
 somewhere in our being, ready to be awakened 
 into action by any bent of corresponding cir- 
 cumstances, constituting an inheritance out of 
 all the life that has been lived before us, to 
 which no age, no human being, has failed to 
 add a contribution. 
 
 A fine expression is given to this thought 
 by George Eliot, in the following : 
 
 " Lay the young eagle in what nest you will, 
 The cry and swoop of eagles overhead 
 
136 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 Vibrate prophetic in its kindred frame 
 
 And make it spread its wings and poise itself 
 
 For the eagle's flight." 
 
 If to the prosaic scientist this seems " tran- 
 scendental," it need only be said here that — 
 in the realm of mentality — thoughts, senti- 
 ments, consciousness are surely nearer real 
 things than any form or combination of so- 
 called matter that constitutes the human or- 
 ganism, the temporary vehicle of such realities. 
 To livCf and the consequent consciousness, is 
 the end and purpose of being. Life is the 
 only real. It came from God, without break 
 of continuity, up through the submerged, phys- 
 ical, prenatal state to the self-conscious and 
 therefore spiritual stage, and thus has arrived 
 at " conscious individuality." 
 
 Wherever there is life, there intelligence is 
 also. Life and sentiency are correlative terms, 
 each implying the other. The Divine Intelli- 
 gence which is immanent in all forms of life, 
 from the lowest to the highest, is markedly 
 manifest in this universally progressive unfold- 
 ing of organisms. '* The same intelligence 
 
Disctission 137 
 
 which in an unconscious form guides all organic 
 formation and all motor instincts, finally be- 
 comes conscious in the brains of the higher 
 animals, and conscious of itself in man." The 
 Universal Life differentiates itself into an infi- 
 nite variety of forms, begetting, reproducing, 
 evolving, individuating ceaselessly. Hence the 
 connection of the Infinite with the finite. In 
 man as an individual, as well as in man a genus, 
 has arisen, has evolved, the power to apprehend 
 this relation of sonship ; and thus is seen the 
 purpose involved in the law, the way, the 
 processes of Nature. By the divine right of 
 our inheritaiue we are immortal. Being indi- 
 vidualized as the necessary outcome of those 
 processes of Nature that are fundamental, in- 
 herent, and universal, self - consciousness be- 
 comes the evidence and assurance of having 
 attained, by the natural processes of evolution, 
 the power to project ourselves into other worlds 
 than that of the material or physical. 
 
 More than this. It is the power, the essen- 
 tial requisite, by which eternal persistence is 
 made possible. It is the way, the open door, 
 
138 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 to spiritual realities, and shows us that spirit- 
 uality is indeed the natural outcome of the 
 very laws of man's being, and that it is its own 
 ground of certitude. 
 
 More life and larger life, then, is what we 
 crave and aspire to attain. And all of life and 
 experience, here and hereafter, can only tend, 
 ultimately at least, to intensify individuality, 
 and so separate us more and ever more from 
 physical nature, giving to mind — the ego, the 
 real man — that supremacy over matter which 
 characterizes spirit and renders it capable of 
 an independent existence. We may thus come 
 to see that truth and righteousness and love and 
 aspiration and all spiritual qualities are verities, 
 and from necessity eternal ; that we may incor- 
 porate these quahties into our own being, and 
 that, so far as they live in us or we in them, we 
 cannot die ; that, therefore, we may now enter 
 into immortal life ; that it may be no longer 
 a conviction merely, but an experience, a life. 
 Here, it would seem, there is no room for doubt. 
 
 " What is excellent, 
 As God lives, is permanent." 
 
Disctission 139 
 
 The full import of the terms " self-conscious- 
 ness " and " self-conscious individuality," as 
 used in this connection, may be granted this 
 further word : 
 
 If self-consciousness is to be considered as 
 the evidence of spiritual birth, the vestibule to 
 the spiritual world, this does not imply that 
 self-consciousness is the ultimate of spiritual 
 life. It should rather be considered as an 
 intermediate step from the lower forms of 
 conscious life on the one hand, from which 
 the individual has arisen or awakened, to that 
 higher and infinitely more sublime unconscious 
 life on the other. A child at birth has before 
 him the task of learning to walk. In order 
 to achieve the power of walking, he must put 
 forth conscious effort. When he has accom- 
 plished his task to perfection, he may walk 
 unconsciously. And so with man as a self- 
 conscious individual ; has he not a divine task 
 before him of learning to walk uprightly in all 
 the ways of a moral and spiritual life worthy 
 of the divinest ambition conceivable to men 
 or gods ? To incorporate in his being all the 
 
140 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 spiritual qualities so that they may spontane- 
 ously well up into action independent of con- 
 scious effort, is not, certainly, an ideal beyond 
 conception. Such an existence, such a state 
 of being, would be, in its very essence, immor- 
 tal. Such a life would be as permanent as are 
 the qualities it embodies. It would have risen 
 into the Unconscious Eternal Life. It would 
 be nothing less than the incarnation of the 
 infinite in the finite soul. . 
 
 Is this impossible to man } Yes, if this life 
 is to be the end. No, a thousand times no, if 
 his entrance here upon the threshold of strug- 
 gle for spiritual attainment is accorded its true 
 meaning and significance. 
 
 " A man's reach should exceed his grasp, 
 Or what 's a heaven for ? " 
 
 In a filial co-operation of the finite will with 
 the Divine Will, our highest, truest self is 
 found, not lost. Self-conscious individuality 
 thus secures at-one-ment with Infinite Exist- 
 ence and eternal verities. Self -consciousness 
 thus rises to Selflessness. Not in the sense of 
 parting with the consciousness or sense of self 
 
Discussion 141 
 
 (which would indeed be " like taking an eter- 
 nal farewell of the soul "), for " consciousness 
 is the necessary attribute of mental action " ; 
 it is rather a glad apprehension of being a vital 
 part of the indivisible, indestructible whole. 
 A passive perception of divine qualities is thus 
 transformed into co-operative activity toward 
 the accomplishment of divine ends. The self 
 is sunk in the Divine order, and a vital unity 
 is voluntarily established and immovably fixed 
 between the Creator and created, the Father 
 and child. Here is no annihilation of individ- 
 ual finite lives, but a harmonious merging of 
 the true functional activity of each individual 
 life in the Infinite Life ; a progressive move- 
 ment of the individual toward the realization 
 of his high destiny. 
 
