Class 
 
 Book 
 
 Copyright N^. 
 
 Ci2FmiGHT DSPOSm 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 AN ANTHOLOGY ON 
 HEROIC DEATH AND IMMORTAL LIFE 
 
 COMPILED BY 
 
 JOHN HAYNES HOLMES 
 
 AND 
 
 LILLIAN BROWNE-OLF 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 
 1919 
 

 COPTBIGHT, 1919 
 
 By DODD, mead AND COMPANY, Inc. 
 
 K9V ) 8 1919 
 
 VAIL-BALLOU COMPANT 
 
 BINOHAMTOH AND NE« TOMI 
 
 ©CI.A535752 
 
TO THOSE IN EVERY LAND 
 
 WHO MOURN THEIR DEAD 
 
 MARTYRED 
 
 IN THE GREAT WAR 
 
 TfflS BOOK IS REVERENTLY DEDICATED 
 
From Life to Death! 
 
 An eager breath, 
 A battle for the true and good^ 
 An agony upon the rood; 
 
 A darkening of the light — 
 And night! 
 
 From Death to Life! 
 A peace from strife; 
 A voyage o'er an ocean wide 
 That moves from shore to shore its tide; 
 A passing of the night — 
 And light! 
 
 J. H, H. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The general plan of this Anthology was conceived by me 
 in the summer of 1918. It was at this time, it will be re- 
 membered, that the menace of the German assault upon the 
 West was shaking not merely Europe but the world to its 
 foundations; and the tide of misery and horror, incident 
 to the gigantic struggle, had mounted to the full. Upper- 
 most in all men's minds at that terrific moment, of course, 
 was the fate of civilization, and the doom which seemed to 
 be falling upon all things deemed precious. Deep down, 
 however, beneath this living consciousness of battle and 
 siege, of tottering thrones and shaking systems, of revolu- 
 tions, turmoils, " chaos and black night," were the agonies 
 silently endured by each one of numberless millions of 
 human hearts the world around, as they contemplated the 
 peril, and soon or late met the loss, of persons who bore 
 into the struggle, as husbands, fathers, sons, lovers, all that 
 made life worth the living, and victory in the battle a mat- 
 ter of concern. John Galsworthy, in Saint's Progress, 
 presents a pathetic picture of the sleep of London on any 
 night during the period of the War. " Here a mother would 
 be whispering the name of her boy . . . and a wife would 
 be turning, to stretch out her arms to — no one; ... By 
 thousands the bereaved would be tossing, stifling their 
 moans; by thousands the ruined would be gazing into the 
 dark future. . . ." It is probable that most people felt the 
 Great War only in this intense personal way, for most of 
 
 vli 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 us, after all, live in the realm not of ideas or institutions 
 at all, but of individual human relations. And this feeling 
 touched such depths of passion, in such myriads of hearts, 
 at the climactic moments of 1918, as never before had been 
 equalled in human history. 
 
 For nearly four years, death had been reaping an un- 
 imaginable harvest by battle, starvation and disease. In 
 these dreadful summer months, the flood of destruction was 
 climbing to heights unseen by man in his most dreadful 
 dreams of world disaster. Death was become the order of 
 the day — untimely death, unnecessary death, horrible 
 death! By a slow turning of life, on the axis of the War, 
 so to speak, the modern man found the frontage of his 
 experience exactly reversed from all that he had ever known, 
 or anticipated. By precept, by example, by the inner 
 promptings of his own soul, he had been taught to welcome 
 life, and use it to the uttermost. Now, however, he saw 
 life suddenly engulfed by death, and after-death! What is 
 it to die, and to what does dying bring us — these were be- 
 come, through the vast cataclysm of universal war, the 
 dominant personal questions of the hour ; and to the average 
 man, the answer to these questions was more important than 
 answers to all the gigantic questions that beset the minds 
 of generals, statesmen and philosophers. To find this an- 
 swer, would be perhaps to perform an inestimable service 
 for the comforting and strengthening of many hearts. And 
 where could this answer be more certainly found than in the 
 utterances of the great and good in ages past, and of some 
 of the humble but very valiant who were living and dying 
 greatly at this great moment? It was in this thought that 
 the idea of this Anthology was conceived, and work upon 
 its pages happily begun. 
 
 On November 11, 1918, came the Armistice, which seemed 
 to end the occasion for this book. Work, therefore, was 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 halted, in anticipation of the abandonment of the plan. 
 Then came the realization that while the Armistice un- 
 doubtedly had made the fighting on the battlefield to cease, 
 it had worked, and could work, no such miracle upon the 
 sorrows, perplexities, and blind despairs which this fighting 
 through more than fifty months had accumulated in men's 
 hearts. The problem of death and after-death was with us, 
 as it had been always. From the moment that Cain felled 
 Abel, man has found himself confronted by the black mys- 
 tery of dying, of being and not being, of mortality and im- 
 mortality. The War, after all, had not created a new 
 problem; it had only intensified an old one. It had not 
 raised up something which began and ended with itself; on 
 the contrary, it had only brought momentarily into the cen- 
 tre of the present picture, so to speak, that which had been 
 from the beginning, and which would be till the end of time. 
 An anthology of heroic death and immortal life, therefore, 
 must have a permanent interest and value. It might be 
 occasioned, but certainly could not be bounded by, the War. 
 So the work was resumed; and now, with the battle long 
 since ended, and the fighting done, is presented to those who 
 seek comfort and inspiration on these high themes. 
 
 II 
 
 The preparation of an anthology involves a twofold prob- 
 lem — that of the selection and the arrangement of material. 
 
 Selection in this case promptly opened up so tremendous 
 a task, that it is doubtful if my collaborator and I would 
 have had the courage to undertake this book, had we known 
 what was before us. The material readily accessible on our 
 chosen themes was embarrassingly abundant. That which 
 could be made available by systematic research, was prac- 
 tically inexhaustible. A volume giving any adequate sur- 
 vey of the field would run to many hundreds of pages and 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 include many thousands of quotations, and even then in- 
 volve a rigorous process of elimination. But our intent 
 from the beginning was to produce an anthology which 
 should be small in compass, conveniently handled and easily 
 read, a book to be loved as scripture rather than consulted 
 as a dictionary or encyclopedia. We were moved, that is 
 to say, by emotional considerations; our desire was to give 
 not knowledge so much as inspiration. This end was best 
 furthered by the plan adopted by Robert Bridges, in his 
 rarely beautiful book. The Spirit of Man, rather than by 
 that adopted by E. C. Stedman in his exceedingly useful 
 American Anthology — to present not an accumulation but 
 a distillation of the ideas which have been characteristic of 
 the highest thought of man on the mysteries of death and 
 life eternal. Such a purpose vastly increased the difficulty 
 of our task, for even the essence extracted was more than 
 could be contained in our chosen vessel. Therefore were 
 we driven to a process of selection which was not only rigor- 
 ous but in some cases arbitrary, and not always satisfac- 
 tory to ourselves. 
 
 Our first task was to gather the passages which were to 
 comprise the content of the Anthology. In doing this, we 
 did not attempt to cover the field. We simply entered those 
 areas which were familiar to ourselves, and garnered what 
 we knew or felt to be precious. Even so, we found in our 
 hands, when the work was done, more material than we 
 could possibly use in accordance with our plans. This 
 meant a winnowing which resulted in the rejection of nearly 
 a third of all that we had originally collected. These pass- 
 ages were perfectly good in themselves, but they repre- 
 sented an overflow which we could not handle. 
 
 The standards which we employed in this process of 
 selection, are three in number. 
 
 (1) First of all, in the case of each particular quotation, 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 was the consideration of its aptness as an expression of the 
 ideals of heroic death and immortal life. These ideals we 
 had deliberately chosen to be the keynotes of our An- 
 thology, and we were insistent that everything should be in 
 harmony therewith. Many passages, beautiful in them- 
 selves and unquestionably inspiring, were cast aside be- 
 cause they did not embody the exact conceptions which we 
 had in mind. 
 
 (2) Secondly, there was the question of the literary qual- 
 ity of our material. This we desired, and in most cases 
 insisted, should be of the highest. Some passages were 
 finally admitted to our pages which are devoid of literary 
 distinction or beauty, because they give important expres- 
 sion to our chosen themes through association with great 
 names or epochs of history. These, however, are excep- 
 tions, and are few in number. The bulk of the material in 
 this volume constitutes what we, at least, regard as liter- 
 ature. 
 
 (3) Lastly, there was that indefinite, intangible question 
 of tone, or attitude, which my collaborator and I regarded 
 as in some ways the most important of all our standards. 
 Through much of the writing that has to do with death and 
 immortality there runs the taint of insipidity. In every 
 collection of material on these subjects which I personally 
 have seen — and as a clergyman I have seen, and used, a 
 good many ! — the prevailing note is at the best that of 
 intelligent piety, and at the worst that of mawkish senti- 
 mentality. In this field, if in none other, the sanctimonious 
 Sunday School literature of two or three generations ago, 
 is still with us. Such maudlin stuff we have sought abso- 
 lutely to avoid. Through this Anthology, like fresh breezes 
 from the "hills whence cometh (our) strength," there blow, 
 we trust, the winds of courage and acclaim. Robustness, 
 virility, heroic cheer, tenderness not inconsistent with valour. 
 
xii PREFACE 
 
 high vision controlled by reason and suffused with poetry — 
 this is the note, or attitude, which we have desired that the 
 material in this book should invariably express. Our An- 
 thology will fulfil no small part of its purpose, if it teaches 
 its readers that the atmosphere of death may be as healthful 
 as that of life. 
 
 Our quotations selected, there came a further application 
 of the sifting process in the problem of what part, or parts, 
 of each particular quotation, we should use. Again with 
 the idea of confining our material within the smallest pos- 
 sible space, we have reproduced from our various sources 
 of prose and poetry, the shortest passages which could be 
 made consistent with completeness of thought and beauty 
 of expression. Setting down nothing as it was not written, 
 we have yet eliminated all that seemed to be in any way 
 extraneous to our chosen themes. We have sought to skim 
 off what from our viewpoint was the cream of each quota- 
 tion selected for inclusion, and thus fill our book with the 
 richest possible material. We realize that to many persons 
 this method of excision will seem inexcusable. To such we 
 simply reply that it is our method; and ask that it be ac- 
 cepted as a chosen condition of our task, and judged from 
 the standpoint of the skill and taste displayed in its ac- 
 complishment. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The preparation of an anthology, as we have seen, in- 
 volves not only the selection, but also the arrangement of 
 material. We doubt if anybody, who has not actually 
 undertaken the work, can realize what it means to arrange 
 material with which one has grown inordinately familiar 
 through the task of selection. When perfectly done, as in 
 Palgrave's Golden Treasury, arrangement becomes as in- 
 visible a thing as the air. When imperfectly done, it seems 
 
PREFACE xiii 
 
 to be a condition of the inevitable limitation of the task 
 attempted. In both cases, the difficulties involved are 
 hidden from the consciousness of those who see the finished 
 product and not the structural process. 
 
 Chronology is of course the obvious, and the most com- 
 mon, method of arranging such material as my collaborator 
 and I have gathered. This method, however, we abandoned 
 altogether in Part I of this Anthology; and utilized only in 
 rough outline form in Part II. Our desire throughout was 
 to have the matter of arrangement determined not so much 
 by dates, or even by subjects, as by feeling. Dates, of 
 course, have played their role, as in Part II; subjects have 
 worked their influence, as in Part I. But we shall be dis- 
 appointed if some few readers, sensitive to the emotions 
 which we have felt and tried to convey in the making of 
 this book, do not catch some view at least of what has con- 
 trolled us in this matter of arrangement. I know of no 
 more definite way of expressing it, than to refer to what 
 the musician calls " the melodic line " in the orchestral 
 score of a symphony or opera. No matter how numerous 
 the themes or how complicated their development, there 
 runs unbroken through every great musical composition, 
 like a trail through a forest, "the melodic line." This is 
 the song which the musician is singing, adorned with a 
 wilderness of notes and chords, now major, now minor, 
 now rising to clear sonorous heights, now submerged in 
 stormy sound, but always pursuing its course, and always 
 clearly felt by the heart that understands. Through this 
 book we have tried, as best we could, to create a " melodic 
 line." We fear that it is broken at times by the fact that 
 we were engaged not in singing our own song but in blend- 
 ing the songs that have been sung by others. But when 
 broken, it is quickly recovered, and never at any time, we 
 believe, wholly lost. It is this, at any rate, which has been 
 
xiv PREFACE 
 
 the motif of our arrangement; and by this, it must be 
 judged. 
 
