IMMORTALITY is the continued existence of the human soul in a future and invisi ble state. " If a man die, shall he live again?" is a question which has naturally agi tated the heart and stimulated the. intellectual curiosity of man, wherever he has risen above a state of barbarism,. and commenced to exercise his intellect at all. The religion of all civilized peoples may he said more or less to-recognize the affirmative of the question,* although often under very vague and materialistic forms. In the ancient Egyptian religion the idea of immortality first assumes a definite shape. There is a clear recognition of a dwelling-place of the dead and of a future judgment. Osiris, the beneficent god, judges the dead, and "having weighed their heart in the scales of jus tice, he sends the wicked to regions of darkness, while the just are sent to dwell with the god of light." The latter, we read c:- an inscription, `• found favor before the great God; they dwell in glory, where they live a heavenly life; the bodies they have quitted will forever repose in their tombs, whilst they rejoice in the life of the supreme God." Immortality is plainly taught, but bound up with the idea of the preservation of the body, to which the Egyptians attached great importance, as a condition of the soul's continued life; and hence they built vast tombs, and embalmed their bodies, as if to last forever. In the Zoroastrian religion the future world, with its governing spirits, plays a prominent part. Under Ormuz and Ahriman there are ranged regular hierarchies of spirits engaged in a perpetual conflict; and the soul passes into the kingdom of light or of darkness, over which these spirits respectively preside, according as it has lived on the earth well or ill. Whoever has lived in purity, and has not suffered the (Ulm (evil spirits) to have any power over him, passes after death into the realms of light. In the early Grecian paganism hades, or the realms of the dead, is the emblem of gloom to the Hellenic imagination. "Achilles, the ideal hero, declares that he would rather till the ground than live in pale elysium." This melancholy view of the future every where pervades the Homeric religion. With the progress of Hellenic thought a higher idea of the future is found to characterize both the poetry and philosophy of Greece, till, in the Platonic Socrates, the conception of immortality shines forth with a clear ness and precision truly impressive. In the Apology and the Phado Socrates discourses
of the doctrine of the soul's immortality, iu language at once rich in faith and in beauty. " The soul, the immaterial part, being of a nature so superior to the body, can it," lie asks in the Phcedo, soon as it is separated from the body, be dispersed into nothing, and perish? Oh, far otherwise. Rather will this be the result. If it take its departure in a state of purity, not carrying with it any clinging impurities of the body, impurities which during life it never willingly shared in, but always avoided, gathering itself into itself, and making the separation from the body its aim and 'study—that is, devoting itself to true philosophy, and studying how to die calmly; for this is true philosophy, is it not?—well, then, so prepared, the soul departh into that invisible region which is of its own nature, the region of the divine, the immortal, the wise, and then its lot is to be happy in a state in which it is freed from fears and wild desires, and the other evils of humanity, and spends the rest of its existence with the gods." It is only in Christianity, however, that_ this higher life is clearly revealed as a reward not merely to the true philosopher, but to every humble and pious soul. Christ " bath brought life and immortality to light by the gospel." " According to his abun dant mercy, God hash begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven." It is undoubtedly owing to Christianity that the doctrine of the soul's immortality has become a common and mere result of speculation, nor product of priestly invention—but a light to the reason, and a guide to the conscience and conduct. The aspirations of philosophy, and the concep tions of mythology, are found in the gospel transmuted into an authoritative influence, governing and directing the present life.