 " Man is not God, but hath God's end to serve, 
 Somewhat to cast off, somewhat to become. 
 Grant this ? — then man must pass from old to new, 
 From vain to real, from mistake to fact; 
 From what once seemed good, to what now proves best. 
 How could man have progression otherwise ? " 
 

 T 
 
 XI 
 
 Aftermath* 
 
 HAT interest and appreciation should call 
 for a new edition of this little book, twenty 
 years after it was written, the author frankly 
 admits is a source of real satisfaction. During 
 the time mentioned, many and varied com- 
 ments, criticisms, and judgments have come to 
 his knowledge regarding its value, and from 
 widely different sources. In the main, these 
 judgments agree that the volume contains, at 
 least, elements of suggestiveness which give 
 it permanent value. This was all that was 
 hoped for when it was first issued, and the fact 
 that it has lived for twenty years is, in itself, 
 a vital testimony that it does contain living 
 elements of truth. 
 
 * Appendix to the Fourth Edition (1906). 
 
Aftermath 143 
 
 This being the case, attempt has been made 
 to revise the work only in a minor degree. 
 The analogies stand, and the author to-day- 
 wishes them to stand, substantially as they 
 were first penned. No advancement in science 
 during these years has, in his opinion, served 
 to weaken their validity or significance. On 
 the other hand, it is beUeved that the marvel- 
 ous advance in the great world of physical 
 knowledge, during these wonderful years, adds 
 reinforcement and strength, in no small degree, 
 to the conclusions that are drawn therefrom. 
 
 As to the metaphysics of the book, more 
 than is found in the original text may well be 
 said. Twenty years has brought about many 
 and great changes in scientific data, not, how- 
 ever, affecting thought so much in a revolu- 
 tionary as in an evolutionary sense. 
 
 The word " matter " does not mean to-day 
 what it meant even a few years ago. This is 
 especially true of the scientific interpretation, 
 and is also largely true as to the popular con- 
 ception. Twenty years ago the word " ether " 
 was but little known ; and, even in the scien- 
 
144 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 tific world, it had but an indefinite meaning. 
 To-day all is changed. The world of ether is 
 no longer a vague hypothesis. It is regarded 
 as the only real substance conceivable to the 
 scientific world ; and toward an understanding 
 of its qualities and attributes we, to-day, see 
 the great physicists of the world directing 
 their chief interest and investigation. The 
 riddle of matter, some of them say, is already 
 well solved. There now remains the great 
 problem of world-substance. Matter, using 
 the word in its formerly accepted sense, can no 
 longer be regarded as substance. It is, rather, 
 the phenomena of substance, a mode of the 
 energies inhering in substance. 
 
 In the strictly scientific sense, there is no 
 matter at all, but simply "energy in motion." 
 There is nothing in the universe that is not a 
 form of energy. Everything in it which we 
 have been taught to call matter can now be 
 defined only in terms of energy. " We have," 
 says a recent writer,* "but to concede the 
 
 * Professor S. Lawrence Bigelow (University of Mich- 
 igan) : Popular Science Monthly, July, 1906. 
 
 • 1 
 
Aftermath 145 
 
 logical sequence of modern reasoning, all based 
 on experimental evidence, and the last strong- 
 hold of the materialists is carried, and we have 
 a universe of energy in which matter has no 
 necessary part." This is a statement seen to 
 be so clearly true that some of our old-time 
 " materialists " are now classing themselves 
 as " energyists " instead. 
 
 In the light of modern investigations and 
 discoveries, it is not too much to say that all 
 forms of matter are now known to be reduci- 
 ble to some form of electric energy. This 
 conclusion is reached and accepted as an out- 
 come of reliable laboratory demonstration. But 
 beyond this even, there are to-day few if any 
 scientists in the realm of physics who do not 
 hold that, theoretically at least, all forms of 
 electric energy are reducible to some form of 
 etheric energy. Thus, to-day, science itself 
 warrants the statement that matter is a mode 
 of ether-motion, or a mode of etheric energy, 
 if one likes that term better. 
 
 This is not saying, however, that there is no 
 objective fact external to consciousness. It, 
 
146 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 rather, recognizes the fact, but explains it in 
 terms of energy, not in terms of matter as 
 ordinarily understood. Using the word matter 
 here, however, for a special purpose, in the 
 sense in which it has been generally under- 
 stood, we may say that there are grades or 
 planes of matter ; and that each grade is inter- 
 fused by a finer substance, unlike matter in 
 any of its varied forms ; and that this sub- 
 stance is continuous and uniformly present 
 throughout all space. From it, furthermore, 
 arises the infinite variety of manifestations 
 which constitute our present phenomenal world, 
 — the physical and psychical world in which 
 we now move and have our being ; for the 
 ether, not matter, appears to be the sole vehicle 
 of every form of energy, both known and un- 
 known. And, by the application of the law of 
 indestructibility, it is coming to be understood, 
 so it is claimed, how one form of energy can 
 be transmuted into another. This means more 
 than at first thought is apparent ; and it has 
 an important bearing upon our theme. 
 
OF THE 
 
 r/^WrtJi^RSITY } 147 
 
 OF 
 
 We are not, it may first be noted, bereft of 
 substance and left afloat in an intangible sea 
 of unstable energies. Substance there is, and 
 energy ; the latter being the manifestation and 
 constant expression of the former. And as 
 all forms of matter, so-called, are reducible to 
 some form of etheric energy, super-physical in 
 its nature, so the infinite forms of etheric 
 energy, we may reasonably suppose, are reduci- 
 ble, finally, to an ultimate, super-physical en- 
 ergy embodied in the infinite ocean of the 
 ultimate substance — the ether. If, however, 
 it suits one's thought better to class the various 
 forms of etheric energy under a single head 
 and term it Ether-Energy, or the energy that 
 inheres in and characterizes the one substance, 
 no real scientific objection can be interposed. 
 " There is an infinite and eternal Energy from 
 which all things proceed " is only another 
 formulation of the same essential deductive 
 thought. In either case, however, we must 
 not lose sight of the substance in which this 
 energy is embodied. Heretofore scientific in- 
 
148 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 vestigation and the consequent modes of logical 
 deduction have been too exclusively engrossed 
 in molecular motion, or the phenomenal forms 
 of energy, overlooking the more important fact 
 — the substance in which this energy is embod- 
 ied, and of which it is an expression. 
 
 A rational concept of the real unity of a 
 universe implies that " Potter and clay " are 
 one ; implies " the basic substance of a self- 
 created, self-moving cosmos, an infinite and 
 eternal entity," whose chief attributes as ob- 
 served in the phenomena of Nature are life 
 and consciousness ; or, in other words, " a sen- 
 tient property by virtue of which it displays 
 the phenomena which we term life." 
 
 Ether lives. " Yesterday, to-day, forever, it 
 is the same exhaustless well-spring of motion, 
 beauty, feeling, a^nd life." Here, with all the 
 emphasis of the later scientific research it may 
 be said, is found the fundamental, rational basis 
 for the modern conception of " the evolution 
 of mind, its desire of infinite opportunity, its 
 tendency to unlimited growth, and its hope of 
 immortal life." 
 
