Classical literature; Immortality (Philosophy) -- Early works to 1800
11. Considering the 'feebleness of the human faculties and the
uncertainty of the subject,' we are inclined to believe that the fewer
our words the better. At the approach of death there is not much said;
good men are too honest to go out of the world professing more than they
know. There is perhaps no important subject about which, at any time,
even religious people speak so little to one another. In the fulness
of life the thought of death is mostly awakened by the sight or
recollection of the death of others rather than by the prospect of our
own. We must also acknowledge that there are degrees of the belief in
immortality, and many forms in which it presents itself to the mind.
Some persons will say no more than that they trust in God, and that they
leave all to Him. It is a great part of true religion not to pretend
to know more than we do. Others when they quit this world are comforted
with the hope 'That they will see and know their friends in heaven.' But
it is better to leave them in the hands of God and to be assured that
'no evil shall touch them.' There are others again to whom the belief in
a divine personality has ceased to have any longer a meaning; yet they
are satisfied that the end of all is not here, but that something still
remains to us, 'and some better thing for the good than for the evil.'
They are persuaded, in spite of their theological nihilism, that the
ideas of justice and truth and holiness and love are realities. They
cherish an enthusiastic devotion to the first principles of morality.
Through these they see, or seem to see, darkly, and in a figure, that
the soul is immortal.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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