Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1881-06-28

vague and distant and chimerical the
cries. Itcontradicts the consciousness
of every man in which abides deep inn
preston Of continued existence. The
casuist may reason against it till ne
bewilders himself in his own sophistry;
but a voice within gives the he to his
vain argument and pleads with author
ity for a life which is to come. The
sincere inquirer cherishes the impress
sion and he thus receives with abso-
lutte conviction the truth which beams
upon him. That the mysterious part
of his being, which thinks and wills
and reasons, shall indeed survive the
wreck of its mortal tenement and is
destined for immortality. Of the few
elements of the natural faith the first
that strikes us is our delight in perma-
hence. All great natures are lovers
of stability, as the type ofthe Eternal.
After science begins belief Of per-
mauence must follow Things so at
tractive, designs so wise, the secret
workman so transcendantly skiilful
that it tasks successive generations Of
observation only to find out, part with
part, the delicate continuance and adj
iustment of weed or moss to its
wants, growth and perpetuity; all
these adjustments becoming perfectly
ineligible to our study at last, and
the contriver Of it all forever hidden
To breathe, to sleep is wonderful.
But never to know the Cause, the
Oliver, and infer His character and
will OF what import this vacant
sky, these putting elements, these in
significant lives, full of selfish loves
and quarrels? Everything is prospec-
tive, and man is to live hereafter.
That the world is for his education is
the only sane way of solving the eng
ma. We delight in stability, and are
really interested in nothing that ends.
Long loved and long enduring objects
are to US, as we see them, only sym
bols of somewhat in US far longer
lived. Our passions and endeavors
have something ridiculous and mock
ing in them if we come to so hasty an
end. If not to be, how like the bells
of a fool is the trump of fame. EN-
merson says, Mature docs not like
the Empress Anne, Of Russia, call
together all the architectural gems Of
the empire, to build and finish and
furnish palace Of snow, to melt t
water at the first thaw." Will you
with vast cost and pains educate your
children to be adopts in their several
arts, and as soon as they are ready tC
produce masterpieces, call out file o.
soldiers to shoot them down? Laying
aside the inner proof, this natura
want ofthe soul which God in Hi
Fatherly lovingness would not have
implanted had He not meant to satisfy
its cravings, saying nothing of Hi
promise, who is the Resurrection
: and the Life, the testimony of his
tory is not to be ignored. The belize
: that death is not the end of man is al
well known as the human race itself
Even in the systems which it il
: claimed pass by the subject in silence
there are found traces of such be
lief. The worship Of ancestors il
China, the series of transmigration
through which the Bhuddist mus
!. pass before he can hope to attail
Nivana, are witnesses to the indie
e structible element of the humal
0 heart which refuses to admit the an
n inhalation Of SO divine a thing as man
/ In the Egyptian ritual of the dead "
! find that documents were rolled u
a and placed in the sarcophagi, to serv
It as a guide book for the soul in he
n pilgrimage in the train eff 0siri
through the regions below. Anon
e the Greeks we find Plato fascinate
It by the questions Of immortality
= though his doctrine of future life
p troubled by the Pythagorean drear
ie of a Metemphschosis, but SocratC
" establishes to himself beyond doul
l. the immortality Of the sou
4 With the Jews the hope Of
resurrection first appears in tn
T, Old Testament Prophet Isaial
Thy dead men shall live; togethc
re with my dead body shall they arts
~ Awake aud sing ye that dwell in dus
Mt for thy dew is as the dew Of herb
IS and the earth shall cast out the dead
Daniel expresses it in the cleare
[? terms-"And many Of them TIN
sleep in the dust of the earth sha
re awake, some to everlasting life ar
ry some to everlasting shame and eve
be lasting contempt The New Test
or ment puts seal upon the questio
d, bearing the impress, answered"
he am persuaded that neither death, n
re life, nor angels, nor principalities, N
ne powers, nor things present, nor thin
is to come, nor height, nor depth, n
IS, any other creature shall be able