Ploughshare and Pruning-Hook: Ten Lectures on Social SubjectsHousman, Laurence
Philosophy
Ploughshare and Pruning-Hook: Ten Lectures on Social Subjects
Housman, Laurence
Social ethics; Social sciences
The highest manifestations of human genius, the most perfected forms
of self-realisation in art, in literature, and science, have been
given to us--and will continue to be given to us--independent of any
bargain that name and identity shall for ever remain attached thereto
while posterity enjoys the benefit. The artist might foresee that his
name would, in a brief time, become dissociated from his work, and his
memory blotted out from the book of the living; he would produce it all
the same. The reformer might know that his motives would be aspersed,
that his name would become after death a spitting and a reproach; but,
for the sake of the cause he believed in, he would still be willing to
die a dishonoured death and leave a reprobated name, to a world that
had failed to understand.
That is human nature at its best; and you will not change it or
endanger it through any increased doubt thrown by modern thought or
science on the prospect of conscious immortality after death. For
whether we recognise it or not, a subconscious spirit, not perhaps of
immortality but of unity, permeates us all; and for furtherance and
worship of that which his soul desires, the spirit of man will ever be
ready to work and strive, and to pass unconditionally into dust--if
that indeed be the condition on which he holds his birthright in a life
worth living.
W. H. Smith & Son, The Arden Press, Stamford Street, London, S.E.1
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|Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. |
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Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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