 IV 
 
 In closing, I must bear testimony to the inspiration in- 
 volved in the preparation of this book. If our readers de- 
 rive a fraction of the comfort and strength from reading it, 
 which we have derived from compiling it, the Anthology 
 will be indeed as a volume of holy scripture. 
 
 Valiant is the heart of man. Set in a world whose 
 bounds he cannot trace — armed with puny hands and 
 brain, to do battle against the gigantic forces of sky and 
 sea and earth — beset behind and before by the twin mys- 
 teries of birth and death — knowing only the unknowable, 
 searching only the unsearchable, living only to die — man 
 has stood erect as one lifted by God's hand, and has moved 
 ever onward, through centuries of unspeakable pain, fear 
 and frustration, with unconquerable courage and unquench- 
 able faith. It is impossible to read however imperfect a 
 record of man's thoughts on death and after, as written 
 from earliest to latest times, without confessing that there is 
 indeed an undying fire of the divine within us, and bowing 
 in adoration before it. Especially is this true of the testi- 
 mony which has been coming to us from brave young 
 hearts, in the filth of the trenches, in the icy wastes of the 
 sea, even in the vast spaces of the air, during these years 
 of the world's blackest tragedy and most awful agony. 
 This Anthology is throughout profoundly eloquent of 
 spiritual faith, but nowhere more so than in those poems 
 at the opening and the close, telling of death met bravely 
 and immortality anticipated surely, which have been written 
 by the youthful soldiers of the Great War. Something 
 there is within man or above him, that makes him greater 
 than himself, stronger than the universe, mightier than the 
 mysteries which always challenge, and sometimes beat him 
 
PREFACE XV 
 
 downward, to despair. Man, in his fronting of death and 
 his dream of immortality, is all that we need, after all, to 
 teach us of God. The soul is its own best testimony to the 
 everlasting reality of religion. 
 
 Acknowledgments are due in this place, first of all, to 
 my collaborator and dear friend, Mrs. Lillian Browne-Olf. 
 Without her untiring labour, this book could never have been 
 prepared; to her fine literary taste is due much of such 
 merit as it may possess. The volume is hers quite as much 
 as mine. We offer it together as our common handiwork. 
 
 I would also give sincere thanks to my secretaries. Miss 
 Mary C. Baker and Miss Mary Andrews, for their indis- 
 pensable assistance and interest. I am grateful also to our 
 publishers for their patience while the work was proceed- 
 ing, and their appreciation when it was done. 
 
 Acknowledgments and thanks to publishers and authors, 
 who have generously permitted the use of copyrighted ma- 
 terial, are set down in the Appendix. 
 
 July 1,1919. J.H. H. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Dedication v 
 
 Preface vii 
 
 Part I — Heroic Death 1 
 
 Part II — Immortal Life 97 
 
 Appendix 281 
 
 Sources 281 
 
 Acknowledgments , . 292 
 
 Index 297 
 
PART I 
 HEROIC DEATH 
 
Man with his burning soul 
 Has but an hour of breath 
 To build a ship of truth 
 In which his soul may sail — 
 Sail on the sea of death. 
 For death takes toll 
 Of beauty, courage, youth. 
 Of all but truth . . . 
 
 John Masefield 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 HEROIC DEATH 
 
 Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he 
 That every man in arms should wish to be? 
 It is the generous Spirit who, when brought 
 Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought 
 Upon the plan that pleased his boyish thought: 
 Whose high endeavours are an inward light 
 That makes the path before him always bright: . . 
 Who, doomed to go in company with Pain, 
 And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train! 
 Turns his necessity to glorious gain; 
 In face of these doth exercise a power 
 Which is our human nature's highest dower; 
 Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves 
 Of their bad influence, and their good receives: 
 . . . Who, if he be called upon to face 
 Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined 
 Great issues, good or bad for human kind. 
 Is happy as a Lover; and attired 
 With sudden brightness, like a Man inspired; 
 And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law 
 In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw; 
 Or if an unexpected call succeed. 
 Come when it will, is equal to the need: . . . 
 Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth 
 For ever, and to noble deeds give birth, 
 3 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Or he must fall, to sleep without his fame, 
 And leave a dead unprofitable name — 
 Finds comfort in himself and in his cause; 
 And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws 
 His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause: 
 This is the happy Warrior; this is He 
 That every Man in arms should wish to be. 
 
 William Wordsworth 
 
 With what kinds of death does the brave man have to 
 do? Is it with the most honourable? But those that occur 
 in war are of this kind, for in war the danger is the great- 
 est and most honourable. The public honours that are 
 awarded in states and by monarchs attest this. Properly, 
 then, he who in the case of an honourable death, and under 
 circumstances close at hand which cause death, is fearless, 
 may be called courageous; and the dangers of war are, 
 more than any others, of this description. 
 
 Aristotle 
 
 They truly live who yield their lives fighting against 
 the foe in the fierce battle amid the flash of swords and 
 the whirling of the spear . . . 
 
 South Indian Tamil Book of Poems 
 
 Not dead but living ye are to account all those who are 
 slain in the way of God. 
 
 Mohammed 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 . . . And Hector's woe, 
 What is it? He is gone, and all men know 
 His glory, and how true a heart he bore. . . . 
 
 Would ye he wise, ye cities, fly from war! 
 Yet if war come, there is a crown in death 
 For him that striveth well and perisheth 
 Unstained: to die in evil were the stain! 
 Therefore, mother, pity not thy slain. 
 
 Euripides 
 6 
 
 Eteocles, his country's friend, shall find 
 Due burial in its friendly bosom. . . . 
 [He] died the champion of his country's cause. 
 As generous youths should die . . . 
 
 Aeschylus 
 7 
 
 Of those who at Thermopylae were slain, 
 
 Glorious the doom, and beautiful the lot; 
 Their tomb an altar: men from tears refrain 
 
 To honour them, and praise, but mourn them not. 
 Such sepulchre, nor drear decay 
 
 Nor all-destroying time shall waste; this right have they. 
 Within their grave the home-bred glory 
 
 Of Greece was laid; this witness gives 
 Leonidas the Spartan, in whose story 
 
 A wreath of famous virtue ever lives. 
 
 — Simonides of Ceos 
 8 
 
 Count Roland in pain and woe and great weakness blew 
 his horn. The bright blood was running from his mouth, 
 
6 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 and the temples of his brain were broken. . . . And [he] 
 said, " Here we shall receive martyrdom, and now I know 
 well that we have but a moment to live. But may all be 
 thieves who do not sell themselves dearly first. Strike, 
 knights, with your bright swords; so change your deaths 
 and lives that sweet France be not shamed by us. . . ." 
 
 The Song of Roland 
 
 ... I have thus spoken concerning the city ... to es- 
 tablish on a firm foundation the eulogy of those of whom I 
 will now speak — the greater part of their praises being 
 hereby delivered. . . . There was none of these who, prefer- 
 ring the further enjoyment of his wealth, was thereby grown 
 cowardly. . . . They fled from shame, but with their bodies 
 they stood out the battle; and so, in a moment big with 
 fate it was from their glory, rather than from their fear 
 that they passed away .... Such were these men, worthy of 
 their country: and for you that remain, you may pray for 
 a safer fortune; but you ought to be no less venturously 
 minded against the foe: not weighing the profit . . . but 
 contemplating the power of Athens, in her constant activity, 
 and thereby becoming enamoured of her. And when she 
 shall appear great to you, consider then that her glories 
 were purchased by valiant men, and by men that learned 
 their duty ... by such men as, though they failed in their 
 attempt, yet would not be wanting to the city with their 
 virtue, but made unto it a most honourable contribution. 
 And having each one given his body to the commonwealth, 
 they receive instead thereof a most remarkable sepulchre, 
 not that wherein they are buried so much as that other 
 wherein their glory is laid up, on all occasions both of word 
 and deed, to be remembered evermore; . . . and their vir- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 7 
 
 tues shall be testified not only by the inscription in stone 
 at home, but in all lands wheresoever in the unwritten 
 record of the mind, which far beyond any monument will 
 remain with all men everlastingly. 
 
 Thucydides {Speech of Pericles) 
 
 10 
 
 Brave hearts! to Britain's pride 
 
 Once so faithful and so true, 
 
 On the deck of fame that died; — 
 
 With the gallant good Riou; 
 
 Soft sigh the winds of Heaven o'er their grave! 
 
 While the billow mournful rolls 
 
 And the mermaid's song condoles, 
 
 Singing glory to the souls 
 
 Of the brave. 
 
 Thomas Campbell 
 
 11 
 
 How sleep the brave who sink to rest, 
 By all their country's wishes blest! 
 When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, 
 Returns to deck their hallow'd mould, 
 She there shall dress a sweeter sod 
 Than Fancy's feet have ever trod. 
 
 By fairy hands their knell is rung, 
 By forms unseen their dirge is sung; 
 There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray, 
 To bless the turf that wraps their clay, 
 And Freedom shall awhile repair 
 To dwell, a weeping hermit, there! 
 
 William Collins 
 
8 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 12 
 
 . . . Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than mine: 
 Yet one I would select from that proud throng, 
 Partly because they blend me with his line, 
 And partly that I did his sire some wrong, 
 And partly that bright names will hallow song; 
 And his was of the bravest, and when showered 
 The death-bolts deadliest the thinn'd files along. 
 Even where the thickest of war's tempest lower'd. 
 They reach'd no nobler breast than thine, young gallant 
 Howard. . . . 
 
 Lord Byron 
 13 
 
 You know, we French stormed Ratisbon: 
 
 A mile or so away 
 On a little mound. Napoleon 
 
 Stood on our storming-day; 
 With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 
 
 Legs wide, arms locked behind. 
 As if to balance the prone brow 
 
 Oppressive with its mind. 
 
 Just as perhaps he mused " My plans 
 
 That soar, to earth may fall. 
 Let once my army-leader Lannes 
 
 Waver at yonder wall " — 
 Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 
 
 A rider, bound on boimd 
 Full-galloping; nor bridle drew 
 
 Until he reached the mound. 
 
 Then off there flung in smiling joy, 
 And held himself erect 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 By just his horse's mane, a boy: 
 
 You hardly could suspect — 
 (So tight he kept his lips compressed, 
 
 Scarce any blood came through) 
 You looked twice ere you saw his breast 
 
 Was all but shot in two. 
 
 " Well," cried he, " Emperor, by God's grace 
 
 We've got you Ratisbon! 
 The Marshal's in the market-place, 
 
 And you'll be there anon 
 To see your flag-bird flap his vans 
 
 Where I, to heart's desire. 
 Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed; his plans 
 
 Soared up again like fire. 
 
 The chief's eye flashed; but presently 
 
 Softened itself, as sheathes 
 A film the mother-eagle's eye 
 
 When her bruised eaglet breathes; 
 " You're wounded ! " " Nay," the soldier's pride 
 
 Touched to the quick, he said: 
 " I'm killed. Sire ! " And his chief beside, 
 
 Smiling, the boy fell dead. 
 
