The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1895-08-07
IS THE SOUL IMMORTAL.
Cardinal Gibbons Believes in Future
Life.

Hone springs eternal in the human breast,
Man never Is, but always to be blest
The soul, uneasy and confined from home,
Rests and e1patiates in life to come
The knowledge of ones self, the
history of others who have passed
away, and faith in God compel the
belief in the Immortality of the soul.
Within one hundred years nearly all
who now walk the earth will have bid
farewell to the scenes Of life, and their
bodies will be forgotten and insig-
ni6cant portion Of the earth upon
which they tread. Though no fact is
more evident than death, though moth
ing is more certain to the learned and
unlearned alike, yet there is in all the
millions who now inhabit the earth a
something that reaches beyond the
grave, something that peers through
the portals of death, a something
which says: I shall not, l must not
die.
Besides the body, which will soon
be consigned to the grave, there is a
principle by which we move, and live,
and have our being. This principle
we call the soul. This soul has intel
lectual conceptions and operations Of
reason and judgment. Our minds
grasp what the senses cannot reach.
We think of God and Of His attri-
butes; we have thoughts Of justice
and of truth we know the difference
between good and evil. This consci-
BUSINESS is inexplicable on the basis of
a solely material principle of being.
All nations, ancient and modern,
whether processing the true or false
religion, have believed in the immor-
tality Of the soul: how much soever
they may have differed as to the ma
ture of future rewards and punish
ments, or the mode of future exist
ence. Such was the faith Of ancient
Greece and Rome, as We learn from
the writing of Homer, Virgil and
Ovid. Belief in the soul Immortality
was held by the ancient Egyptians,
Chaldeans and Persians and other
nations of Asia. Grotius testi6es that
faith in future life likewise existed
among the Germans, Gauls, Britons
and other tribes of Europe. The In
dians of North and South America
looked forward to the happy hunting
grounds, reserved in after life for the
brave.
This belief in future life was not
confined to the uncultivated masses.
1t was taught by the most eminent
writer's and philosophers among the
enlightened and polished nations OF
antiquity. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle,
Cicero, Seneca and Plutarch, guided
by the light Of reason only, proclaimed
their belief in the souls Immortality.
'sThe belief which we hold" says
Plutarch, ''is so old that we cannot
trace it's author or its origin, and it
dates back to the most remote anti
quity." Even idolatry implied re-
cognition of the souls Immortality,
for how could men pay honor to de-
parted heroes if they believed that
death is the end of man 8 existence ?
Belief in the soul Immortality fol-
lows necessarily from a belief in an
all wise God. God, who created moth
ing without a purpose, has given us
desire to know, and longing to be
happy Man. intellect is not con6n-
ed to the narrow limits Of the body.
It reaches down to the unexplored
depths of the sea; it wings its flight
to the heavenly orbs it enters into
most subtle substances, penetrates the
matter that composes them and separ-
ates their elements /; it dissects its
own thoughts while the carnal body
can at best serve as an unwieldly
pivot, upon which this time-defy-
ing principle depends. Yet when
analysis and calculation have exhaust
ed their powers, the intellect of man
still finds itself baked by unsolvable
problems. Can it be that this intel
lect, so superior to the body of man,
will perish forever, with its capacity
for knowing still unsatis6ed
Why this Unsuitable desire for hap
piness =? Is it in vain 7? Yet ask any
one of the millions who now live:
Was there ever a time in your life
when the cup Of bliss was filled, was
there ever moment when you had all
you desired and feared not it's loss ?
Not one could answer yes, for death
would say, with hollow, mocking
laugh: Thou fool, I come. Ask the
miser who loves his wealth Have
you enough I? His answer, accentua-
ted by his thin, meagre form, will be:
More, still more. Ask the ambitious
man, who loves self: Are you salts
fed /? His answer will be: Higher,
still higher. Ask the sensual man
Did you find happiness in the grati6i;,
cation of your appetites ? He will
answer: "Vanity of vanities, and all
is vanity Ask the affectionate
father or husband as he stands at the
grave Of his beloved. lie will answer:
We shall meet again.
God has given us a desire for per-
feet felicity, which He intends to be
one day fully gratiGed, and if this
felicity cannot be found, as we have
seen, in the present life, it must be
reserved for the time to come. And
as no intelligent being can be content
ed with any happiness that is Infinite
in duration, we must conclude that it
Ill Lo otorno1 ond thot commemorative