No More Learning

_III. --Of Mind and Soul and Death_

Mind and soul are portions of the body. While mind is the ruling
element, they are both of the nature of the body--only they are
composed of exceedingly minute and subtle atoms capable of marvellous
speed. Therefore, when death deprives the body of mind and soul, it
does not make the body appreciably lighter.

It is as if a wine had lost its scent,
Or breath of some sweet perfume had escaped.

Mind and soul consist of spirit, air, heat, and an elusive fourth
constituent, the nimblest and subtlest of essences, the very "soul of
the soul. " It follows that mind and soul are mortal. Among many proofs
may be adduced their close interconnection with the body, as seen
in cases of drunkenness and epilepsy; their curability by medicine;
their inability to recall a state prior to their incarnation;
their liability to be influenced by heredity like corporeal seeds.
Besides, why should an immortal soul need to quit the body at death?
Decay surely could not hurt immortality! Then, again, imagine souls
contending for homes in a body about to be born! Consequently, the
soul being mortal, death has no sting.

To us, then, death is nothing--matters naught,
Since mortal is the nature of the mind,
E'en as in bygone time we felt no grief
When Punic conflict hemmed all Rome around.
When, rent by war's dread turbulence, the world
Shuddered and quaked beneath the heaven's high realm,
So when we are no more, when soul and frame
Of which we are compact, have been divorced,
Be sure, to us, who then shall be no more,
Naught can occur or ever make us feel,
Not e'en though earth were blent with sea and sky.

Men in general forget that death, in ending life's pleasures, also
ends the need and the desire for them.
"Soon shall thy home greet thee in joy no more,
Nor faithful wife nor darling children run
To snatch first kiss, and stir within thy heart
Sweet thoughts too deep for words. Thou canst no more
Win wealth by working or defend thine own.
The pity of it! One fell hour," they say,
"Hath robbed thee of thine every prize in life. "
Hereat they add not this: "And now thou art
Beset with yearning for such things no more. "

The dead are to be envied, not lamented. The wise will exclaim: "Thou,
O dead, art free from pain: we who survive are full of tears. "

"What is so passing bitter," we should ask,
"If life be rounded by a rest and sleep,
That one should pine in never-ending grief? "

Universal nature has a rebuke for the coward that is afraid to die.
There are no punishments beyond. Hell and hell's tortures are in this
life. It is the victim of passion or of gnawing cares that is the real
victim of torment.


_IV--The World's Origin and Its Growth_

Not by design did primal elements
Find each their place as 'twere with forethought keen,
Nor bargained what their movements were to be;
But since the atom host in many ways
Smitten by blows for infinite ages back,
And by their weight impelled, have coursed along,
Have joined all ways, and made full test of all
The types which mutual unions could create,
Therefore it is that through great time dispersed,
With every kind of blend and motion tried,
They meet at length in momentary groups
Which oft prove rudiments of mighty things--
Of earth, and sea, and sky, and living breeds.

Amidst this primeval medley of warring atoms there was no sun-disk to
be discerned climbing the vault, no stars, or sea, or sky, or earth,
or air--nothing, in fact, like what now exists. The next stage came
when the several parts began to fly asunder, and like to join with
like, so that the parts of the world were gradually differentiated.
Heavier bodies combined in central chaos and forced out lighter
elements to make ether.