 Robert Browning 
 
 14 
 
 Crouched in the sea fog on the moaning sand 
 All night he lay, speaking some simple word 
 From hour to hour to the slow minds that heard, 
 Holding each poor life gently in his hand 
 And breathing on the base rejected clay 
 Till each dark face shone mystical and grand 
 
10 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Against the breaking day; 
 And lo, the shard the potter cast away 
 Was grown a fiery chalice crystal-fine 
 Fulfilled of the divine 
 
 Great wine of battle wrath by God's ring-finger stirred. 
 Then upward, where the shadowy bastion loomed 
 Huge on the mountain in the wet sea light, 
 Whence now, and now, infernal flowerage bloomed, 
 Bloomed, burst, and scattered down its deadly seed — 
 They swept, and died like freemen on the height, 
 Like freemen, and like men of noble breed; 
 And when the battle fell away at night 
 By hasty and contemptuous hands were thrust 
 Obscurely in a common grave with him 
 The fair-haired keeper of their love and trust. 
 Now limb doth mingle with dissolved limb 
 In nature's busy old democracy 
 To flush the mountain laurel when she blows 
 Sweet by the southern sea, 
 
 And heart with crumbled heart climbs in the rose. . . . 
 
 William Vaughan Moody 
 
 15 
 
 . . . Brave, good and true, 
 
 I see him stand before me now. 
 
 And read again on that young brow, 
 
 Where every hope was new, 
 How sweet were life! Yet, by the mouth firm-set, 
 And look made up for Duty's utmost debt, 
 
 I could divine he knew, 
 That death within the sulphurous hostile lines, 
 In the mere wreck of nobly pitched designs, 
 
 Plucks heart's-ease, and not rue. . . . 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 11 
 
 Right in the van, 
 On the red rampart's slippery swell. 
 With heart that beat a charge, he fell 
 
 Forward, as fits a man; 
 But the high soul burns on to light men's feet 
 Where death for noble ends makes dying sweet; 
 
 His life her crescent span 
 Orbs full with share in their undarkening days 
 Who ever climbed the battailous steeps of praise 
 
 Since valour's praise began. . . . 
 
 James Russell Lowell 
 
 16 
 
 . . . Salute the sacred dead. 
 
 Who went and who return not. — Say not so! ... 
 
 We rather seem the dead, that stayed behind. 
 
 Blow, trumpets, all your exultations blow! 
 
 For never shall their aureoled presence lack . . . 
 
 They come transfigured back. 
 Secure from change in their high-hearted ways. 
 Beautiful evermore, and with the rays 
 Of morn on the white shields of Expectation. 
 
 James Russell Lowell 
 
 17 
 
 Fall, stream, from Heaven to bless; return as well; 
 So did our sons; Heaven met them as they fell. ^ 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson 
 
 18 
 
 In an age of fops and toys, 
 Wanting wisdom, void of right, 
 
 1 Inscription for a well in memory of the martyrs of the Civil War. 
 
12 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Who shall nerve heroic boys 
 
 To hazard all in Freedom's fight — 
 
 Break sharply ojBf their jolly games, 
 
 Forsake their comrades gay 
 
 And quit proud homes and youthful dames 
 
 For famine, toil and fray? 
 
 Yet on the nimble air benign 
 
 Speed nimbler messages. 
 
 That waft the breath of grace divine 
 
 To hearts in sloth and ease. 
 
 So nigh is grandeur to our dust, 
 
 So near is God to man. 
 
 When duty whispers low. Thou must. 
 
 The youth replies, / can. 
 
 O, well for the fortunate soul 
 
 Which Music's wings infold. 
 
 Stealing away the memory 
 
 Of sorrows new and old! 
 
 Yet happier he whose inward sight, 
 
 Stayed on his subtile thought. 
 
 Shuts his sense on toys of time, 
 
 To vacant bosoms brought. 
 
 But best befriended of the God 
 
 He who, in evil times, 
 
 Warned by an inward voice. 
 
 Heeds not the darkness and the dread, 
 
 Biding by his rule and choice. 
 
 Feeling only the fiery thread 
 
 Leading over heroic ground. 
 
 Walled with mortal terror round. 
 
 To the aim which him allures, 
 
 And the sweet heaven his deed secures. 
 
 Peril around, all else appalling, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 13 
 
 Cannon in front and leaden rain, 
 Him duty through the clarion calling 
 To the van called not in vain. 
 
 Stainless soldier on the walls, 
 Knowing this — and knows no more — 
 Whoever fights, whoever falls, 
 Justice conquers evermore. 
 Justice after as before — 
 And he who battles on her side, 
 God, though he were ten times slain, 
 Crowns him victor glorified, 
 Victor over death and pain. 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson 
 
 19 
 
 young men tliat shed your blood with so generous 
 a joy for the starving eartli! heroism of the world! 
 What a harvest of destruction to reap under this splendid 
 summer sun ! Young men of all nations, brought into con- 
 flict by a common ideal, making enemies of those who 
 should be brothers; all of you, marching to your death, 
 are dear to me. Slavs, hastening to the aid of your race; 
 Englishmen fighting for honour and right; intrepid Bel- 
 gians who dared to oppose the Teutonic colossus, and 
 defend against him the Thermopylae of the West; Ger- 
 mans fighting to defend the philosophy and the birthplace 
 of Kant against the Cossack avalanche; and you, above 
 all, my young compatriots, in whom the generation of 
 heroes of the Revolution lives again; you, who for years 
 have confided your dreams to me, and now, on the verge 
 of battle, bid me a sublime farewell. ... my friends, 
 may nothing mar your joy! Whatever fate has in store. 
 
14 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 you have risen to the pinnacle of earthly life. . . . And 
 you will be victorious. Your self-sacrifice, your courage, 
 your whole-hearted faith in your sacred cause ... all this 
 assures me of your victory, young armies of the Marne 
 and Meuse, whose names are graven henceforth in history 
 by the side of your elders of the Great Republic. Yet 
 even had misfortune decreed that you should be vanquished 
 ... no people could have aspired to a more noble death. 
 . . . Conquerors or conquered, living or dead, rejoice! 
 
 Romain Rolland 
 
 20 
 
 Ship after ship, crammed with soldiers, moved slowly 
 out of the harbour, in the lovely day, and felt again the 
 heave of the sea. No such gathering of fine ships has 
 ever been seen upon the earth, and the beauty and exalta- 
 tion of the youth upon them made them like sacred things 
 as they moved away. . . . These men had come from all 
 parts of the British world. . . . They had said good-bye to 
 home that they might offer their lives in the cause we 
 stand for. In a few hours at most, as they well knew, per- 
 haps a tenth of them, would have looked their last on the 
 sun, and be a part of foreign earth or dumb things that the 
 tides push. Many of them would have disappeared for 
 ever from the knowledge of man, blotted from the book of 
 life none would know how; by a fall or a chance shot in 
 the darkness, in the blast of a shell, or alone, like a hurt 
 beast, in some scrub or gully, far from comrades and the 
 English speech and the English singing. And perhaps a 
 third of them would be mangled, blinded or broken, lamed, 
 made imbecile or disfigured, with the colour and the taste 
 of life taken from them, so that they would never move 
 with comrades nor exult in the sun. . . .But as they moved 
 out, these things were but the end they asked, the reward 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 15 
 
 they had come for, the unseen cross upon the breast. All 
 that they felt was a gladness of exultation that their young 
 courage was to be used. They went like Kings in a pageant 
 to the imminent death. 
 
 As they passed from moorings to the man-of-war anchor- 
 age on tlieir way to the sea, their feeling that they had 
 done with life and were going out to something new, welled 
 up in those battalions; they cheered and cheered till the 
 harbour rang with cheering. As each ship crammed with 
 soldiers drew near the battleships, the men swung their 
 caps and cheered again, and the sailors answered, and 
 the noise of cheering swelled, and the men in the ships 
 not yet moving joined in, and the men ashore, till all 
 the life in the harbour was giving thanks that it could go 
 to death rejoicing. All was beautiful in that gladness of 
 men about to die. . . . 
 
 They left the harbour very, very slowly; this tumult 
 of cheering lasted a long time; no one who heard it will 
 ever forget it, or think of it unshaken. It broke the hearts 
 of all there with pity and pride; it went beyond the guard 
 of the English heart. Presently all were out . . . and 
 the sun went down with marvellous colour, lighting island 
 after island, and the Asian peaks, and those left behind 
 in Mudros trimmed their lamps knowing that they had 
 been for a little brought near to the heart of things. 
 
 John Mdsefield 
 
 21 
 
 Lovers of Life! Dreamers with lifted eyes! 
 O Liberty, at thy command we challenge Death! 
 The monuments that show our fathers' faith 
 Shall be the altars of our sacrifice. 
 Dauntless, we fling our lives into the van. 
 
16 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Laughing at Death because within Youth's breast 
 Flame lambent fires of Freedom, man for man 
 We yield to thee our heritage, our best. 
 Life's highest product. Youth, exults in life; 
 We are Olympian Gods in consciousness; 
 Mortality to us is sweet; yet less 
 We value Ease when Honour sounds the strife. 
 Lovers of Life, we pledge thee Liberty 
 And go to death, calmly, triumphantly. 
 
 SeTgt. J, N. Streets 
 
 22 
 
 Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead! 
 There's none of these so lonely and poor of old, 
 But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold. 
 These laid the world away; poured out the red 
 Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be 
 Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, 
 That men call age; and those who would have been, 
 Their sons, they gave their immortality. 
 
 Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth, 
 Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain. 
 Honour has come back, as a king, to earth, 
 And paid his subjects with a royal wage; 
 And Nobleness walks in our ways again; 
 And we have come into our heritage. 
 
 Rupert Brooke 
 
 23 
 
 Now God be thanked Who has matched us with His hour. 
 And caught our youth, and waken'd us from sleeping, 
 
 With hand made sure, clear eye and sharpen'd power, 
 To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 17 
 
 Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary, 
 Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move, 
 
 And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary. 
 And all the little emptiness of love! 
 
 Oh! we who have known shame, we have found release there, 
 Where there's no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending. 
 Nought broken save this body, lost but breath; 
 
 Nothing to shake the laughing heart's long peace there 
 But only agony, and that has ending; 
 
 And the worst friend and enemy is but Death. 
 
 Rupert Brooke 
 
 24 
 
 Come now, Death, 
 While I am proud. 
 While joy and awe are breath 
 And heart beats loud! 
 
 While all around me stand 
 Men that I love. 
 
 The wind blares aloud, the grand 
 Sun wheels above. 
 
 Naked I stand today 
 Before my doom, 
 Welcome what comes my way, 
 Whatever come. 
 
 What is there more to ask 
 Than that I have? — 
 Companions, love, a task, 
 And a deep grave! 
 
18 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Come then, Eternity, 
 
 If thou my lot; 
 
 Having been thus, I cannot be 
 
 As if I had not. 
 
 Naked I wait my doom! 
 Earth enough shroud! 
 Death, in thy narrow room 
 Man may be proud! 
 
 Robert Nichols 
 
 25 
 
 Use me, England, in thine hour of need, 
 Let thy ruling rule me now in deed. 
 
 Thou hast given joyous life and free, 
 Life whose joy now anguisheth for thee. 
 
 Give then, England, if my life thou need. 
 Gift yet fairer, Death, thy life to feed. 
 
 Anonymous 
 
 26 
 
 If I should die while I am yet in France 
 
 Before the battle clouds have rolled away, 
 
 Give me to feel that death will but enhance 
 
 Life's secret vision on its passing day. 
 
 Grant then to me new, individual power 
 
 In reverie, whilst whimsically I trace 
 
 Thro' eager, breathless youth, each pulsing hour, 
 
 The light and shadow on its fading face. 
 
 And in death's soonest minute let me seek j 
 
 Life heightened by new splendour, poise, surprise. 
 
