The Mitchell capital. (Mitchell, Dakota [S.D.]) 1879-1918, 1906-01-12
Professor osler on immortality.

iQl!l lIc SIllCdSC JOuTHdl.
The sphinx of natur propounds no
question so deeply interesting to all
human beings as the question. Does
death end all?" 1t is q question no
man has answered, or will answer.
But it is a question no man can Danish
from his consciousness, nor can any
man cease from seeking the answer
to it.
Science in it's progress has solved
many problems, but it casts no light
ON this one, 1t may say, with Ernst
Haeckel, Il believe death is the end"
or with Professor William James, II
believe every emor and affection of
the present life is to be preserved and
no man, in saecUla saeculorum, shall
ever cease to be able to say to HIM
self: I am the same personal being
who, in old times upon the earth, had
these experiences" But it is always
II believe" and never Il know; with
science, as with faith.
However, the tendency of the times
is to allow greater weight to the be-
lief of men of science than to the be-
lief OF ordinary men, and the more
distinguished the scientist, the heavier
his opinion weighs in the balance of
probabilities. Therefore. when such a
man as Professor Osler is made to
appear as believing hat death ends all,
as the newspaper dispatches made him
appear on yesterday. his supposed
Oi'iilioIl . IlhClS W ulleCl every TeaUGr'S
peace of mind.
For this reason it is important to
point u that DR.. Osler is totally mis-
represented in the quotations, alleged
to be from a new book by him, which
the newspapers printed yesterday. They
are to the effect that man dies as he
has lived, u~niatiuenced by the thought
of a future life;" the great majority
of men on their death beds gave no
sign, II way or the other; like their
birth, their death was q sleep n a
forgetting;;s' the preacher is right; in
this matter man hath no pre-eminence
over the beast-as one dieth, so dieth
the other"
AS a matter of fact. while these quo
tations are exact, they are not new.
They are made from Professor Osler's
IngerSoll. lecture on the Immortality of
the soul. Instead of proving that mod
ern science. as represented by Professor
Osler, believes that death ends all, they
are merely a statement of some of the
difficulties in the way of a faith which,
in spite of them, is triumphant n
firm.
The most serious difficulty in the
intellectual life,' say Professor Osler
in another part of his Ingersoll lecture,
us TO strike a balance between the emo
emotional, tells us we are immortal;
science, which is the rational, merely
organized knowledge" tells us the
question is an open one. Striking a.
balance between these extremes, Pro-
fessor ,Osler finds himself of the opinion
of Cicero, who had rather be wrong
with Plato than right with those who
deny altogether the life after death.
The truth is that, as science gropes
further and further into that darkness
behind the Veil of appearances, its
knowledge, in the absolute seemingly
so great, shrinks into insignificance
relatively to that which is known to
be unknown, perhaps unknowable. The
cries of modern science has given
place, as discovery has followed dis
covery, to an awed humility. Ten
years ago the scientist, thinking him
self seated on the atom, denied the fur
Their advisability of matter and pro-
claimed it's indestructibility. TODAY,
with radium pounding at the stars,
through ions and electrons. he admits,
not merely that matter may be infinite
ly deNisible, but even that it may be
there is no such thing as matter, but
only force.
In brief, science believes that the
universe is alive, with eternal life; and
not only the universe, but every SMALL
est part of it. Therefore we may be-
lieNe that death does not end all, for
there is no death. AS Maeterlinck
beautifully says, it is only "a bend in
the road, hiding it's further course from
our VIEW