the case. I do not know whether the animals persist after they disappear
or not. I do not even know whether the infinite difference between us
and them may not be compensated by THEIR persistence and MY cessation
after apparent death, just as the humble bulb of an annual lives, while
the glorious flowers it has put forth die away.

Surely it must be plain that an ingenious man could speculate without
end on both sides, and find analogies for all his dreams. Nor does it
help me to tell me that the aspirations of mankind--that my own highest
aspirations even--lead me towards the doctrine of immortality. I doubt
the fact, to begin with, but if it be so even, what is this but in grand
words asking me to believe a thing because I like it.

Science has taught to me the opposite lesson. She warns me to be careful
how I adopt a view which jumps with my preconceptions, and to require
stronger evidence for such belief than for one to which I was previously
hostile.

My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact,
not to try and make facts harmonise with my aspirations.

Science seems to me to teach in the highest and strongest manner the
great truth which is embodied in the Christian conception of entire
surrender to the will of God. Sit down before fact as a little child, be
prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever
and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing. I have
only begun to learn content and peace of mind since I have resolved at
all risks to do this.

There are, however, other arguments commonly brought forward in favour