The herald., 1896-06-01

it's and his evil powers and propensi-
ties be imprisoned as we'll as his body
But when he is hanged. decapitated, or
electrocuted, he is deprived of present
opportunity for reformation. Besides
his physical body alone is destroyed,
while his evil and ferocious mind is lib
Grated from the physical. and goes forth
in the astral body to seek and tlnd the
haunts of the vicious and criminal mind
ed, and to influence and impel them to
the commission of crime.
Furthermore, capital punishment
does not lessen crime nor deter the Grim
inal class from engaging in it, but in
creaSes the evil. Statistics prove that
one suicide or murderer, whether judi
cial or otherwise. Is usually succeeded
by train of similar occurrences. This
fact is so conspicuous that sociologists
are now giving the subject great at
tention. The reason of this fact is that
the souls of suicides and judicially eX-
ecuted victims are bound and nat
urally attracted to those still in the body
in whom lurk latent tendencies towards
suicide or murder. which are aroused
to frequently culminate in similar acts.
1t Is believed that when this subject be-
comes rightly understood. nations will
entirely abolish capital punishment. ii
for no other reason than as protection
for the living against the vampirism of
the ghoulish, misscalled dead.
There is another and far more sig
nificant phase of suicide. That already
considered is minor and concerns the
destruction of the body and the abuse
or earth-life opportunities for progress,
While the second phase involves the ter
rible possibility of the ultimate and ire
trievable loss of the soul itself That
possibility is proclaimed in all religions
and PHILOSOPHERS of ancient and modern
times. Jesus asked: What shall it
profit man if he gain the whole world
and lose his own soul?"
We elbow soulless men and women
on the street daily. That is. there exist
those who have yielded to their lower
selfish and animal natures until the di-
vine spark could no longer reside with
them, and has taken its flight and left
the lower man to suffer the tortures
of the damned, to which he has doomed
himself The soul is lost only to the
lower, animal man who has become to-
tally deficient in all high attributes and
exists as Satan of evil. BulWer Lyt-
ton, in his Strange Story. depicts such a
one in the character of Margrave. Jack
the Ripper. Jesse Pomeroy, the boy
fiend, and Deeming. the Australian mur
derer, are cases in point. There are
many others who are cruel and murder
Gus out of pure fiendish love of evil to
which they are welded by their own evil
natures. Soulless people are not all con-
fined in asylums and prisons. More Of
ten they are possessed of suchshreWd-
ness and cunning as to elude ordinary ia
cilties for detection. conviction and pun
ishment They may be found in the
professions, trades and all walks of life.
So long as there is a lingering desire
or aspiration for higher things. and an
effort made to realize them. the soul
has not departed from the aspiring and
struggling man. The tie may have be-
come weakened by yielding to lust and
wickedness and the light of the soul
dimmed, yet it strives for mastery and
to reign over the lower man. If ideals
be high and effort made to be true to
them. the soul may gain complete tri-
umDh