Aftermath 149 
 
 " Matter," or that form of energy which has 
 been called matter, is, in a relative sense at 
 least, a limited product from Nature's work- 
 shop. The ether is infinitely boundless in 
 extent, carrying within itself infinite possibili- 
 ties and potentialities, which it is evermore 
 realizing through the sublime processes of 
 intelligent organization — organic evolution. 
 And organic evolution presupposes an Infinite 
 Organic Entity, vital, living, conscious, and 
 certainly 710 less than personal. 
 
 When the analysis of " matter " is pushed 
 to the extreme, it is found that " matter and 
 force become confounded, and the only effect- 
 ive reality remaining is the invisible ether, and 
 in the study of its manifestations we must 
 seek the history of the universe." This is all 
 the more clear since almost all our astronomers 
 are agreed that the material universe is a finite 
 and, therefore, limited system. " Since, then, 
 we have to deal with a finite system, we are 
 entitled to apply the laws which are formulated 
 by the mechanical theories ; ... for we see 
 
150 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 in the universe a fixed quantity of matter acted 
 upon according to very definite laws by an 
 equal quantity of energy; here we are con- 
 fronted with a dynamical system, the trans- 
 formations of which we may investigate with 
 perfect exactness according to the mathemat- 
 ical processes applicable to mechanics. So, 
 then, if it were possible for us to establish all 
 the formulae which at a given moment repre- 
 resent the variable state of the universe, we 
 might quite well, by an appropriate series of 
 calculations, deduce therefrom the resulting 
 state at the moment immediately succeed- 
 ing, and so, step by step, follow out all the 
 transformations to come. . . . An infinite 
 intelligence possessed by all these formulae, 
 representing the variable state of the world, 
 . . . would thus have a perception of the 
 future; . . . and thus our limited mind can 
 conceive how the intelligent being might ac- 
 quire a progressive vision of the future, whilst 
 undergoing a gradual development toward the 
 infinite." 
 
 Herein we may catch a gHmpse of the sig- 
 
Aftermath 1 5 1 
 
 nificance involved in the sublime processes of 
 organic evolution — the attainment of a con- 
 sciousness whose sweep of vision knows no 
 past or future, an eternal Now. 
 
 All the sciences teach unvaryingly that 
 energy apart from some form of embodiment 
 does not exist. An atom of hydrogen, for 
 instance, may be divided into 700 or more 
 parts ; and in the cell we have several billions 
 of ions. Still each part or ion exhibits the 
 body aspect as surely as the aspect of energy. 
 Certain conclusions must inevitably follow, 
 based upon these and a multitude of other 
 facts known to the scientific world to-day. 
 But this need not disturb certain phases of 
 world-wide thought further than to cause it to 
 change its point of view ; and every change of 
 one's view-point, often enforced against the 
 will, means growth and enlargement of the 
 real self. But in this case it is believed that 
 the change, when it is more fully understood 
 in its wide scope of implication and ramifica- 
 tion, will afford an immense relief to the 
 
152 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 wide-spread incubus of fear and dread heavily 
 weighing down the awakening consciousness 
 of a large part of the intelligent world. But, 
 in any event, the world must learn to follow 
 where the truth leads. Only in so following 
 is a higher, larger life to be gained. 
 
 It may already be said that a deeper ob- 
 servation and perception of the laws and 
 processes of evolution show that there must 
 indeed be differentiations of form as well as 
 of quality and attribute ; that, in fact, the two 
 go together. 
 
 " For soul is form and doth the body make." 
 
 And in this process of body-making we discern 
 Nature's method of individualizing ** soul" or 
 form ; it being rationally conceivable that the 
 individual soul is represented by etheric move- 
 ments of a more subtle description than those 
 that constitute the bodily elements. Organ- 
 ization and intelligence, however, rise hand in 
 hand, each dependent upon the other. " Sun- 
 dered, were that possible, matter would no 
 
Aftermath 153 
 
 longer be matter ; the universe would vanish 
 on the breadth of Void." 
 
 The very fundamental tenets of evolution 
 tell us that " it is the tendency of the function 
 to create the organ " ; that, as Herbert Spencer 
 puts it, "function precedes organism." If 
 thought, then, were simply and solely an out- 
 come of the brain's physical or material action, 
 this law of evolution would be completely vio- 
 lated, for it would then be the organ which had 
 created the function. " We should rather view 
 the brain as the organ which materializes con- 
 sciousness and ideas in the physical world. 
 Otherwise they would exist only in the etheric 
 plane. If in the evening of life thought loses 
 somewhat of its vigor and clarity, it is because 
 the instrument which it possesses in order to 
 manifest itself no longer enjoys its pristine 
 acuteness, but has become worn out together 
 with the physical body." 
 
 It has also too long and too often been said 
 that Nature has no concern for the individual. 
 It was, and is, a superficial view. A closer 
 
154 l^h^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 view shows that, in her processes and ongoings, 
 she \^ as concerned for the individual as for 
 the mass. In fact, one may almost say that 
 Nature cares for nothing else than the individ- 
 ual. The sequence of Nature's laws is marked 
 by her movements from homogeneity to heter- 
 ogeneity ; from the one substance to an as- 
 cending scale of infinite transformations of the 
 same, — her own substance, her own body, 
 possessing the elements of her own being, both 
 physical and psychical, in potential if not in 
 actual form. 
 
 Viewing the subject, then, from the stand- 
 point of science, " disembodied spirit " is, in the 
 abstract, unthinkable. To disembody spirit or 
 personality would be the sure way of annihilat- 
 ing it. Disembody an atom, and the atom is 
 gone. Spirit, life, intelligence, energy, ex- 
 presses and manifests substance, or some dif- 
 ferentiated form of substance. Were it pos- 
 sible to absolutely annihilate any particle of 
 substance, all its characteristic manifestations 
 would cease to be. Body and manifestation, 
 ion and psychon, are mutually dependent. In 
 
Aftermath 155 
 
 an essential sense they are one. Who shall 
 say which, if either, is primary? Is either 
 primary ? This, however, is not saying that 
 the sentient element in any given individual 
 form or body of substance is not the dominant 
 force in its evolution, the one permanent qual- 
 ity that abides, while forms continually change. 
 On the other hand, the higher scientific syn- 
 thesis of to-day makes it possible to define not 
 only life, but the universe itself, as consciotisly 
 directed energy. 
 
 As long, then, as spirit, life, consciousness, 
 remains existent, there must be form, body, 
 expression ; else there would be no differentia- 
 tion, — Nature's method of constituting and 
 characterizing individuality of being. 
 
 In an essential sense, then, body is the price, 
 so to speak, of individuality, here or elsewhere, 
 in this form of life or any other conceivable 
 form. And the same principle will apply with 
 equal force if we substitute the word person- 
 ality for individuality. 
 