 New colour flushing deep its paling cheek. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 19 
 
 New wonder looking from its tired eyes. 
 Time's brought a rare patine to old Romance — 
 Death has an ancient dignity in France. 
 
 Lieut. Carroll Carstairs 
 
 27 
 
 I am writing you a few lines to say that I am assigned 
 with my company to two French companies to defend an 
 important position (hill) against the expected German of- 
 fensive. My company will be in the first position to resist 
 the tremendous concentration against us, and I do not 
 believe there is a chance of any of us surviving the first 
 rush. I am proud to be trusted with such a post of honour 
 and have the greatest confidence in my own men to do 
 their duty to the end. . . . My company is expected to pro- 
 tect the right flank of the position and to counterattack 
 at sight of first boche. In war some units have to be sacri- 
 ficed for the safety of the rest, and this post has fallen to 
 us and will be executed gladly as one contribution to the 
 final victory. ... I want you in case I am killed to be 
 brave and remember that one could not have wished a 
 better way to die than for a righteous cause and one's 
 country. 
 
 An American Officer (Anonymous) 
 
 28 
 
 ... To go out and risk death, or meet it as we can . . . 
 seems (to me) like a great final examination in college 
 for a degree summa vita in mortem, and it challenges the 
 best in me — spurs me on to dig down for every best re- 
 serve of energy, strength, and thought. ..." Death is the 
 greatest event in life," and it is seldom anything is made 
 
20 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 of it. What a privilege then to he able to meet it in a 
 manner suitable to its greatness! Once in your life to 
 have met a crisis which required the use of every last latent 
 capacity! It is like being able to exercise a muscle which 
 has been in a sling for a long time. So for me the exami- 
 nation is comparatively easy to pass. . . . 
 
 Briggs Adams 
 
 29 
 
 I have a rendezvous with Death 
 
 At some disputed barricade, 
 
 When Spring comes round with rustling shade 
 
 And apple blossoms fill the air. 
 
 I have a rendezvous with Death 
 
 When Spring brings back blue days and fair. 
 
 It may be he shall take my hand 
 
 And lead me into his dark land 
 
 And close my eyes and quench my breath; 
 
 It may be I shall pass him still. 
 
 I have a rendezvous with Death 
 
 On some scarred slope of battered hill, 
 
 When Spring comes round again this year 
 
 And the first meadow flowers appear. 
 
 God knows 'twere better to be deep 
 Pillowed in silk and scented down, 
 Where love throbs out in blissful sleep. 
 Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, 
 When hushed awakenings are dear. 
 But I've a rendezvous with Death 
 At midnight in some flaming town, 
 When Spring trips north again this year, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 21 
 
 And I to my pledged word am true, 
 I shall not fail that rendezvous. 
 
 Alan Seegar 
 
 30 
 
 We may not know how fared your soul before 
 Occasion came to try it by this test. 
 Perchance, it used on lofty wings to soar; 
 Again, it may have dwelt in lowly nest. 
 
 We do not know if bygone knightly strain 
 Impelled you then, or blood of humble clod 
 Defied the dread adventure to attain 
 The cross of honour or the peace of God. 
 
 We see but this, that when the moment came 
 You raised on high, then drained the solemn cup — 
 The grail of death; that, touched by valour's flame, 
 The kindled spirit burned the body up. 
 
 Oscar C. A, Child 
 
 31 
 
 I, too, have loved with you our mother Earth: 
 Listen'd at pensive eve the lyric thrush 
 Shake out his ecstasy to lovely birth 
 Rapturously in some lone shadowy bush. 
 I, too, have gazed on youth: watched in his eyes 
 The lightning passion flash, the vision glow, 
 Have watched him as a god ascendant rise — 
 I, too, have seen the fires of Youth bum low. 
 Fearless you took the shadowy way with death. 
 You took the harp of life with broken strings, 
 
22 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Sang in your passing brave of noble things. 
 That brave serenity I pray to know 
 When out with Death into the night I go. 
 
 Sergt. /. A'^. Streets 
 
 32 
 
 Ye who have perished ere the morning broke, 
 Ye whom death conquered when the noon was clear, 
 And ye who left us in the battle smoke 
 Through the long twilights of the latter year, 
 When home was far, and death and sorrow near. 
 When hope burnt feebly in the midst of pain. 
 Glory ye sought, which casteth out all fear — 
 Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain. 
 
 And ye who pass upon the sea in ships. 
 Whose businesses upon great waters lie. 
 Who met the death unseen with smiling lips 
 And gave your lives lest other men should die, 
 Lo! through the steep confusion of the sky. 
 Above the surge and thunder of the main, 
 A voice thrills downward like a battle-cry, 
 " Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain." 
 
 No place was ours among the rank and file 
 
 Of war; for us no sudden trumpets pealed; 
 
 But ours to gather and to mourn awhile 
 
 The sad and splendid leavings of the field. 
 
 To you — to you 'twas given to bear the shield, 
 
 To guard and cherish it without a stain — 
 
 And when, in God's good time, these wounds are healed 
 
 Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 23 
 
 Ah! valiant souls, whose marching days are o'er, 
 Who went to battle like a banquet spread, 
 Who having walked amid the ways of war, 
 Now tread the echoing pathways of the dead. 
 Others have passed where now your spirits tread. 
 Who perished that the world might live again, 
 To them and you alike it shall be said, 
 " Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain." 
 
 Crommelin Brown 
 
 33 
 
 Sleep well, heroic souls, in silence sleep, 
 Lapped in the circling arms of kingly death! 
 No ill can vex your slumbers, no foul breath 
 Of slander, hate, derision mar the deep 
 Repose that holds you close, your Kinsmen reap 
 The harvest you have sown, while each man saith 
 " So would I choose, when danger threateneth, 
 Let my death be as theirs," we dare not weep. 
 For you have scaled the starry heights of fame. 
 Nor ever shrank from peril and distress 
 In fight undaunted for the Conqueror's prize; 
 Therefore your death, engirt with loveliness 
 Of simple service done for England's name, 
 Shall shine like beacon-stars of sacrifice. 
 
 W. L. Courtney 
 
 34 
 
 Tread softly here: Go reverently and slow! 
 
 Yea, let your soul go down upon its knees, 
 
 And with bowed head, and heart abased, strive hard 
 
 To grasp the future gain in this sore loss! 
 
 For not one foot of this dank sod but drank 
 
 Its surfeit of the blood of gallant men. 
 
24 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Who, for their faith, their hope, — for Life and Liberty, 
 Here made the sacrifice, — here gave their lives, 
 And gave right willingly — for you and me. 
 
 From this vast altar-pile the souls of men 
 
 Sped up to God in countless multitudes; 
 
 On this grim cratered ridge they gave their all, 
 
 And, giving, won 
 
 The Peace of Heaven and immortality. 
 
 Our hearts go out to them in boundless gratitude; 
 
 If ours — then God's; for His vast charity 
 
 All sees, all knows, all comprehends — save bounds. 
 
 He has repaid their sacrifice, — and we — ? 
 
 God help us if we fail to pay our d«bt 
 
 In fullest full and all unstintingly ! 
 
 John Oxenham 
 
 35 
 
 Not where they fell, upon the awful scene 
 Of carnage, and encompassed by the air 
 Of hellish exhalations — nay not where 
 Terrific thunders mocked a sky serene. 
 Loosing swift havoc where long peace had been: 
 O mourners, menaced by false-tongued despair. 
 Your loved ones, nobly fall'n, remain not there 
 To lie beneath a coverlet of green. 
 
 Uplifted, they attain the hero's joy 
 As pensioners of God in that Estate, 
 Whose soil is freedom, and whose air delight. 
 While their dear mortal ruins consecrate 
 The earth itself to valour's fine employ, 
 Whence love's clear morn shall follow hate's wild night. 
 
 /. Cartwright Frith 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 25 
 
 36 
 
 Carnage! 
 
 Humanity disgraced! 
 Time's dearest toil eflfaced! 
 Poison gases and flame 
 Putting Nero to shame! 
 Bayonet, bomb and shell! 
 Merry reading for hell! 
 The wickedness! the waste! 
 
 Courage! 
 
 To gain their fiery goal, 
 
 Some crumbling, bloodsoaked knoll, 
 
 How fearlessly they fling 
 
 Their flesh to suffering. 
 
 Offer their ardent breath 
 
 To gasping shuddering death! 
 
 miracle of soul! 
 
 Katherine Lee Bates 
 
 37 
 
 In lonely watches night by night 
 Great visions burst upon my sight, 
 For down the watches of the sky 
 The hosts of dead go marching by. 
 
 Strange ghostly banners o'er them float, 
 Strange bugles sound an awful note. 
 And all their faces and their eyes 
 Are lit with starlight from the skies. 
 
 The anguish and the pain have passed 
 And peace hath come to them at last, 
 
26 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 But in their stern looks linger still 
 The iron purpose and the will. 
 
 Dear Christ, who reign'st above the flood 
 Of human tears and human blood, 
 A weary road these men have trod, 
 house them in the house of God! 
 
 Frederick George Scott 
 
 38 
 
 Adieu ! 
 
 What need of tears 
 
 Or fears 
 
 For you! 
 
 Adieu! 
 
 This is no common day — 
 
 Your feet upon the way 
 
 All Knights of old have trod, 
 
 All Saints hacked through to God. 
 
 Your soul shall catch 
 
 Their glinting glory: 
 
 While from afar I watch 
 
 How you shall match 
 
 Their story. 
 
 Adieu ! 
 
 A Soldier Son (Anonymous) 
 
 39 
 
 All that our wonderful dead relinquish they bequeath 
 to us; and when they die for us, they leave us their lives 
 not in any strained metaphorical sense, but in a very real 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 27 
 
 and direct way. Virtue goes out of every man who falls 
 while performing a deed of glory; and that virtue drops 
 down upon us; and nothing of him is lost and nothing 
 evaporates in the shock of the premature end. He gives us 
 in one solitary and mighty stroke what he would never have 
 given us in a long life of duty and love. Death does not 
 injure life; it is powerless against it. Life's aggregate 
 never changes. What death takes from those who fall 
 enters into those who are left standing. The number of 
 lamps grows less, but the flame rises higher. Death is in 
 no wise the gainer so long as there are living men. The 
 more it exercises its ravages, the more it increases the in- 
 tensity of that which it cannot touch, the more it pursues 
 its phantom victories, the better does it prove to us that man 
 will end by conquering death. 
 
 Maurice Maeterlinck 
 
 40 
 
 Whoever comes to see that death is the immemorial sacri- 
 fice of the individual to the good of the whole, that it is 
 the very foundation of all the higher life, has attained an 
 understanding that will appeal not only to his reason, but 
 to his emotions as well. If he is so fortunate as to go yet 
 further and to comprehend in his view the majestic spec- 
 tacle of the on-going of life, of which the individual is 
 but a noble incident, he will have at least the comfort 
 which comes from the addition of dignity to grief. 
 
 Nathaniel Shaler 
 
 41 
 
 Death holds a high place in the policy and great com- 
 munities of the world. ... It is the part of a valiant and 
 generous mind to prefer some things before life, as things 
 
28 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 for which a man should not doubt nor fear to die. . . . 
 True natural wisdom pursueth the learning and practice 
 of dying well, as the very end of life, and indeed he has 
 not spent his life ill that hath learned to die well. It is 
 the chiefest thing and duty of life. The knowledge of 
 dying is the knowledge of liberty, the state of true free- 
 dom, the way to fear nothing, to live well, contentedly and 
 peaceable. 
 
 Sir Henry Vane 
 
 42 
 
 Thrice happy they who to the grave depart 
 With eyes on these ends fixed; they only, there. 
 Have life. . . . 
 
 Sophocles 
 
 43 
 
 ... It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little 
 infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other. He that 
 dies in an earnest pursuit, is like one that is wounded in 
 hot blood; who, for the time, scarce feels the hurt; and 
 therefore a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is 
 good doth avert the dolours of death. But above all, 
 believe it, the sweetest canticle is Nunc dimittis when a 
 man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations. . . . 
 
