Ecclesiastes 12:7: “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return to God who gave it.” It is natural for men to appeal first and most directly to those sources from which they expect the most efficient help. So the advocates of man’s natural immortality, when put to the task of showing what scriptures they regard as containing proof of their position, almost invariably make their first appeal to the text here quoted. In the examination of this text, and all others of a like nature, let it ever be remembered that the question at issue is, Has man in his nature a constituent element, which is an independent entity, and which, when the body dies, keeps right on in uninterrupted consciousness, being capable of exercising in a still higher degree out of the body the functions of intelligence and activity which it manifested through the body, and destined, whether a subject of God’s favor, or of his threatened and merited wrath, to live so long as God himself exists. Does this text assert anything of this kind? Does it state that from which even such an inference can be drawn? We invite the reader to go with us, while we endeavor to consider carefully what the text really teaches. Our opponents appeal to it as direct testimony. Let us see how far we can go with them. 1. Solomon, under a series of beautiful figures, speaks in Eccl. 12:1-7, of the lying down of man in death. Granted. 2. Dust, or the body, and spirit are spoken of as two distinct things. Granted. 3. At death, the spirit leaves the body. Granted. 4. The spirit is disposed of in a different manner from the body. Granted. 5. This spirit returns to God, and is therefore conscious, after the dissolution of the body. Not granted. Where is the proof of this? Here our paths begin to diverge from each other. But how could it return to God if it was not conscious? Answer: In the manner Job describes. “If he [God] set his heart upon man, if he gather unto himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again to dust.” Job 34:14, 15. This text speaks of God’s gathering to himself the “breath” of man; something which no one supposes to be capable of a separate conscious existence. Over against this proposition we are compelled to mark, Assumption. 6. This spirit is therefore to exist forever. This conclusion also we fail to see, either expressed, or even in the remotest manner, implied. Thus the vital points in the evidence are wholly assumed.