 This conception is in harmony with what is 
 now seen to be one of Nature's most funda- 
 
156 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 mental principles in organic evolution : the 
 " innate tendency to differentiate." This prin- 
 ciple is, in fact, the basis of Nature's universal 
 law of growth. Without it there would be 
 even no physical world with its co-operative 
 associations and principles which underlie the 
 perpetuity of individual life and its embodi- 
 ment in physical form. It is so fundamental 
 that we may well term it the " God-principle " 
 within all forms of life, more effective in the 
 evolutionary processes than even heredity or 
 environment. To it man owes his divine im- 
 pulse to strive^ — strive to know, strive to 
 attain, — to evermore strive on and upward, 
 notwithstanding whatever difficulties beset his 
 pathway. And this is no accident. It is 
 the nature of the "stuff" out of which he is 
 "made" — evolved. And is it not, likewise, 
 a divine promise that he shall not strive in vain 
 in his effort, his co-operative effort to establish 
 the stability and perpetuity of his own evolving 
 individuality ? 
 
 We thus catch a glimpse of " at what a heavy 
 
Aftermath 157 
 
 price the material universe must buy its organic 
 life, which is its beauty, seeing that it pays 
 with its very existence. Is it not legitimate 
 to think that this is no useless sacrifice, but 
 that it must contribute to transfer permanently 
 to a newer and more subtle plane that ephem- 
 eral life which the universe has purchased 
 with its own ? " 
 
 Again, it is said, and by one who has given 
 the border-land discoveries of modern science 
 the most profound study : " We know that the 
 most insignificant material facts are recorded 
 in the invisible ether ; it preserves their image 
 in its unceasing vibrations ; must we not sup- 
 pose that life itself and, above all, personality, 
 which are the most dearly purchased manifesta- 
 tions of the activity of the universe, likewise 
 persist in the hidden vibrations of a yet more 
 subtle ether ? " 
 
 Planes of the etheric substance, as well as 
 of the grosser forms of matter, are here clearly 
 suggested by this writer ; and not only hinted. 
 
158 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 but clearly held by himself and others in 
 current literature upon the subject. Call this 
 a mere speculation, a conjecture, if we will ; 
 but it is a scientific conjecture, supported by 
 a vast and rapidly increasing body of accepted 
 fact ; and it may be seen how grandly it gen- 
 eralizes the doctrine of evolution, seeing that 
 " it supposes the incessant transformations 
 which that doctrine observes in living organ- 
 isms to be taking place, not only in perceptible 
 matter, but also in all the planes of an increas- 
 ingly subtle fluidic matter. Such a supposi- 
 tion carries back the limits of the infinitely 
 small far beyond the boldest flights of the 
 imagination, and we thus recognize that the 
 wonderful ether which bathes all worlds is 
 really the necessary agent of the unity of cre- 
 ation, not only in the infinity of space, but in 
 the infinity of life." 
 
 We to-day, by virtue of the principle of dif- 
 ferentiation here referred to, recognize our- 
 selves as but individual^ differentiated forms 
 
Aftermath 159 
 
 of the one substance, inheriting — actually 
 inheriting — something of the attributes and 
 qualities of that substance, — " children of 
 God," as the older phrase renders it. Out of 
 that substance we have emerged, bringing with 
 us life, and mind, and spiritual being. There- 
 fore " whatever may be in this substratum " is 
 ours by right of inheritance, and ours to attain 
 as individuals, — unless, perchance, we forget 
 to strive. Surely, moreover, one of the qual- 
 ities of this infinite substratum is its eternal en- 
 durance, its endlessness of existence. Neither 
 beginning nor ending is conceivable here. 
 
 Combining, then, old and new phrases, we 
 may say : From God we come, and in God we 
 move ever on and up through the stairway of 
 ascending forms, — organic because vital and 
 living, possessing and partaking of the one 
 eternal energy common to the one eternal 
 substance which pervades, if it does not even 
 constitute, the universe of Being, carrying 
 with itself the energies of physical and spir- 
 itual life. 
 
i6o The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 Bodies, then, may not be left out of the 
 rational conception of what constitutes an im- 
 mortal personal existence. Not these bodies 
 which we know so well, it is true. These are, 
 even now, ever changing day by day. And 
 this fact, rightly viewed, should give us a clue 
 and hint of what lies before us. In a strictly 
 scientific sense we have no real self -ownership 
 in this ever flowing stream of the primordial 
 physical elements that constitutes our visible 
 bodies ; its " usufruct " is all that, in any real 
 sense, ever belongs to us. The only really 
 permanent element that is ours, in an organic 
 sense, is " an etheric vortex, generating from 
 minute to minute the movements of life." Of 
 this super-physical element, now invisible to 
 sense perception, our real bodies are consti- 
 tuted; and we already know enough of its 
 nature to assure us that it is not subject to 
 any of the destructive accidents that beset the 
 grosser forms of matter, such as flesh and blood 
 represent. "The living organism, neverthe- 
 
Aftermath i6i 
 
 less, preserves its own permanent personality, 
 which we are unable to connect with any of 
 the material forces which are present. We are 
 bound to admit that we are confronted with 
 a new force, independent of the others and of 
 a nature more subtle than theirs."* This is 
 very significant when taken in connection with 
 the remark of the same eminent philosopher, 
 that it is well known that " the ether registers 
 with incorruptible fidelity the most insignifi- 
 cant facts." 
 
 Transformations, then, take on, as well as 
 put off. And science now shows us the ma- 
 terial at hand, in infinite abundance, for life's 
 uses in the construction of its finer forms of 
 differentiation. Of this material a late writer 
 says : " Though the " (our present) " material 
 body is the only body which at the present mo- 
 ment actually responds to its environment, yet 
 the latent capacity for such response inheres 
 in each body in the ethereal series, ready to be- 
 
 • Louis Elb6 : " Futnre Life in the Light of Ancient 
 Wisdom and Modem Science." 
 
1 62 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 come actual upon the advent of the requisite 
 stimulus, — the death of the outer body. The 
 ethereal body, of course, is not affected by 
 any of the agencies that operate to injure 
 or destroy masses of our matter. Neither 
 sword-blade nor bullet can divide it, the weight 
 of all the seas cannot crush it, closest sealing 
 cannot confine it. The ethereal body knows 
 not the hurts of the material. I do not see, 
 therefore, why any organic individual should 
 ever die. I do not think one ever does. Sim- 
 ply, when the death transformation overtakes 
 it, and the material body drops away, the next 
 more tenuous body, flowing free, takes on new 
 beauty as the new adjustment arises between 
 it and the psychic energies released from their 
 previous association."* 
 
 Let us, to illustrate this conception, con- 
 sider a single analogy drawn from the history 
 of embryological life. The mature embryo finds 
 itself provided with an organ heretofore un- 
 used, that of respiration. During its placental 
 
 * F. H. Turner : " Beside the New- Made Grave." 
 