 Francis Bacon 
 
 44 
 
 It is a shame to crave long life. . . . What delight 
 
 Bring days, one with another, setting us 
 
 Forward or backward on our path to de^th? 
 
 I would not take the fellow at a gift 
 
 Who warms himself with unsubsUPtia^l hopes; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 29 
 
 But bravely to live on, or bravely end, 
 Is due to gentle breeding. . . . 
 
 Sophocles 
 
 45 
 
 When I do count the clock that tells the time, 
 
 And see the brave day sunk in hideous night; 
 
 When I behold the violet past prime, 
 
 And sable curls all silver 'd o'er with white; 
 
 When lofty trees I see barren of leaves 
 
 Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, 
 
 And summer's green, all girded up in sheaves, 
 
 Borne in the bier with white and bristly beard ; 
 
 Then of thy beauty do I question make. 
 
 That thou among the wastes of time must go. 
 
 Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake 
 
 And die as fast as they see others grow; 
 
 And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence 
 
 Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence. 
 
 William Shakespeare 
 
 46 
 
 As for me, I see no such great reason why I should either 
 be proud to live, or fear to die. I have had good experi- 
 ence of this world. I have known what it is to be a sub- 
 ject, and I now know what it is to be a sovereign. . . , 
 When I call to mind things past, behold things present, 
 and look forward to things to come, I count them happiest 
 that go hence soonest. Nevertheless ... I am armed with 
 better courage than is common in my sex, so that what- 
 soever befalls me, death shall never find me unprepared. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth 
 
30 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 47 
 
 ... In my best meditations I do often defy death; I 
 honour any man that contemns it, nor can highly love any 
 that is afraid of it. . . . 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne 
 
 48 
 
 I do not fear to die. I assure you, as in the presence 
 of God, that if on this very night, suddenly, the summons 
 to death were to reach me, I should bear it with calm- 
 ness; I should raise my hands to heaven, and say " Blessed 
 be God." 
 
 Immanuel Kant 
 
 49 
 
 . . . Life is not the greatest good, since the foundation 
 of all morality is that many things are to be preferred to 
 life; and death is not the greatest evil, since we are men, 
 so to speak, only in so far as we rise above the fear of 
 death. 
 
 M. Brunetiere 
 
 50 
 
 What need have I to fear — so soon to die? 
 Let me work on, not watch and wait in dread: 
 What will it matter, when that I am dead. 
 That they bore hate or love who near me lie? 
 'Tis but a lifetime, and the end is nigh 
 At best or worst. Let me lift up my head 
 And firmly, as with inner courage, tread 
 Mine own appointed way, on mandates high. 
 Pain could but bring, from all its evil store. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 31 
 
 The close of pain: hate's venom could but kill; 
 Repulse, defeat, desertion could no more. 
 Let me have lived my life, not cowered until 
 The unhindered and unhastened hour was here. 
 So soon — what is there in the world to fear? 
 
 Edward Rowland Sill 
 
 51 
 
 Fear death? — to feel the fog in my throat, 
 
 The mist in my face, 
 When the snows begin, and the blasts denote 
 
 I am nearing the place, 
 The power of the night, the press of the storm, 
 
 The post of the foe; 
 Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form. 
 
 Yet the strong man must go: 
 For the journey is done and the summit attained. 
 
 And the barriers fall, 
 Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, 
 
 The reward of it all. 
 I was ever a fighter, so — one fight more. 
 
 The best and the last! 
 I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, 
 
 And bade me creep past. 
 No ! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers 
 
 The heroes of old. 
 Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears 
 
 Of pain, darkness, and cold. 
 For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, 
 
 The black minute's at end, 
 And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, 
 
 Shall dwindle, shall blend. 
 Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, 
 
 Then a light, then thy breast, 
 
32 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, 
 And with God be the rest! 
 
 Robert Browning 
 
 52 
 
 . . . Death is a thing to be despised! Which either 
 ought altogether to be regarded with indifference, if it en- 
 tirely annihilates the mind, or ought even to be desired, 
 if it leads it to a place where it is destined to be immortal. 
 
 Cicero 
 
 53 
 
 Cowards die many times before their deaths; 
 
 The valiant never taste of death but once. 
 
 Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, 
 
 It seems to me most strange that men should fear; 
 
 Seeing that death a necessary end 
 
 Will come, when it will come. 
 
 William Shakespeare 
 
 54 
 
 Bacon has justly noticed that while death is often re- 
 garded as the supreme evil, there is no human passion that 
 does not become so powerful as to lead men to despise it. 
 It is not in the waning days of life, but in the full strength 
 of youth, that men, through ambition or the mere love of 
 excitement, fearlessly and joyously encounter the risk. 
 Encountered in hot blood it is seldom feared, and innum- 
 erable accounts of shipwrecks and other accidents, and 
 many episodes in every war show conclusively how calmly 
 honour, duty and discipline can enable men of no extraor- 
 dinary characters, virtues or attainments, to meet it even 
 when it comes before them suddenly, as an inevitable fact, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 33 
 
 and without any of that excitement which might blind their 
 eyes. 
 
 r. E. H, Lecky 
 
 55 
 
 There is nothing that nature has made necessary which 
 is more easy than death. What a shame, then, to stand in 
 fear of anything so long that is over so soon! It is not 
 death itself that is dreadful, but the fear of it that goes 
 before. 
 
 Why was such a one taken away in the prime of his 
 years? Life is to be measured by action, not by time. 
 A man may die old at thirty, and young at fourscore. 
 Nay, the one lives after death, and the other perished be- 
 fore he died. The fear of death is a continual slavery, as 
 the contempt of it is certain liberty. 
 
 Seneca 
 
 56 
 
 [The wise man] will live without either pursuing or 
 flying from death, but whether for a longer or a shorter 
 time he shall have the soul enclosed in the body, he cares 
 not at all; for even if he must depart immediately, he 
 will go as readily as if he were going to do anything else 
 which can be done with decency and order. . . . [For] 
 what means all this? Thou hast embarked, thou hast made 
 the voyage, thou art come to shore; get out! 
 
 Marcus Aurelius 
 
 57 
 
 ... A freeman thinks of nothing less than of death. 
 His wisdom is a meditation not of death, but of life. . . . 
 
 Spinoza 
 
34 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 58 
 
 . . . Suppose then that [you] may lose [your] life 
 in this way. You will die a good man, doing a noble act. 
 For since we must certainly die, of necessity a man must 
 be found doing something, either following the employ- 
 ment of a husbandman, or digging, or trading, or serv- 
 ing in a consulship. . . . What then do you wish to be 
 doing when you are found by death? I for my part would 
 wish to be found doing something which belongs to a man, 
 beneficent, suitable to the general interest, noble. . . . 
 
 Epictetus 
 
 59 
 
 As the production of the metal proveth the work of 
 the alchemist, so is death the test of our lives, the assay 
 which sheweth the standard of all our actions. 
 
 He hath not spent his life ill, who knoweth to die well; 
 neither can he have lost all his time, who employeth the 
 last portion of it to his honour. 
 
 Avoid not death, for it is a weakness; fear it not, for 
 thou understandeth not what it is; all that thou certainly 
 knowest is, that it putteth an end to thy sorrows. 
 
 Think not the longest life the happiest; that which is 
 best employed, doth man the most honour. . . . 
 
 Indian Manuscript 
 
 60 
 
 Old age will give the coward no peace, though spears 
 may spare him. 
 
 His destiny let no man know beforehand; his mind will 
 be freest from care. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 35 
 
 Cattle die, kindred die, we ourselves also die; but the fair 
 fame never dies of him who has earned it. 
 
 Saemund 
 
 61 
 
 Think not that I fear the world, or my departure from 
 it. Death being a fact, I have no fear of it. That which 
 I alone fear is not having lived well enough. What does 
 it matter whether we live in the world a hundred years 
 or but one day? Let us take care that the bowl of our 
 form hold the heart's good wine, before we become clay 
 again for the potter to mould into other shapes. 
 
 Kheyam 
 
 62 
 
 If life be a pleasure, yet since death also is sent by the 
 hand of the same Master, neither should that displease us. 
 
 Michael Angela 
 
 63 
 
 Death is certain to all things which are subject to birth. 
 Wherefore it does not behove thee to grieve about that 
 which is inevitable. Stand firm in the path of truth. . . . 
 Perform thy duty. Be free from care and trouble, and 
 turn thy mind to things which are spiritual. 
 
 Bhagavadgita 
 
 64 
 
 If thou hast a good conscience, thou wilt not greatly fear 
 death. 
 
 Labour so to live, that at the hour of death thou mayest ^ 
 rather rejoice than fear. 
 
 Thomas a Kempis 
 
36 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 65 
 
 I know no privilege so great as that of dying; but it is 
 a privilege to those in whom evil is more and more sub- 
 dued, and who go more and more beyond themselves. 
 
 William Ellery Channing 
 
 66 
 
 Give me a soul which can grim death defy, 
 And count it Nature's privilege to die. 
 
 Juvenal 
 
 67 
 
 Youth whose hope is high, 
 Who dost to Truth aspire. 
 Whether thou live or die, 
 look not back nor tire. 
 
 Thou that art bold to fly 
 Through tempest, flood and fire, 
 Nor dost not shrink to try 
 Thy heart in torments dire: 
 
 If thou canst Death defy. 
 If thy Faith is entire, 
 Press onward, for thine eye 
 Shall see thy heart's desire. 
 
 Beauty and love are nigh. 
 And with their deathless quire 
 Soon shall thine eager cry 
 Be numbered and expire. 
 
 Robert Bridges 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 37 
 
 68 
 
 ... It is better to lose health like a spendthrift than 
 to waste it like a miser. It is better to live and be done 
 with it than to die daily in the sick-room. By all means 
 begin your folio; ... a spirit goes out of a man who 
 means execution, which outlives the most untimely ending. 
 . . . All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, 
 have done good work, although they may die before they 
 have the time to sign it. Every heart that has beat strong 
 and cheerfully has left a hopeful impulse behind it in the 
 world, and bettered the tradition of mankind. And even 
 if death catch people, like an open pitfall, and in mid- 
 career, laying out vast projects, and planning monstrous 
 foundations, flushed with hope ... is there not something 
 brave and spirited in such a termination? and does not 
 life go down with a better grace, foaming in full body 
 over a precipice, than miserably straggling to an end in 
 sandy deltas? When the Greeks made their fine saying 
 that those whom the gods love die young, I cannot help 
 believing they had this sort of death also in their eye. 
 For surely, at whatever age it overtake the man, this is 
 to die young. Death has not been suffered to take so 
 much as an illusion from his heart. In the hot-fit of life, 
 a-tip-toe on the highest point of being, he passes at a 
 bound on to the other side. The noise of the mallet and 
 -chisel is scarcely quenched, the trumpets are hardly done 
 blowing, when, trailing with him clouds of glory, this 
 happy-starred, full-blooded spirit shoots into the spiritual 
 land. 
 
 Robert Louis Stevenson 
 
38 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 69 
 
 . . . The flesh is a cloud upon genius. Death, that im- 
 mense light, comes and penetrates the man with its aurora. 
 No more flesh, no more matter, no more shadow. The 
 unknown which was within him manifests itself and beams 
 forth. In order that a mind may give all its light, death 
 is required. 
 
 . . . The grave is a crucible. The earth thrown on a 
 man cleanses his name, and allows it not to pass forth 
 till purified. . . . 
 
 Victor Hugo 
 
 70 
 
 If I must die 
 I will encounter darkness as a bride 
 And hug it in my arms. 
 
 William Shakespeare 
 
 71 
 
 Fear death! It is the most beautiful adventure in life. 
 
