We are now to enquire about that life into which our departed ones have gone from us. "I" has gone on his mysterious journey into the strange, new land. We are standing in the darkened death chamber, where the dead body lies, with close shut eyes, like an empty house whence the tenant has gone out, closing the windows after him, and the sobbing friends are feeling the inevitable pressure of the questions, "Where is he? What is he doing? What is he seeing? Can we know anything at all about his condition now?" Many of them say, "No, we cannot know anything; all is vague, shadowy, unreal. It is vain to torment our hearts by thinking." So they lock away his photographs and letters, and they gradually, reluctantly let him drop out of their conversation and their prayers, and, as far as possible, out of their thoughts, trusting sadly in the healing influence of time and forgetfulness to quiet the aching questions in their hearts. Ah! it is a poor comfort! Some of them even think that there is something presumptuous in intruding into mysteries which they say God has not revealed. "Do not the secret things belong unto the Lord our God?" What a pity they do not complete that text, "But the things that are revealed belong to us;" and then go on to find out whether, after all, God has not revealed a great deal more than they think about that mysterious journey on which the beloved one has gone. A reverent curiosity concerning the life of our departed is surely not displeasing to God. "I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren," says St. Paul, "concerning them that are asleep." I wish I could comfort those sorrowing questioners, as I have comforted myself, by thus searching for what God has revealed. I do not want to offer mere sentimental guesses. I want to find for them the "things that God has revealed," and if I draw some conclusions which I cannot definitely prove from Scripture, they are only such as seem to me reasonable and probable from a fair consideration of the evidence, and I shall draw a clear distinction between the authoritative teaching of Scripture, which you are bound to accept, and any conclusions which I draw from Scripture, which you are free to reject. Let me first put your questionings into clear, definite shape, as you look upon the face of your dead. Is it a life of sleep and unconsciousness into which he has gone, or is he as fully alive and conscious as he was an hour ago? Is there further probation in that life? Is there growth and progress? Does he still remember? Does he still love? Does he still know or care anything about the old home and about us who are left behind? Can he help us? Can we help him? Are we to think of him as one gone absolutely into the unknown, or may we think of him as we do of our other absent one who went to India last year, only with the difference that one writes home and the other does not? II