Aftermath 163 
 
 life and embodiment there is no need of such 
 an organ as the lungs, and no explanation of its 
 presence is to be found other than that which 
 points to some other stage of life and environ- 
 ment than its placental existence. This organ 
 could function only as it received the direct 
 stimulus of a new environment. This it re- 
 ceives in the *' death-transformation " from its 
 placental embodiment to this stage of life's dif- 
 ferentiation, — what we recognize as "birth." 
 And in its response to this stimulus — its first 
 independent physical act — life's newly ac- 
 quired processes begin their new adjustmentSj 
 in a world so vastly greater than the old that 
 the continuity of relationship is readily lost 
 sight of. 
 
 Something not unlike this, we may reason- 
 ably suppose, takes place when we finally exit 
 from this present gross body of ours. We 
 already possess spiritual organs, or, at least, a 
 vast surplus of spiritual capacity and power, 
 that are unessential to a merely physical exist- 
 ence here and now. Why should we not, then, 
 
164 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 regard these as prophetic of a stage of life 
 where their true functioning shall adequately 
 explain their present germal existence ? The 
 lung of an embryo, as well as many another 
 organ, had no meaning apart from a stage 
 of life then yet to be entered upon. So, it 
 may truly be said, the evident capacities and 
 foregleamings of a spiritual nature, manifest 
 here in this life, have no sufficient meaning 
 or explanation apart from a stage where a 
 full and free adjustment of adaptation to its 
 native air shall be possible. And, clearly, the 
 " native air " of this inner, evolving organism 
 of ours is to be found only in the atmosphere 
 of that etheric world whose confines are as 
 illimitable as spiritual existence. 
 
 To illustrate further, this basic substance 
 of our bodies, the " mother-substance " as it is 
 coming to be called, being one, and its energy 
 one, it may be said that ultimate substance and 
 ultimate energy afford us a basis of organic 
 unity. Energy inheres in the substance. It 
 is the life, or, at least, the manifestation of the 
 
Aftermath 165 
 
 life of the substance. Hence, the correlation 
 of energies, the transmutation of energies, is 
 reduced to a rational basis. Science opens 
 here a wide field for a class of deductions 
 which it would be underestimation to term 
 mere speculations. 
 
 We have here to take into account the laws 
 that relate to the indestructibility of energy, 
 the laws of mechanics, of mathematics, of chem- 
 istry, of electric force, the physical laws and 
 phenomena which are accepted universally as 
 establishing the theory that action and reac- 
 tion of all forces are, always and everywhere, 
 equal. Thus, even the laws of compensation 
 have a vital bearing upon our subject, and have 
 been interestingly and suggestively followed 
 out in some of the later investigations into the 
 great realm of universe-energies. It is clearly 
 seen, to-day, it is claimed, that the ether is " a 
 wondrous medium insuring the community of 
 worlds and the unity of the universe " ; that 
 it is "the fountain-head of all energy"; that 
 " all the phenomena of which we are cognizant 
 
1 66 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 are direct or indirect manifestations of the 
 ether acting upon matter." And, by apply- 
 ing the laws of rational mechanics, we are 
 taught " how it is possible for the mysterious 
 ether to register the past and reveal the future 
 through its never-ending vibrations, which are 
 capable of infinite multiplication without being 
 modified or destroyed." 
 
 The etheric body, then, according to this 
 theory, — and there is a large aggregation of 
 rigidly scientific data to support the theory, — 
 " forms the necessary link between the imma- 
 terial soul and the physical body. During life 
 it remains attached within the body which it 
 animates, permeating all its parts. It is, how- 
 ever, more especially concentrated in the brain 
 and in the network of sensory and motor nerves, 
 the activity of which it keeps up ; it subdivides 
 itself in order to penetrate all the organs of 
 the body, whereof it would seem to espouse 
 the outward form. . . . But it also acts out- 
 side the physical body by giving rise to more 
 
Aftermath 167 
 
 complex manifestations involving various fac- 
 ulties of the soul. In certain special cases it 
 can escape almost completely from the body, 
 and, to use the now accepted term, externalize 
 itself ; it can reveal its presence by phenom- 
 ena visible to all, and the investigation of those 
 phenomena acquires particular interest as re- 
 gards the demonstrative proof of the existence 
 of this hypothetical aggregate." (The word 
 ** aggregate," as here used, refers to the etheric 
 body. ) Among these singular phenomena there 
 are almost conclusive evidences " which show 
 sensitivity, which we erroneously attribute to 
 the physical body, to be a property essentially 
 distinct from the physical body, which in 
 itself is inert like all matter." The laws 
 have even been formulated which govern these 
 phenomena. 
 
 To those who have not kept pace with the 
 advance of modem investigation, such state- 
 ments as these may seem like fairy tales from 
 Wonderland. Therefore it cannot be too fre- 
 quently or forcibly stated that the investiga- 
 
1 68 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 tions under review are conducted by, and that 
 these reports come from, earnest, sober, cau- 
 tious, trained men, of recognized rank in the 
 modem scientific world, — much trustworthy 
 light being thus thrown upon the heretofore 
 dark problem as to the rational possibility of 
 the continuance of personal life, and of the 
 endlessness thereof, after physical life ceases. 
 In fact, these investigations, of which a mere 
 hint is given here, go far toward a conclusive 
 showing that the etheric body of which we 
 are now possessed is the basis of that life and 
 consciousness which constitute our present real 
 personality ; and that it is in no wise affected, 
 as to its real integrity, by the accident of mere 
 physical death. 
 
 To-day, then, we are allowed, in the name 
 of science, ** to cling energetically to the prin- 
 ciple of survival, which is presented to us upon 
 the double authority of the deductions based 
 upon universal tradition, and upon the obser- 
 vation of facts." 
 
Aftermath 169 
 
 Let us not, in our thought, be befogged by- 
 words. Science to-day sees energy everywhere 
 in the universe. No remotest or minutest bit 
 of space anywhere but teems with manifold 
 energy. The ether is universal in space, per- 
 meating all *• bodies " equally with all " space." 
 It is space ; and thus its energy is, likewise, 
 coequal with space. 
 
 What, then, is energy .? 
 