 Charles Frohman 
 
 72 
 
 If in the noon they doubted, in the night 
 
 They never swerved. Death has no power to appal. 
 There was one Way, one Truth, one Life, one Light, 
 
 One Love that shone triumphant over all. 
 
 If in the noon they doubted, at the last 
 
 There was no way to part, no way but One 
 That rolled the waves of Nature back and cast 
 
 In ancient days a shadow across the sun. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 39 
 
 If in the noon they doubted, their last breath 
 
 Saluted once again the eternal goal, 
 Chanted a love-song in the face of Death 
 
 And sent the veil of darkness from the soul. 
 
 If in the noon they doubted, in the night 
 
 They waved the shadowy world of strife aside, 
 
 Flooded high heaven with an immortal light, 
 And taught the deep how the Creator died. 
 
 Alfred Noyes 
 
 73 
 
 Southward with fleet of ice 
 
 Sailed the corsair Death; 
 Wild and fast blew the blast, 
 
 And the east wind was his breath. ... 
 
 Eastward from Campobello 
 
 Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed; 
 Three days or more seaward he bore, 
 
 Then, alas! the land-wind failed. 
 
 Alas! the land-wind failed. 
 
 And ice-cold grew the night; 
 And nevermore, on sea or shore. 
 
 Should Sir Humphrey see the light. 
 
 He sat upon the deck, 
 
 The Book was in his hand; 
 "Do not fear! Heaven is as near," 
 
 He said, " by water as by land." 
 
 In the first watch of the night, 
 Without a signal's sound. 
 
40 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Out of the sea, mysteriously, 
 
 The fleet of Death rose all around. , • • 
 
 Southward forever southward. 
 
 They drift through dark and day; 
 
 And like a dream, in the Gulf -Stream 
 Sinking, vanish all away. 
 
 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 
 
 74 
 
 Not here! the white North has thy bones; and thou, 
 
 Heroic sailor-soul. 
 Art passing on thine happier voyage now 
 
 Toward no earthly pole. 
 
 Alfred Tennyson 
 
 75 
 
 Friday, March 16. . . . Tragedy all along the line. At 
 lunch the day before yesterday, poor Titus Oates said he 
 couldn't go on; he proposed we should leave him in his 
 sleeping bag. That we could not do, and induced him to 
 come on, on the afternoon march. In spite of its awful 
 nature for him, he struggled on and we made a few miles. 
 At night he was worse and we knew the end had come. 
 
 Should this be found I want these facts recorded. Oates's 
 last thoughts were of his Mother, but immediately before 
 he took pride in thinking that his regiment would be pleased 
 with the bold way in which he met his death. We can 
 testify to his bravery. He has borne intense suffering for 
 weeks without complaint, and to the very last was able and 
 willing to discuss outside subjects. He did not — would 
 not — give up hope to the very end. He was a brave soul. 
 This was the end. He slept through the night before last, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 41 
 
 hoping not to wake; but he woke in the morning — yester- 
 day. It was blowing a blizzard. He said, " I am just going 
 outside and may be some time." He went out into the 
 blizzard and we have not seen him since. . . . We knew that 
 poor Gates was walking to his death, but though we tried to 
 dissuade him, we knew it was the act of a brave man and 
 an English gentleman. 
 
 Capt, Robert F. Scott 
 
 76 
 
 ... As near to the site of the death as we could judge, 
 we built (a) cairn to his memory, and placed thereon a 
 small cross and the following record, " Hereabouts died 
 a very gallant gentleman. Captain L. E. G. Gates, of the 
 Inniskilling Dragoons. In March, 1912, returning from 
 the Pole, he walked willingly to his death in a blizzard, 
 to try and save his comrades, beset by hardships. This 
 note is left by the relief Expedition of 1912." 
 
 E, L, Atkinson 
 
 77 
 
 . . . Gur wreck is certainly due to this sudden advent 
 of severe weather, which does not seem to have any satis- 
 factory cause. I do not think human beings ever came 
 through such a month as we have come through. . . . For 
 four days we have been unable to leave the tent — the 
 gale is howling about us. We are weak, writing is diffi- 
 cult, but for my own part I do not regret this journey, 
 which has shown that Englishmen can endure hardships, 
 help one another, and meet death with as great a fortitude 
 as ever in the past. We took risks, we knew we took them; 
 things have come out against us, and therefore we have 
 no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of Provideince, 
 
42 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 determined still to do our best to the last. But if we 
 have been willing to give our lives to this enterprise, 
 which is for the honour of our country, I appeal to our 
 countrymen to see that those who depend on us are prop- 
 erly cared for. 
 
 Had we lived I should have had a tale to tell of the 
 hardihood, endurance, and courage of my companions 
 which would have stirred the heart of every Englishman. 
 These rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the 
 tale. ... 
 
 Capt. Robert F. Scott 
 
 78 
 
 He [the elder Pliny] ordered the galleys put out to 
 sea, and went himself on board with an intention of as- 
 sisting not only Rectina, but the several other towns which 
 lay thickly strewn along that beautiful coast. Hastening 
 then to the place whence others fled with the utmost ter- 
 ror, he steered his course direct to the point of danger, 
 and with as much calmness and presence of mind as to 
 be able to make and dictate his observations upon the mo- 
 tion and all the phenomena of that dreadful scene. He 
 was so close to the mountain that the cinders which grew 
 thicker and hotter the nearer he approached, fell into 
 the ship, together with pumice-stones and black pieces 
 of burning rocks; they were in danger too not only of 
 being aground by the sudden retreat of the sea, but also 
 from the vast fragments which rolled down from the 
 mountain and obstructed all the shore. Here he stopped 
 to consider whether he should go back again — " For- 
 tune," he said to the pilot, " favors the brave: steer to 
 where Pomponianus is " . . . 
 
 ... It [the wind] was favourable to carrying my uncle 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 43 
 
 to Pomponianus whom he found in the greatest consterna- 
 tion: he embraced him tenderly, encouraging and urging 
 him to keep up his spirit; and the more effectually to 
 soothe his fears by seeming unconcerned himself, ordered 
 a bath to be got ready, and then after having bathed sat 
 down to supper with great cheerfulness, or at least (what 
 is just as heroic) with every appearance of it. 
 
 Meanwhile broad flames shone out in several places 
 from Mount Vesuvius, which the darkness of the night 
 contributed to render still brighter and clearer. But my 
 uncle, in order to soothe the apprehensions of his friend, 
 assured him it was only the burning of the villages: — 
 after this he retired to rest, and it is most certain he was 
 so little disquieted as to fall into a sound sleep. . . . 
 The court which led to his apartment being now almost 
 filled with stones and ashes, if he had continued there any 
 time longer it would have been impossible for him to 
 make his way out, so he was awoke and got up, and went to 
 Pomponianus and the rest of the company. . . . They 
 consulted together whether it was most prudent to trust 
 to the houses . , . which now rocked from side to side with 
 frequent and violent concussions, as though shaken from 
 their very foundations ... or fly to the open fields, where 
 the calcined stones and cinders . . . fell in large showers 
 and threatened destruction. In this choice of dangers they 
 resolved for the fields, a resolution, which while the rest 
 of the company were hurried into it by their fears, my 
 uncle embraced with cool and deliberate consideration. . . . 
 
 They thought proper to go further down upon the shore 
 to see if they might safely put out to sea, but found the 
 waves still running extremely high and boisterous. There 
 my uncle laying himself down upon a sail-cloth, called 
 twice for some cold water, which he drank, when imme- 
 diately the flames, preceded by a strong whiff of sulphur, 
 
44 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 dispersed the party and obliged him to rise. He raised 
 himself with the assistance of two of his servants, and 
 instantly fell down dead, suffocated, as I conjecture, by 
 some gross and noxious vapour. 
 
 As soon as it was light again, which was not till the 
 third day after this melancholy accident, his body was 
 found entire and without any marks of violence upon it, 
 in the dress in which he fell and looking more like a man 
 asleep than dead. . . . Farewell. 
 
 Pliny the Younger 
 
 79 
 
 Our city was in danger of being effaced; and no man 
 among the rich, or eminent, or illustrious, dared to ap- 
 pear in public, but all fled, and hurried out of the way. 
 But they who feared God, the men who passed their lives 
 in monasteries, hastened down with much boldness, and 
 set all free from this terror . . . they cast themselves 
 willingly into the midst of the fire and rescued all ; and as 
 for death, which seems universal and awful, they awaited 
 it with the utmost readiness and ran to meet it with more 
 pleasure than others do toward principalities and honours. 
 
 St. John Chrysostom 
 
 80 
 
 . . . Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail. 
 Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt. 
 Dispraise, or blame, nothing but well and fair. 
 And what may quiet in a death so noble. . . . 
 
 John Milton 
 
 81 
 
 . . . Death is not, then, an object of dread. . . . How 
 many have consecrated their life by the renown of their 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 45 
 
 death alone, how many have been ashamed to live, and 
 have found death a gain! We have read how often by 
 the death of one, great nations have been delivered. . . . 
 By the death of martyrs religion has been defended, faith 
 increased, the Church strengthened; the dead have con- 
 quered, the persecutors have been overcome. . . . The death 
 itself of the martyrs is the prize of their life. 
 
 Saint Ambrose 
 
 82 
 
 ... I see a beautiful city and a brilliant people rising 
 out of this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, 
 in their triumphs and defeats, through long, long years 
 to come, I see the evil of this time, and of the previous 
 time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making 
 expiation for itself and wearing out. 
 
 I see the lives for which I lay down my life, peaceful, 
 useful, prosperous and happy, in that England which I 
 shall see no more. ... 
 
 It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever 
 done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have 
 ever known. 
 
 Charles Dickens 
 
 83 
 
 Lavinia — . . . Do not think that it is easy for us to die. 
 Our faith makes life far stronger and more wonder- 
 ful in us than when we walked in darkness and had 
 nothing to live for. Death is harder for us than for 
 you: the martyr's agony is as bitter as his triumph is 
 glorious. 
 
 The Captain — A martyr, Lavinia, is a fool. Your death 
 will prove nothing. . . , 
 
46 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Lavinia — Then why kill me? 
 
 The Captain — I mean that truth, if there be any truth, 
 needs no martyrs. 
 
 Lavinia — No; but my faith, like your sword, needs test- 
 ing. Can you test your sword except by staking your 
 life on it? 
 
 G. Bernard Shaw 
 
 84 
 
 Creep into thy narrow bed, 
 Creep, and let no more be said! 
 Vain thy onset! all stands fast. 
 Thou thyself must break at last. 
 
 Let the long contention cease! 
 Geese are swans, and swans are geese. 
 Let them have it how they will! 
 Thou art tired; best be still. 
 
 They out-talked thee, hiss'd thee, tore thee? 
 Better men fared thus before thee; 
 Fired their ringing shot and pass'd, 
 Hotly charged — and sank at last. 
 
 Charge once more, then, and be dumb! 
 Let the victors, when they come. 
 When the forts of folly fall. 
 Find thy body by the wall! 
 
 Matthew Arnold 
 
 85 
 
 Ay, tear his body limb from limb, 
 Bring cord, or ax, or flame; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 47 
 
 He only knows that not through him 
 Shall England come to shame. 
 
 Sir F, H. Doyle 
 
 86 
 
 Like a triumphal path he trod 
 The thorns of death and shame. 
 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley 
 
 87 
 
 Patriots have toiled, and in their country's cause 
 Bled nobly; and their deeds, as they deserve, 
 Receive proud recompense. We give in charge 
 Their names to the sweet lyre. ... 
 But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid, 
 To those who, posted at the shrine of truth, 
 Have fallen in her defence. A patriot's blood, 
 Well spent in such a strife, may earn indeed, 
 And for a time ensure to his loved land, 
 The sweets of liberty and equal laws. 
 But martyrs struggle for a brighter prize. 
 And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed 
 In confirmation of the noblest claim. 
 Our claim to feed upon immortal truth, 
 To walk with God, to be divinely free, 
 To soar, and to anticipate the skies. 
 Yet few remember them. ... 
 
