New Britain herald., 1917-01-08
No Fear Of Death.

(Student in Arms, London Spectator.) ' l am not psychologist, and I have not seen many people, die in their beds; but it IS established that very few people are afraid of a natural death when it comes to tho test A violent death such as death in battle is obviously g. different matter It comes to a man when he is in the full possession of his health and vigor. and when every physical instinct is urging him to self preservation If a man feared death in such circum
 stances one could not be surprised.
 and yet in the present war hundreds
 of thousands of men have gone to
 meet practically certain destruction
 without giving a sign of terror. Their
 emotions seem to be numbed. Noises
 sights, and sensations which would ordinarily produce intense pity, sor- row, or dread have no effect on them at all, and yet never was their mind clearer, their sight, hearing, etc, more acute. But with the issue before them, with victory or death or tho prospect of eternity, their minds blahkly refuse to come to grips. It is
 before an attack that a man is more
 liable to fear-before his blood is hot, and while he still has leisure to think
 The trouble may begin a day or two in advance, when he is first told of the attack which Is likely to mean death to himself and so many of his chums. One indulges in regrets about the home one may never see again. One is rather sorry for ones self; but self-pity is not wholly unpleasant.
 One feels mildly heroic, which Is not
 wholly disagreeable either. Very few I
 stract. Very few men believe in hell, or are tortured by their consciences But as the hour approaches when 1 the attack is due to be launched tho strain becomes more tense. The men are probably cooped up in a very ] small space. Movement is restricted. Matches must not be struck. Voices | must be hushed to a whisper. Shells 1 bursting and machine guns rattl1ng :, bring home the grim reality of the
 affair. It Is then more than at any other time in an attack that a man [ has to "face the spectres of the mlnd,'
 and allay them if he can.
 1 The vast majority experiences more or less violent physical shrinking from l the pain of death and wounds, f especially when they are obliged to be l physically inactive, and when they 1 have nOth1nS else to tn1nk about. | This kind of dread is, in the case of
 a good many men, intensified by dark l ness and suspense, and by the deafen-
 ing noise and shock that accompany l the detonation of high explosives.
 But it cannot properly be called the l fear of death. and 1t Is a purely 1 physical reaction which can be. and
 nearly always Is. controlled by the ] mind. Last of all there is the repul- ] sion and loathing for the whole busi- l ness of war; with It's bloody ruthless l ness, its f1endish ingenuity. and its in
 sensate cruelty. that comes to a man
 after battle, when the tortured and
 dism em bered dead lie strew-n about l the erench, and the wounded groen l from No-Man s-Land. But neither is
 that the fear of death It Is a repu1- ] sion which breeds hot anger more l often than cold fear. reckless hatred | of life more often than abtect clingfns 1 to it. But even where men are afraid 1 it is generally not death that they fear.
 Their fear is physical and instinctive
 shrinking from hurt, shock and the 1 unknown, when instinct obtains the
 mastery only through surprise, or l through a man being excessively self
 centered It is not the fear of death l rationally considered: but an irration- 1 al physical instinct which all men 1 possess, but which almost all can con- 1 trol.