 However we may define the word, can its 
 ultimate meaning be less than Life } Energy 
 apart from some form of life is inconceivable. 
 And, conversely, life apart from some form of 
 energy is, also, inconceivable. When therefore 
 we speak, in scientific terms, of resolving the 
 material universe into ether-energy, we are 
 practically resolving it into terms of life ; and 
 we may as well say that every remotest and 
 every minutest bit of space teems with man- 
 ifold life. And we should remember here that 
 the word life embraces its psychic forms of 
 
170 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 expression, as well as the physical; for "life 
 is the subjective side of matter, its personal 
 attribute : that property which renders the 
 * ion ' a * psychon.' " To-day we know that this 
 remark by a noted biologist is as applicable to 
 the ether as it is to any form of matter. 
 
 Life, then, is the one great fact. There is 
 no room for death anywhere in God's worlds. 
 Death is not, as we have been taught for so 
 long a time, "the final law of Nature." Life 
 is the law of Nature, and evermore life, as 
 modern biology so surely proves ; and it is no 
 less the aim and purpose of Nature than it is 
 the final outcome of the " Kingdom of God," 
 here or elsewhere. We have, like foolish chil- 
 dren, mistaken the real significance of Nature's 
 processes in achieving her upward transforma- 
 tions and correlations of life^ and have called 
 it "death." This, to the author, seems to be 
 the necessary and rational deduction to be 
 drawn from an unbiased study of such scientific 
 data as the last twenty years have afforded. 
 
Aftermath 171 
 
 No *' creed " of science, however, let it be 
 said, can yet be written ; perhaps it never will 
 be written in full. But at every stage in its 
 advance certain lines of drift or tendency may 
 be noted as indicating the trend, more or less 
 general, of scientific deduction regarding any 
 given subject. 
 
 It is true that a purely negative attitude is 
 not normal to the human mind. It must be- 
 lieve something, if only in a tentative sense. 
 This is especially the fact where, as in this 
 case, the origin and destiny of human beings 
 is involved. Men and women, the world over, 
 are not content, and never will be content, to 
 rest in absolute unbelief. Abundant caution 
 should therefore be exercised in the weighing 
 of evidence. At the same time, one need not 
 foreordain himself to the status of positively 
 obstinate unbelief simply because the evidence 
 falls short of absolute proof. That attitude 
 may be the plain badge of weakness rather 
 than of mental strength. Candor, open-mind- 
 
172 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 edness, is no less a virtue than is strenuous 
 caution. A really judicial mind is swayed by 
 the preponderance of evidence rather than by 
 a preconceived opinion. One needs always to 
 be on guard against the conceit of a " superior 
 intelligence." The special feature, however, 
 which marks this age, as compared with the 
 past, is the fact that, to-day, foundations of be- 
 lief are far more searchingly inquired into, and 
 the rational faculty is less easily satisfied. Evi- 
 dences of a scientific nature are called for, and 
 must be forthcoming, before much credence 
 is given to a " faith " that claims to lift the 
 veil of the future. This is inevitable and 
 well. No lover of his kind would turn back 
 the tide. 
 
 It is to be said, however, that no one with 
 an observant eye can have failed to note that 
 a marked change is taking place in the attitude 
 of scientific thought regarding immortality. 
 Throughout the world, numbers of men of prac- 
 tical scientific training are carefully weighing 
 the evidences, pro and con, which these later 
 
Aftermath 173 
 
 years afford ; and the general verdict is such 
 that science, rigid, austere science, can no 
 longer be quoted as purely negative in its atti- 
 tude. ** It may be that a future life awaits 
 every human being, but science knows of no 
 evidence that it is so," was formerly the almost 
 universal voice from the strictly scientific world. 
 The note now is very different. Proof, abso- 
 lute proof, is lacking ; no one talks of proof ; 
 but, considering the question dispassionately 
 and comprehensively, from the viewpoint of 
 scientific data solely, there exists to-day, it may 
 truthfully be said, a body of affirmative evi- 
 dence sufficiently strong to warrant a rational 
 conclusion that this life does not end all, nor 
 lead out into a void of utter darkness. Slowly 
 but surely, a new faith is growing up in the 
 minds and hearts of men ; a faith born of a 
 deeper and saner knowledge of the laws and 
 principles that govern this living universe, in 
 which and of which we are and must ever be 
 a vitally essential part. 
 
 Let the following quotation from the work 
 
174 T^^^ Evolution of Immortality 
 
 of a specialist in biological investigation give 
 merely a hint of much of similar character that 
 is now available : " Within a normal ♦ cell ' of 
 living matter there is an expression of energy 
 not derived from gravitation, but superior to 
 it ; as if emanating from an inner seat of en- 
 ergy, as if acting upon matter at a different 
 angle or point d' appui. Such an opinion by 
 no means conflicts with the monistic concep- 
 tion of energy. It is meant merely to set forth 
 that life is not the immediate derivative of grav- 
 itation, or chemism, . . . but rather a static 
 property of matter which antedates gravity, 
 and, in the intimate composition of matter, 
 outranks it."* 
 
 Furthermore, to pursue now our thought 
 along another but related line, it may be said 
 that life, while manifesting itself in degrees 
 and stages according to the complexity of the 
 organism in which it is found embodied, comes 
 first of all in man to a clear and perfect con- 
 * C. A. Stephens, M.D. : "Natural Salvation." 
 
Aftermath 175 
 
 sciousness of itself as an individual differenti- 
 ation from its parent source. This does not 
 imply that intelligence and consciousness, or 
 that self-consciousness even, are known only 
 to man. The implications based upon the 
 broader knowledge of to-day are, rather, that 
 all of these qualities, and far more than these, 
 inhere in that infinite substratum, the basic 
 substance or source from which man has 
 come, — from which he is evolved by the in- 
 nate differentiating laws that inhere in that 
 substratum. 
 
 Man, the child, we trace back to the infi- 
 nite substance and its inhering life ; in other 
 words, to the Infinite Life. Man's life, then, 
 surely cannot rise, in any degree, above its 
 source. Whatever is good and divine in 
 him inheres also in the substratum that pre- 
 cedes him and of which he is. Source or 
 cause cannot be less than effect. We may 
 reasonably hold, therefore, that man possesses 
 enough of the divine impulsion within himself 
 to insure, soon or late, harmonious relations 
 
1/6 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 of life with Life. Else how are we to explain 
 the ever present, "innate tendency to differ- 
 entiate," the impulse to strive ^ to aspire, which 
 seems so universally to characterize all normal, 
 healthy Hfe ? It is there, embedded in Nature 
 like a fundamental principle, and in some sat- 
 isfactory way it must be accounted for in our 
 systems of thought. Is it satisfactory to say 
 that, after all, we are to strive in vain .? And, 
 furthermore, for what are we striving .? Is it 
 anything less than an ever ascending scale of 
 individual differentiations, an immortality of 
 being, separate from but in harmony with uni- 
 versal Being ? Immortality, we are told by one 
 of our modern specialists in the great field of 
 biology, "is what the whole scheme of evolu- 
 tion moves forward to ; it is the dream of all 
 the longsuffering ages of man " ; and he might 
 have added that it is, as well, the unconscious 
 dream of all organic life below man. 
 