 William Cowper 
 
 88 
 
 Through the straight pass of suffering 
 The martyrs ever trod. 
 
48 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Their feet upon temptation, 
 Their faces upon God. 
 
 A stately, shriven company; 
 Convulsion playing round, 
 Harmless as streaks of meteor 
 Upon a planet's bound. 
 
 Their faith the everlasting troth; 
 Their expectation fair; 
 The needle to the north degree 
 Wades so, through polar air. 
 
 Emily Dickinson 
 
 89 
 
 Triimiph may be of several kinds. 
 There's triumph in the room 
 When that old imperator. Death, 
 By faith is overcome. . . . 
 
 Emily Dickinson 
 
 90 
 
 You have gained but little, Athenians, and at how great 
 a cost! . . . Could you have waited but a little while, 
 the event would have come of itself. My age is not hidden; 
 you see that I am far on in life and near to death. I 
 am not speaking now to all, but to those of you who voted 
 my death. And to them I say: You suppose, gentlemen, 
 that I have lost through lack of words to convince you, 
 even provided I had stooped to say and do anything to 
 escape. Not so. I am cast, not through lack of words, 
 but through lack of impudence and shamelessness, and 
 because I would not speak what you are most pleased 
 to hear, nor weep and wail, nor do and say a thousand 
 other degrading things which others have taught you to 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 49 
 
 expect. At the time it did not seem worth while to de- 
 mean myself as a slave through fear; neither do I now 
 repent of my manner of defence. I choose to defend my- 
 self thus and die, rather than as you would have me and 
 live. Neither in war nor in a lawsuit ought a man . . . 
 to accept every means of avoiding death. In battle, for 
 instance, a man often sees that he may save his life by 
 throwing away his arms and falling in supplication be- 
 fore his pursuers; and so in all times of peril there are 
 ways of escape if one will submit to any baseness. Nay, 
 Athenians, it is not so hard to shun death, but hard in- 
 deed to shun evil, for it runs more swiftly than death. I, 
 you see, an old man and slow of gait, have been overtaken 
 by the slow runner; whereas my accusers, who are young 
 and nimble, are caught by the swift runner, which is 
 wickedness. And now I go away condemned by you to 
 death, but they depart hence condemned by truth herself 
 to injustice and sin. I abide by my award, and they by 
 theirs. ... I at least am content. For [I am] of good 
 hope toward death, being persuaded of this one thing at 
 least, that no evil can befall a good man either in life or 
 death, and that his affairs are all in the hands of God. 
 . . . And now it is time to depart hence, I to die and you 
 to live; but which of us goes to the better fate no one 
 knows save only God. 
 
 Plato (Apology of Socrates) 
 
 91 
 
 When he had said this, he arose and went into another 
 room to bathe, and took Crito with him, bidding us remain 
 where we were. And when he had bathed, and his sons 
 were brought in to him, and the women of his house came, 
 and he had talked with them and given his parting com- 
 
50 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 mands in the presence of Crito, then at last he sent away 
 the women and children and came back to us. And it was 
 near the setting of the sun, for he had remained a long 
 while within. So he came and sat with us after the bath, 
 but not much was spoken. And presently the jailer ap- 
 peared and approaching him said : " I shall have no fault 
 to find with you, Socrates, as with others who are provoked 
 and curse me when by order of the magistrates I bid them 
 drink the poison. During all this time I have found you 
 the noblest and gentlest and best man of all who have ever 
 come here; and I am sure you will not be angry with me 
 now, but with those whom you know to be responsible. 
 You imderstand why I am come; it is farewell, and try to 
 bear as lightly as you may what can't be helped." With 
 that the man burst into tears and turned to go out. And 
 Socrates looking up at him replied, " Farewell to you, I will 
 do as you bid." Then turning to us, he continued : " How 
 courteous the fellow is; all the while I have been here, he 
 has been coming to me and talking at times, and has shown 
 himself the kindest of men; and now how generously he 
 weeps for me. — But come, Crito, we must do as he orders. 
 Let some one fetch the poison, if it is prepared; and if it 
 is not ready, bid the man prepare it." And Crito said : " I 
 think, Socrates, the sun is still upon the hilltops, and has 
 not set. And I know, too, that others take the cup quite 
 late after the notice is given, eating and drinking abundantly 
 and even indulging their other appetites. Do not hurry, 
 for there is still time." Then said Socrates : " Naturally 
 those you mention, Crito, act so, for they suppose it is a 
 gain to them; and it is natural that I should not act so, for 
 in delaying the draught I see no other profit than the win- 
 ning of my own contempt for clinging greedily to a life 
 that is all but spent already. Come, I beg you, do as I 
 wish." 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 51 
 
 Thereupon Crito, hearing this, made a sign to his slave 
 who stood by. And the slave went out and after a con- 
 siderable time returned bringing the man who was to give 
 the poison, and who now carried the cup ready in his hand. 
 Socrates saw the man and said : " Very good, my friend ; 
 you understand these matters; what am I to do? " "Noth- 
 ing," he replied, " except drink the poison and walk about 
 until your legs grow heavy; then lie down and it will work 
 of itself." And so saying he handed the cup to Socrates. 
 He received it quite cheerfully, never trembling or chang- 
 ing color or countenance; but looking up at the man with 
 that steady gaze of his, he asked, " What say you? is it per- 
 mitted to make a libation to the gods from this cup? " 
 " We prepare only what we think a sufficient draught, 
 Socrates," he answered. " I understand, but at least we are 
 permitted, nay, obliged to pray the gods to grant us a happy 
 journey from this world to the other. So I pray, and so 
 may it be." And with these words he raised the cup to his 
 lips and drank, very calmly and cheerfully. Until then 
 most of us had been able to hold back our tears pretty 
 well, but when we saw him drinking and the cup now 
 drained, it was too much. In spite of my efforts my own 
 tears began to fall fast, so that covering up my face I gave 
 myself to weeping. Even before me Crito had left the 
 room, unable to restrain his tears. As for Apollodorus, 
 he had never left off weeping the whole time, and now be- 
 tween his sobs and lamentations he broke out into a loud 
 cry that completely unnerved us. Only Socrates remained 
 quiet and rebuked us, saying: "What a thing you are 
 doing, my dear friends! For this reason chiefly I dismissed 
 the women, dreading their disturbance; for I have heard 
 that a man should die in peace and silence. I bid you be 
 quiet and brave." At this we were shamed by his words 
 and ceased from weeping. He meanwhile was walking 
 
52 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 about; and when now his legs grew heavy, he lay down on 
 his back as directed. The man who had given the drink felt 
 his feet and legs from time to time; and finally pressing 
 his foot hard asked if he felt anything; and Socrates said 
 no. After that he pressed his knees and so upward, show- 
 ing us he was growing cold and rigid. And Socrates him- 
 self felt them, and said he should leave us when the numb- 
 ness reached his heart. He had now veiled himself in his 
 mantle, but when he was beginning to grow cold about the 
 groin, he drew the covering a moment from his face and 
 said : " Crito, I owe a cock to Aesculapius. Do not forget 
 to pay it." — and these were his last words. " It shall be 
 done," answered Crito ; " but have you nothing else to 
 say? " He made no reply to this question; but after "a. lit- 
 tle while there was a movement, and the man uncovered 
 him, and his eyes were fixed. And Crito, seeing him, 
 closed his mouth and eyes. 
 
 So passed away our friend, Escherates, who was, I 
 think, of all living men I have known, the best and wisest 
 and the most just. 
 
 Plato 
 
 92 
 
 Howbeit many in Israel were fully resolved and con- 
 firmed in themselves not to eat any unclean thing. Where- 
 fore they chose rather to die that they might not be 
 defiled . . ., and that they might not profane the holy cove- 
 nant; so they died. 
 
 / Maccabees 
 
 93 
 
 . . . Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called 
 Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples. Sit ye here, while 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 53 
 
 I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and 
 the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and 
 very heavy. 
 
 Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceedingly sorrow- 
 ful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. 
 And he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and 
 prayed, saying, my Father, if it be possible, let this cup 
 pass from me: nevertlieless, not as I will, but as thou wilt. 
 
 And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them 
 asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could you not watch 
 with me one hour? Watch and pray, that ye enter not into 
 temptation : the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. 
 
 He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, 
 my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, 
 except I drink it, thy will be done. 
 
 And he came and found them asleep again: for their 
 eyes were heavy. And he left them and went away again, 
 and prayed the third time, saying the same words. Then 
 cometh he to his disciples, and saith unto them; Sleep on 
 now, and take your rest: behold, the hour is at hand, and 
 the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 
 Rise, let us be going: behold, he is at hand that doth be- 
 tray me. 
 
 And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, 
 came, and with him a great multitude with swords and 
 staves, from the chief priests and elders of the people. 
 Now he that betrayed him gave them a sign, saying, Whom- 
 soever I shall kiss, that same is he: hold him fast. And 
 forthwith he came to Jesus, and said, Hail, master; and 
 kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore 
 art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, 
 and took him. 
 
 And, behold, one of them which were with Jesus stretched 
 out his hand and drew his sword, and struck a servant of 
 
54 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 the high priest's, and smote off his ear. Then said Jesus 
 unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all 
 they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. . . . 
 And Jesus said to the multitudes. Are ye come out as against 
 a thief with swords and staves for to take me? I sat daily 
 with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on 
 me. . . . 
 
 Then all the disciples forsook him and fled. 
 
 And they that had laid hold on Jesus led him away to 
 Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and elders were 
 assembled. . . . And they all sought witness against Jesus, 
 to put him to death; but found none: yea, though many 
 false witnesses came, yet found they none. At the last 
 came two false witnesses, and said, This fellow said, I am 
 able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three 
 days. And the high priest arose, and said unto him, An- 
 swerest thou nothing? What is it which these witness 
 against thee? But Jesus held his peace. 
 
 And the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure 
 thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be 
 the Christ, the Son of God. Jesus saith unto him. Thou 
 hast said: nevertheless I say unto you. Hereafter shall ye 
 see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and 
 coming in the clouds of heaven. 
 
 Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying. He hath 
 spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? 
 . . . What think ye? They answered and said. He is guilty 
 of death. Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him; 
 and others smote him with the palms of their hands, saying, 
 Prophesy unto us, thou Christ, who is he that smote 
 thee? . . . 
 
 When the morning was come, all the chief priests and 
 elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 55 
 
 to death: and when they had bound him, they led him 
 away, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. . . . 
 
 And Pilate, when he had called together the chief 
 priests and the rulers and the people, said unto them. Ye 
 have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the 
 people: and behold, I have examined him, . . . have found 
 no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye 
 accuse him: ... I will therefore chastise him, and release 
 him. . . . 
 
 And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this 
 man, and release unto us Barabbas. ... 
 
 Pilate, therefore, willing to release Jesus, spoke again 
 unto them. But they cried, saying. Crucify him, crucify 
 him. And he said unto them the third time. Why, what 
 evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in 
 him: I will therefore chastise him, and let him go. And 
 they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might 
 be crucified. 
 
 And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. 
 And Pilate . . . when he had scourged Jesus, delivered him 
 to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took 
 Jesus into the common hall, and gathered unto him the 
 whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him, and put on 
 him a scarlet robe. And when they had platted a crown 
 of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right 
 hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked 
 him, saying. Hail, King of the Jews. And they spit upon 
 him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. And 
 after they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, 
 and put his own raiment on him, and led him away to 
 crucify him. . . . And there followed him a great company 
 of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented 
 him. . . . 
 
56 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 And when they were come to the place which is called 
 Calvary, there they crucified him. . . . Then said Jesus, 
 Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. 
 
