The daily state chronicle., 1890-09-07
INGALLS, ON LIFE AND DEATH.
The Doom of Humanity and the Uni
yerse-.The Future Hope.

The Doom of Humanity and the UNI
verse--The Future Hope.
From the Eulogy on Senator Beck, Pro
nounced Aug. 23)
The right to live is, in human estlma-
tlon, the most sacred, the most invola-
BILE. the most inalienable. The JOY OF
living in such a splendid and luminous
day as this is inconceivable. 70 exist
in exultation. To live forever is our
sublimest hope. Annihilation, ex'lnc-
ton. and eternal death are the forebo-
dings of despair To know, to love, to
achieve, to triumph, to confer happl-
ness, to alleviate misery. is rapture lhe
greatest crime and the severest penalty
| known to human law is the sacrifice and
| forfeiture of life
And vet we are all under sentence of
| death. Other events may or may not
occur. Other conditions may or may
not exist We may be rich or poor; we
may be learned or ignorant; we may be
| happy or wretched; but we all must die.
The verdict has been pronounced by the
inexorable degree of an omnipotent trl-
bunal. Without trial or opportunity OF
defense; with no knowledge Of the ac-
cuser, or of the nature and cause Of the
accusation; without being confronted
with the witnesses against US, we have
been summoned to the bar of life and
condemned to DEATH There is no writ
of error, nor review. There is neither
exculpation nor appeal. All must be re-
linqulshed. Beauty and deformity, good
and evil, virtue and vice, share the same
relentless fate. The tender mother cries
passionately for mercy for her first born
but there is no clemency. The craven
felon sullenly prays for moment in
which to repent, but there is no re-
prieve. The soul helplessly beats it's wings
, against the bars, shudders and disap-
: pears.
. The prescription extends alike to the
individual and the type. Nations die
t ard races expire. Humanity itself is
: destined to extinction. Sooner or later
| it is the instruction of science that the
S energy of the earth will be expended,
: and it will become incapable of support
l ing life. A group of feeble and pallid
: survivors in some sheltered valley in the
e tropics will behold the sun sink below
is the horizon and the pitiless stars glitter
:, in the midnight sky. The last man viii
IS perish and the sun will rise upon al
1t earth without an inhabitant lis atmos
is phere, its seas, its life and heat, will
vanish, and the planet will be an idl'
If cinder uselessly spinning in its orbit.
IS Every hour some world dies unnoticet
a. in the armament; some sun shoulder
es to embers and ashes on the hearthston
IS of infinite space, and the mighty maz
i'd of systems sweeps ceaselessly onward i
er it's voyage of doom to remorseless an
ne unsparing destruction.
n With the disappearance of man fro1
ir the earth, all traces Of his existence wi
DO be lost. The palaces, towers and ten
lr Piles be has reared, the institutions h
ar has established, the cities he has buill
ch | ed, the books he has written, the creed
ar he has constructed, the PHILOSOPHERS b
v has formulated-all science, art, liter,
lie ture, and knowledge will be obliterate
Sc and engulfed in empty and vacant OF
| livion.
as The great globe itself
#, Yea, all which it inhabit, shall DISSOLVE
+ And, like this insubstantial pageant fade,
- | Leave not a rock behind.
ad There is an intelligence so vast an
nd enduring that the flaming intervals b.
~ tween the birth and death of universe
as no more than the flash of firefii
,ar above the meadows of summer; a colo
N. sal power by which these stupendo1
cd orbs are launched IN the abyss, like bu
tie bles blown by child in the mornir
,nr sun, and, whose sense of justice and re-
On son cannot be less potential than tho
,be immutable statutes that are law of ben
rd to the creatures. He has made, al
,ir- which compel them to declare that if tt
wo only object of creation is destruction,
intinity is the theatre of an uninterru
ala ted series of irreparable calamities,
wv. the final cause Of life is death, then tir
yhtt is an inexplicable tragedy, and eterni
Ora an illogical and indefensible cats
~ trophe.
are No, Mr.. President, this obsequy is f
nj the quick and not for the dead. It
AZ not an inconsolabe lamentation. 1t
ara an affirmation to those who surviv
- that as our departed associate, conte
dn- plating at the close of his life the mon
sea ment of good deeds he has erected, me-
rial enduring than brass and loftier than t
,art pyramids of kings, might exclaim wi
,ste the Roman poet, mon omnis morial
So, turning to the silent and unknown
his ture, he could rely with just and re;
yes, onahle confidence upon that most impr
old sive aua momehtouS assurance ever
5av livered to the human race, ''He Il
nm. believeth in me though he were de,
YER yet shall he live; and whosoe
the liveth and believeth in me shall ne
die"
and