 Still another hne of thought or deduction 
 presents itself in connection with the foregoing. 
 
Aftermath 177 
 
 which may be noted in this connection. To 
 many minds faith, however attained, is all-suf- 
 ficient. These do not ask for, perhaps do not 
 need, a rational basis for their faith. But as 
 a result of all the great movements which 
 to-day are overturning traditional forms and 
 systems of religious belief, there has come a 
 wide-spread skepticism, in the public mind, as 
 to the validity of the foundations underlying 
 the traditional faith in immortality. This is a 
 matter-of-fact age. There is little of the poet, 
 or of the poetic insight, in it. It lacks, and is 
 rather scornful of, either the conscious or un- 
 conscious imaginative quality which serves the 
 poet so well. Symbolism is vague and mean- 
 ingless to it. That which the poetic imagina- 
 tion discovers as "most divinely true," and 
 which it seeks to express through the language 
 of emblems, the merely intellectual world pro- 
 nounces " logically false." 
 
 The intellectual method, so much the fashion 
 to-day, possesses, in many ways, very great 
 merit ; the modern world is greatly its debtor. 
 
178 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 But were the world to limit itself to the intel- 
 lectual method alone, it would fail to catch the 
 truest aspect of the deeper realities which have 
 only to be perceived in order to lift the life, 
 awe the soul, and touch the emotions. It re- 
 quires no very remarkably high intellectual 
 quality to perceive that all its so-called " per- 
 fect conceptions " are but the merest shadows 
 after all. They always fall short of the larger 
 fact. 
 
 The truth is, feeling and imagination must 
 be allowed their perfect work in any really in- 
 tellectual scheme, while at the same time reason 
 has its great part to play. In any future out- 
 lining of the new faiths and beliefs that await 
 the coming day, the two must combine. The 
 head must marry the heart, in that truest and 
 most loyal sense which makes of the union a 
 divine uplifting of each to a higher plane of 
 insight and life. The essential thing is that 
 the intellect penetrate deeply, and evermore 
 deeply, into the mysteries of Nature; while 
 the heart, as it surely will, shall thus rise ever 
 
Aftermath 179 
 
 higher in the realm of a saner imagination 
 and truer feeling, being, as it will be, re- 
 sponsive to the greater and more far-reach- 
 ing knowledge. 
 
 The traditional forms of faith in the survival 
 of the soul after death, as indicated by even a 
 very large proportion of our present religious 
 literary and pulpit utterances, have dwindled 
 down to a vague and indefinite " hope." " I 
 wish I could believe," it is often sadly said, 
 ** but I cannot and preserve my intellectual in- 
 tegrity." "I cannot believe in an immortal 
 life," recently said a highly intellectual wife and 
 mother ; " nevertheless, I am frantic to be able 
 to do so." This woman, it must be admitted, 
 represents to-day a large and rapidly increasing 
 class of minds ; and it is little wonder that such 
 is the case. The world is in the vortical center 
 of one of its vast transitional stages. It sadly, 
 and consciously, needs a faith which does not 
 run counter to its new intellectual position. 
 The foundations of its inherited faith no longer 
 answer to the demands of even popular knowl- 
 
l8o The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 edge. Overwhelming doubt and a brooding 
 fear have usurped the place of childlike trust. 
 The head tries in vain to see and comprehend 
 what the heart impels to. For those lacking 
 the new scientific insight, great brazen Hons 
 of misunderstood intellectual fact beset the 
 way, and " death " seems but the passing of 
 the soul into unavoidable night. Many are 
 too honest to evade the doubt, and they face 
 it steadily if sternly, loyal above all to the light 
 that appeals to their highest conceptions of 
 sanity and right judgment. Nevertheless, the 
 heart clings, instinctively if despairingly, to the 
 vaster hope, so inwrought is it in the deep ex- 
 periences and longings of mankind. 
 
 The pathos of the picture ! Scarcely has the 
 world before seen the like. And there is a 
 shade of grandeur about it ; for, amid its deep- 
 est shadows, there glows like a phosphorescent 
 light the undying instinct for and devotion to 
 truth, however it may seem to affect man's 
 preconceived personal holdings. Do we not 
 have the history of the race as a sanction for 
 
Aftermath i8i 
 
 the belief that such loyal following of the 
 highest conceptions of truth shall lead out, 
 unquestionably, into a larger and fuller light 
 and life? 
 
 To meet, then, the world's present temper 
 and intellectual attitude, faith in personal im- 
 mortality must be reinforced by the affirma- 
 tions of a new scripture — the scripture of 
 Nature's processes and laws. At the least, a 
 rational method must come to the support and 
 clarification of the traditional faith. This is 
 the undoubted need of the hour. 
 
 And it is coming. The alphabet of the new 
 language is already here ; and the task of ar- 
 ranging it in order, so as to spell out the new 
 gospel — the gospel of physical science — is 
 already well under way. Thus, and thus alone, 
 shall the head and the heart of mankind again 
 be united, and the blossoms of serenity and 
 peace spring anew along the pathway of mor- 
 tal life. 
 
1 82 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 One of the chief intellectual bars to the con- 
 ception of the survival of human personality 
 beyond this life has already been alluded to, — 
 namely, the "disembodied spirit myth," as it 
 has been called. Here indeed, in the case of 
 the older forms of thought, existed a difficulty 
 which the traditional faith alone — the faith of 
 dogmatic " authority " — could surmount. The 
 day has come, however, when to " faith " may 
 be added some elements of " knowledge," to- 
 gether with much more which, though indeed 
 as yet to be classed as conjecture, may still be 
 received as having behind it a large body of 
 generally accepted fact. 
 
 It is not difficult to-day, for one who is famil- 
 iar with the latest discoveries in physical sci- 
 ence, to predict that the time is near at hand 
 when this of late rejected stone of the older 
 faith will become the chief corner-stone of the 
 new. And our theologians will do well to take 
 note of this fact, recalling the contemplative in- 
 sight accredited to Paul, borrowed from Greek 
 
Aftermath 183 
 
 philosophy, wherein he, or someone writing in 
 his name, saw that there is a " natural body '* 
 and there is a " spiritual body," even here and 
 now during this present stage of life.* All 
 that is needed in amending the New Testament 
 conception is to substitute the word " etheric " 
 for the word ** spiritual," — substantial agree- 
 ment with the most modern views at once 
 follows. And the agreement will seem all the 
 more complete if we bear in mind that the 
 "natural body" is composed of what is com- 
 monly understood as " matter," and that the 
 " ether " forming the " spiritual body " of mod- 
 em apprehension is a finer, more tenuous sub- 
 stance, non-material in its phenomena, and, in 
 that sense at least, truly " spiritual " ; although, 
 at the same time, it must be regarded, and in 
 the most real sense, as substance^ and therefore 
 capable of performing or answering to all the 
 demands and functions of body^ the subjective 
 
 * It is suggested that the reader recall the analogies cited 
 as the basis of the argument presented in the early pages 
 of this book. 
 
