We are Agnostics, and, though some may preserve an agnosticism concerning the continuance of consciousness after death, we are all of us resigned to the inevitable. And if there be no meeting past the grave, If all is darkness, silence, yet 'tis rest; Be not afraid, ye waiting hearts that weep, For God still "giveth his belovèd sleep," And if an endless sleep He wills, so best. [357] Can we state it as our honest opinion that the consolations of belief enter into the every-day life of the average man, influencing thereby his happiness? We cannot. Only on rare occasions, in times of bereavement, or in time of his own approaching death, will he turn to his belief for consolation. Does he obtain then the consolation he looks for? Again the answer must be in the negative. Here and there we come across examples of a happy resignation such as we should expect to find; but usually it is far otherwise. No one nurses his grief longer than the average Christian; no one is more unwilling to die--he is really more anxious to live than Hindoo, Parsee, Mohammedan, or Buddhist believer, or Japanese Agnostic. Whether it be that Agnosticism engenders a spirit of resignation, it is difficult to say; but the fact remains that no one accepts the ills of life more cheerfully, no one meets his death more bravely, than the average Agnostic. How often one hears of the deaths of unbelievers quite as beautiful in their serene calm as those of devout believers. To give examples recently before the public, we have the heart-stirring accounts of the last moments of two well-known Agnostics, the late Sir Leslie Stephen, the author of An Agnostic's Apology, and the late George Jacob Holyoake, the founder of Secularism. These may be exceptional cases; but such are exceptional, also, among believers. According as a man is possessed of self-control, or is naturally fearless or resigned, so will his conduct or feelings be affected. We are speaking, mind you, of averages; and I maintain that bereavements and death are met by the average Agnostic with as much resignation as by the average Christian who has religious consolation to fall back upon.