The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-11-09

call death may be but the first of these changes
where. like the caterpillar we become butter
fly
Nature is surely incompieteness itself, if, &C.
cordlng to all these theories, by nature alone we
have not immortality, or, at least, way of de-
veloplng 1T. We are given eyes, and according to
nature there must be something TO those
eyes would not be given u.s. We also have the
sense of touch, but if there was nothing to feel,
according to nature, this would not be given
US. Both these the animals have in the same pro-
portion as we have, but not so with love. The
animal will soon forget its own offspring, but
with as love is immortal. Show me the mother
who, although far beyond the allotted age. and
wrlnkled and gray, has forgotten her children
Then the scientists say that no matter can be
destroyed-only changed; that nothing can be
created From whence, then. came all this
worldY It must have been always On
the strength of these doctrines, I say
the same causes must make the same
changes In any other world as in this
Surely what will produce chemical change
here would make the same thing on the moon or
venus. What is right on this earth must also
be right in the hereafter. What is right is
eternay right and what is wrong here is like
wise wrong hereafter. l do not think that in the
next world 1t will be right to steal the town
scrip or trade off my neighbours farm I think
that the States prison will also be there for of
fenders-maybe not literally, but at least by
the law of continuity and immortality of right
and wrong That is. the subsequent condition
Will always De marked DV the present condition.
not just as in evolution, but the future must al
ways be the outcome of nature. If we mean
here we shall be marked by meanness in the flu
ture, though the temptations may not be just
the same.
Let US assume this argument fair one.
Suppose there were no God and no future state.
Would not the tendency be to the lower walks of
life and not to morality. Axman would say,
''let me have good time here as long as | can,
without regard to the demoralizing tendency"
might meet man and say, 81 see you are not
very wicked and are honest-why is this'" The
answer would he Because of public opinion,
and not because | wish to do right for myself,
that l may enjoy life hereafter
Now suppose contrast these two states
Take a man who is atheist and whose wife is
a Christian His little girl is very sick and
about to depart this life. The atheist and his
Christian wife stand side by side near
the little one. Suppose the father
tells the child, you are now about
to die. You will soon be returned to gas and
to dust, and that will be the last of you" The
mother would not do anything of this sort. but
would comfort the little one in its last moments
by thoughts of the next world, where she would
be with Jesus, and finally meet her there. after
she, too had left this earth. The father would
take away and freeze out all hope entirely and
leave the child to die in sorrow, while the words
of the mother give eternal hope and happiness
of something better hereafter. In this, then,
do we see that faith in Immortality degrades and
lowers e!evateS existence If have
faith in the future Immortality, therefore, we
have all, and by atheism we lose all, and the
doctrine of God of all is not yet shaken.