184 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 phase of which is " psychon " — life, conscious- 
 ness, mind, personality, " soul." 
 
 Furthermore, it requires to-day no wildly im- 
 aginative faculty to enable one to at least begin 
 to perceive that in Nature's transformation act 
 falsely called death she is simply relieving the 
 "natural" body of its functional activity of 
 embodying an individual personality, and trans- 
 ferring that individual personality to an etheric 
 body already present and, at least potentially, 
 prepared to receive it. This, no doubt, would 
 be a daring assertion to make at the present 
 time in any positive way ; yet such assertion 
 is being made, and by those who have given 
 the most careful attention and comprehensive 
 consideration to the latest border-land discov- 
 eries in scientific investigation. Such writers 
 and seekers have come to understand that the 
 word " growth " is an infinitely pregnant evo- 
 lutionary term, involving in its processes an 
 all-pervasive organizing intelligence as bound- 
 less and illimitable as the universe itself. 
 
 When the original of this little volume was 
 
Aftermath 185 
 
 issued, no attempt was made to show how, in 
 accord with natural laws, the transference of 
 an individual personality from the " natural " 
 body to an ethereal body was or could be con- 
 ceived of as rationally possible. The mere 
 suggestion of such transference was all that 
 the then known facts seemed to warrant. Now, 
 however, scientific attainment is broader, the 
 problem presents a different aspect, and a wide 
 field is opening wherein the " perplexities of 
 knowledge " may be brought into freer and far 
 more harmonious relations with those world- 
 wide intuitions which underlie the "feelings" 
 of human experience. 
 
 Here is an inviting field on which the author 
 might enter in the immediate connection ; but 
 the limitations of a simple Appendix forbid. 
 And the present writer turns from it less re- 
 luctantly because others have recently dealt 
 with it and with allied subjects. 
 
 It is, however, legitimate to say here that a 
 glimpse, hinting at the process or manner, may 
 be gained by referring to the main analogy 
 
1 86 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 dealt with in the first chapters of this volume, 
 wherein it is seen that the placental body of an 
 evolving embryo, with its functions, is but one 
 of a series of bodies, leading up ever to higher 
 forms of organized life. It therefore appears 
 that the additions of twenty years to meta- 
 physical data come in the natural order of evo- 
 lution, and have brought no refutation of such 
 implications and logical deductions as are found 
 in these pages. On the contrary, the author 
 fully believes that the scientific discoveries of 
 these later years, together with a rational view 
 of their significance and natural implications, 
 afford no little reinforcement to the conclu- 
 sions and suggestions which seemed to him 
 warranted by the available data of twenty 
 years ago. 
 
 His conviction therefore remains that, as 
 each individual in the past has had, in accord- 
 ance with the fundamental laws and principles 
 of evolution, a series of successive forms of 
 organic existence, unbroken in line of contin- 
 uity ; so, by virtue of these same laws, there 
 
Aftermath 1 8/ 
 
 lies before each one of us an unending series, 
 an ever expanding or evolving succession of 
 individual forms and stages of life, varying from 
 this that we now know only as the natural order 
 and laws of growth — the very soul and sub- 
 stance of evolution — bring their inevitable and 
 unending changes, both in bodily form and com- 
 plexity and in psychical activity. He fully be- 
 lieves, moreover, that the time is near when it 
 will be clearly seen that without the passing 
 of the present physical form there could be no 
 continuous, progressive life ; that to move out 
 of this mortal house of ours is, for every indi- 
 vidual soul, a positive condition of growth, and 
 no more to be feared than the parting with our 
 former placental bodies, which we had out- 
 grown and which had become a bar and hin- 
 drance to our upward course. 
 
 It is further his belief that it will be dis- 
 cerned that there can be no such state or con- 
 dition of existence as is implied in the old 
 phrase, " disembodied spirit " ; but that there 
 are an infinite series of embodiments, one sue- 
 
1 88 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 ceeding another in the infinite gradations of a 
 finer and more tenuous substance, each grade 
 or special form of substance being, by virtue 
 of its finer and greater complexity of organiza- 
 tion, capable of a higher, finer, and more spirit- 
 ual mode of expression, ever approaching, but 
 never attaining unto, the full life of Infinite 
 Spirit embodied in and manifesting the quali- 
 ities of Infinite Substance. 
 
 Dare we face with unawed and unabashed 
 countenances such outlook on the destiny of 
 humanity ? on our own personal destiny ? 
 
 What does it mean to be called the children 
 of God ? 
 
 If children, then are we like unto him, par- 
 takers of His nature and being ; inheritors of 
 His life ; beginningless, endless. 
 
 This is the ultimate lesson to be learned 
 from the simple laws and principles of mod- 
 ern biology, of organic evolution ; — simple, 
 and yet divine ; infinite in possibility. Godlike 
 in their majestic sweep and manifestation. 
 
Aftermath 189 
 
 Necessarily, the presentment here of the 
 new metaphysical data now available has been 
 fragmentary and discursive — a mere sug- 
 gestive outlining of a few phases of a vast 
 range of material. A fuller development, 
 however, of the writer's more personal views 
 may be found in a little volume (1901) entitled 
 " New Modes of Thought : The New Material- 
 ism and The New Pantheism." 
 
 In closing, he wishes to be permitted to 
 quote here the last paragraph of his paper pre- 
 sented to the World's Congress of Evolution- 
 ists (1893), — published a year later under 
 the title of "The Relation of Evolutionary 
 Thought to Immortality": — 
 
 The heart of man has always claimed its 
 right to a continuance of personal being ; and 
 his best and deepest intuitions have ever as- 
 serted the certainty and validity of that claim. 
 And reason, searching long and rigidly, bids 
 the heart to a hope and trust never so well 
 and strongly founded as to-day. It points 
 
1 90 The Evolution of Immortality 
 
 toward no heaven of stationary existence, but 
 to a continuous life of ever onward and upward 
 progress, bound by no limits of growth in all 
 the realms of intelligence, power, goodness, 
 beauty, truth, and holiness. It points to the 
 progressive unfolding of those ethical relations 
 and achievements which environ the soul in 
 the very atmosphere of all that is blessed and 
 satisfying ; and tells us that this life need not 
 be waited for until some other world shall em- 
 bosom us within its clasp, but that it may be 
 entered upon here and now. It bids us trans- 
 mute earth into heaven, and enter upon the 
 heritage prepared for us from the foundation 
 of the world. 
 
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