On A Future State - Page 2

satisfies no person,
and cuts the knot which we now seek to untie. Moreover, should it
be proved, on the other hand, that the mysterious principle which
regulates the proceedings of the universe, is neither intelligent
nor sensitive, yet it is not an inconsistency to suppose at the
same time, that the animating power survives the body which it
has animated, by laws as independent of any supernatural agent as
those through which it first became united with it. Nor, if a future
state be clearly proved, does it follow that it will be a state of
punishment or reward.

By the word death, we express that condition in which natures
resembling ourselves apparently cease to be that which they were.
We no longer hear them speak, nor see them move. If they have
sensations and apprehensions, we no longer participate in them.
We know no more than that those external organs, and all that fine
texture of material frame, without which we have no experience that
life or thought can subsist, are dissolved and scattered abroad.
The body is placed under the earth, and after a certain period there
remains no vestige even of its form. This is that contemplation
of inexhaustible melancholy, whose shadow eclipses the brightness
of the world. The common observer is struck with dejection at the
spectacle. He contends in vain against the persuasion of the grave,
that the dead indeed cease to be. The corpse at his feet is prophetic
of his own destiny. Those who have preceded him, and whose voice
was delightful to his ear; whose touch met his like sweet and subtle
fire; whose aspect spread a visionary light upon his path--these
he cannot meet again. The organs of sense are destroyed, and the
intellectual operations dependent on them have perished with their
sources. How can a corpse see or feel? its eyes are eaten out, and
its heart is black and without motion. What intercourse can two
heaps of putrid clay and crumbling bones hold together? When you
can discover where the fresh colours of the faded flower abide,
or the music of the broken lyre, seek life among the dead. Such
are the anxious and fearful contemplations of the common observer,
though the popular religion often prevents him from confessing them
even to himself.

The natural philosopher, in addition to the sensations common
to all men inspired by the event of death, believes that he sees
with more certainty that it is attended with the annihilation of
sentiment and thought. He observes the mental powers increase and
fade with those of the body, and even accommodate themselves to
the most transitory changes of our physical nature. Sleep suspends
many of the faculties of the vital and intellectual principle;
drunkenness and disease will either