The Logan Republican. [volume] (Logan, Utah) 1902-1924, 1908-05-23
TOLSTOI ON LIFE AND DEATH.

A cable to the New York Sun quotes
Tolstoi, in answer to friend who con.
graduated him on his approaching
eightieth birthday as saying:
"Iknow with certainty that In dying
l shall be happy and l shall enter
world more real. All earthly life Is o
dream and death the true awakening.
l await that awakening with happi-
ness.
Our earthly life is one Of dreams Of
another and more real life, and that
other life is dream OF yet another,
and so on ad intnitum even to the last
life, the life OF God"
or death at different ages and under
different circumstances he says:
death in youth Is as when man is
awakened before he has slept full
measure. Death in old age is as when
man awakes of his own accord after
good sleep. Suicide Is as a night
mare which man banishes by remem.
bering that he is asleep. He makes
an effort and wakes
BY that, Count Tolstoi means that
he has faith that life Is an endless
progression upward, ana that in nurs.
ing the ecstacy of that faith, he is not
only content but happy, When he
says he knows, he means that in try
ing to measure the mystery Of why
men we're appointed to pass through
birth and death, believing by the Or
der of nature that there must be a
Col, and that, by abundant manifes-
tations, He must be a merciful God,
the conclusion Is irresistible that man
must partake Of the eternal progress
OF mind, and that as that something
which we call the soul, being divine,
cannot be extingushed, but appears
first in the worm, then In the butter.
fly, and thence onward and upward,
taking on more splendors with each
transition, until its divine essence
purges away all that Is material and
gross, and finally, ascending the last
stair, stands with the angels. 1t Is
not an unreasonable view. Perhaps 1t
guarantees more peace 10 fainting ma
ture than any other, and in its per.
lection is sufficient TO make "a dy-
ing couch soft as down pillows are, "but
1t does not begin to explain half the
mysteries OF this life, or why many
things are ordered here as they are.
Across the way is little lady holding
her dead baby to her breast and
through her binding tears she cannot
see one ray OF light, nor in the depths
Of her soul can she find one reason why
that little thing which was all the
world to her, should have been taken
from her, Next door TO her is All uged
man who has exhausted all life's pos.
sibilities. II not dead TO the calls of
ambition and duty he has not the
strength for future endeavor and his
ears have grown deaf to the music of
hope which was once his enchantment,
and still he lives on,
And these contradictions confront
US in thousand forms every day. or
course we have but live senses and all
these are dull in their manifestations.
Our hope is that they will grow SUBJ
limated after a while, that clearer
vision US and that music, which we
cannot hear now, will later break with
a charm ineiIable upon us.
DO flashes OF that new light, do bars
of that divine melody begin TO fill
Tolstoi's vision with light and the
deeper cham bers OF his soul with song?
Let us hope so, and that at last when |
his work shall be finished he will re-
member that he is asleep and waking,
Danish forever the darkness and the
chill