 And they parted his raiment, and cast lots. And the 
 people stood beholding. And the rulers also with them 
 derided him, saying. He saved others; himself he cannot 
 save. And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, 
 and offering him vinegar, and saying. If thou be the king 
 of the Jews, save thyself. And a superscription also was 
 written over him. . . . This is the King of the Jews. . . . 
 
 And it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness 
 over all the earth. . . . And Jesus cried with a loud voice. 
 Father, into thy hands I conunend my spirit; and having 
 said this, he gave up the ghost. . . . 
 
 The Gospels 
 
 94 
 
 When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, 
 and they gnashed on him (Stephen) with their teeth. 
 
 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stead- 
 fastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus 
 standing on the right hand of God, and said. Behold, I 
 see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on 
 the right hand of God. 
 
 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their 
 ears, and ran upon him with one accord, and cast him out of 
 the city . . . and stoned him. And they stoned Stephen, 
 calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my 
 spirit. 
 
 And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice. Lord, 
 lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said 
 this, he fell asleep. 
 
 The Acts of the Apostles 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 57 
 
 95 
 
 The martyrs shrank from suffering like other men, but 
 such natural shrinking was incommensurable with apos- 
 tasy. No intensity of torture had any means of affecting 
 what was a mental conviction; and the sovereign Thought 
 in which they had lived was their adequate support and 
 consolation in their death. To them the prospect of wounds 
 and loss of limbs was not more terrible than it is to the 
 combatant of this world. They faced the implements of 
 torture as the soldier takes his post before the enemy's 
 battery. They cheered and ran forward to meet his at- 
 tack, and as it were dared him, if he would, to destroy 
 the numbers who were ready to close up the foremost rank, 
 as their comrades who had filled it fell. And when Rome 
 at last found she had to deal with a host of Scaevolas, then 
 the proudest of earthly sovereignties, arrayed in the com- 
 pleteness of her material resources, humbled herself be- 
 fore a power which was founded on a mere sense of the 
 unseen. ... 
 
 At that time Polycarp, the familiar friend of St. John 
 and a contemporary of Ignatius, suffered in his extreme old 
 age. When, before his sentence, the Proconsul bade him 
 " swear by the fortunes of Caesar, and have done with 
 Christ," his answer betrayed that intimate devotion to the 
 self-same Idea, which had been the inward life of Ig- 
 natius. " Eighty and six years," he answered, "have I 
 been His servant, and He has never wronged me, but ever 
 has preserved me; and how can I blaspheme my King and 
 my Saviour? " When they would have fastened him to 
 the stake, he said: "Let alone; He who gives me to 
 bear the fire, will give me also to stand firm upon the 
 pyre without your nails." 
 
 John Henry Newman 
 
58 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 96 
 
 When blessed Vincent was put to the torture, with eager 
 countenance, and strengthened by the presence of God, 
 he cried: This it is which I have always desired, and 
 for which in all my prayers I have made request. 
 
 Church Service 
 
 97 
 
 . . . The trial being ended, Jerome received the same 
 sentence as had been passed on Huss, . . . but, being a 
 layman, had not to undergo the ceremony of degradation. 
 
 . . . They delayed the execution for two days, in hopes 
 that he would recant; during which time the Cardinal of 
 Florence used his utmost endeavours to bring him over, but 
 all proved ineffectual: Jerome was resolved to seal his 
 doctrine with his blood. 
 
 On his way to the place of execution he sang several 
 hymns; and on arriving at the spot where Huss had suf- 
 fered, kneeled down and prayed fervently. He embraced 
 the stake with great cheerfulness; and when the execu- 
 tioner went behind him to set fire to the fagots, he said: 
 " Come here and kindle it before my eyes ; for had I been 
 afraid of it, I had not come here, having had so many op- 
 portunities to escape." When the flames enveloped him 
 he sang a hymn; and the last words he was heard to say 
 were — " Hanc animam in flammis aff ero, Christe, tibi ! " 
 
 Foxe 
 
 98 
 
 I have fought: that is much — victory is in the hands 
 of fate. Be that it as it may with me, this at least future 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 59 
 
 ages will not deny of me, be the victor who may — that I 
 did not fear to die, yielded to none of my fellows in 
 constancy, and preferred a spirited death to a cowardly 
 life. . . . 
 
 Greater perhaps is your fear in pronouncing my sen- 
 tence than mine in hearing it. 
 
 They are fools who dread the menace of death, for this 
 your body is constantly passing away and being renewed. 
 
 The wise man fears not death; yea, there may be times 
 when he puts himself in its way. 
 
 Giordano Bruno 
 
 99 
 
 Winged by desire and thee, dear delight! 
 As still the vast and succoring air I tread. 
 So mounting still, on swifter pinions sped, 
 I scorn the world, and heaven receives my flight, 
 And if the end of Ikaros be nigh, 
 I will submit, for I shall know no pain: 
 And falling dead to earth, shall rise again; 
 What lowly life with such high death can vie? 
 Then speaks my heart from out the upper air, 
 "Whither doth lead me? sorrow and despair 
 Attend the rash ": And thus I make reply: — 
 " Fear thou no fall, nor lofty ruin sent; 
 Safely divide the clouds, and die content 
 When such proud death is dealt thee from on high." 
 
 Giordano Bruno 
 
 100 
 
 They were then led to the place of execution. . . . 
 Amid the insults which were poured upon them as they 
 passed, there were not wanting expressions of grief and 
 
60 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 sympathy. Some exhorted them to die with a willing 
 mind, some are said to have offered them food. " Why," 
 asked Savonarola, " should you offer such things to me, 
 who am about to leave this life? " and again, " In the 
 last hour only God is needed to comfort mortals." A 
 priest named Nerotto asked him, "With what mind do 
 you endure this martyrdom? " He simply replied, 
 " Should I not die willingly for Him who suffered as much 
 for me? " and raising up his eyes to his crucifix, he kissed 
 it. 
 
 William Clark 
 
 101 
 
 My children, before God, before the consecrated Host, 
 with the enemy already in the convent, I confirm to you 
 my doctrine. That which I have spoken I have received 
 from God, and He is my witness in heaven that I do not 
 lie. . . . My last counsel is this: let faith, patience and 
 prayers be your arms. I leave you with anguish and grief, 
 to put myself into the hands of my enemies. I know 
 not whether they will take away my life; but I am certain 
 that if I must die, I shall be able to aid you in heaven more 
 than I have been able to do on earth. Be comforted, 
 embrace the cross, and with that you will find the harbour 
 of safety. 
 
 Savonarola 
 
 102 
 
 . . . When the bishop urged him [John Huss] to recant, 
 he turned to the people and addressed them thus: 
 
 "These lords and bishops do counsel me that I should 
 confess before you all that I have erred; which thing, if it 
 might be done with the infamy and reproach of man only, 
 they might, peradventure, easily persuade me to do; but 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 61 
 
 now I am in the sight of the Lord my God, without whose 
 great displeasure I could not do that which they require. 
 For I well know that I never taught any of those things 
 which they have falsely alleged against me, but I have 
 always preached, taught, written, and thought contrary 
 thereunto. Should I by this my example, trouble so many 
 consciences, endued with the most certain knowledge of the 
 Scriptures and of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ? 
 I will never do it, neither commit any such offence, that 
 I should seem to esteem this vile carcass appointed unto 
 death more than their health and salvation." 
 
 . . . When the fagots were piled around him, the Duke 
 of Bavaria was so officious as to desire him to abjure. 
 " No," said he, " I never preached any doctrine of an evil 
 tendency; and what I taught with my lips, I now seal with 
 my blood." He then said to his executioner, " You are 
 now going to burn a goose (the name of Huss signifying 
 goose in the Bohemian language) , but in a century you will 
 have a swan whom you can neither roast nor boil." 
 
 Foxe 
 
 103 
 
 My well beloved in the Lord, many causes, and especially 
 the expectation of my speedy death, had made me suppose 
 that the letters I recently wrote to you would be the last. 
 Now that a delay is accorded — since it is permitted me to 
 converse with you by letter, I write to you again, to testify, 
 at least all my gratitude. In what concerns my death, 
 God only knows why it is deferred, as also that of my 
 very dear brother Jerome, who, I hope will die in a holy 
 manner and without stain. I know that he acts and suffers 
 now with more firmness than I, infirm sinner that I am. 
 God has granted us much time . . . that we might, at 
 last, remember that the joys of eternal life do not im- 
 
62 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 mediately follow this world's joys, but that it is by pass- 
 ing through great tribulations that the saints enter the 
 kingdom of God. Some of them have been, without shrink- 
 ing, sawed in twain, others have been burned, stripped of 
 their skin, buried alive, stoned, crucified, crushed between 
 millstones, dragged here and there into death, precipitated 
 to the bottom of the waters, strangled, cut to pieces, over- 
 whelmed by outrages before their death, and tortured by 
 hunger in their prisons and in their chains. Who could 
 describe the torments and agonies which all the saints have 
 suffered for the divine truth under the old and new cov- 
 enant, and especially those who have branded the iniquity 
 of priests, and who have raised their voices against it. 
 It would be a strange thing at present to remain im- 
 punished when attacking the perversity of priests, who will 
 not endure any blame. 
 
 John Huss 
 
 104 
 
 The end he [Thomas More] expected came. He was 
 accused of high treason, and never permitted to go 
 home again. After three or four days he was lodged in a 
 prison in the Tower. . . . 
 
 When he had been a month in the Tower, his daughter 
 Margaret obtained leave to see him; but only after a long 
 and wearisome suit. . . . His wife came also, and in her 
 impetuous way she spoke to him as follows: 
 
 " I marvel you, who are taken for a wise man, will so 
 play the fool as to be here in a close and filthy prison, 
 and be content to be shut up with rats and mice, when 
 you might be allowed to be at liberty, with the good will 
 of both king and council, if you would but do as the 
 Bishop and the best and most learned of the realm have 
 done. Seeing you might have a right fair house, your 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 63 
 
 library, your books, gallery, garden, orchard, and all other 
 necessaries so handsome about you; where you might be 
 in the company of your wife, children, and household, and 
 be merry. I muse what in Heaven's name you mean thus 
 to tarry? " 
 
 Her husband listened to her patiently. Then, with a 
 cheerful face, he replied : " Prithee, good Mistress Alice, 
 tell me one thing: Is not this house as nigh Heaven as 
 my own? " 
 
 . . . Twelve months passed away before his trial was 
 over. He was judged guilty of high treason, and sentenced 
 to be beheaded on Tower Hill. . . . When the procession 
 reached the Tower, Margaret Roper broke through the 
 guards who surrounded him with the cry, " Oh, my father ! 
 my father! " He parted from her with loving words of 
 comfort and at the sight of her grief the soldiers and the 
 people standing round shed tears. An old servant, 
 Dorothy Collie by name, made her way to him at that time 
 and kissed him before them all. " 'Tis homely, but lov- 
 ingly done," said More with a tender smile. . . . 
 
 To his daughter Margaret came a letter written with a 
 piece of coal the night before the execution. Among other 
 words she read : " Tomorrow I long to go to God ; it were 
 a day very neat and convenient. I never liked your 
 manner to me better than when you kissed me last; for I 
 like when daughterly love and dear charity have no cause 
 to look unto worldly courtesy. Farewell, dear daughter, 
 pray for me, and I will pray for you and all your friends, 
 that we may meet together in heaven." 
 
 After his death, the Constable of the Tower, Sir W. 
 Kingston, came to William Roper to tell him of the last 
 interview he had had with Sir Thomas More. Seeing the 
 tears rolling down the Constable's cheeks as he bade him 
 farewell, More had stayed him and said : " Good Mr. 
 
64 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Kingston, trouble not yourself, but be of good cheer. I 
 will pray for you and your lady, that we may meet in 
 heaven together, where we shall be merry for ever and ever." 
 " In good faith, Mr. Roper," added the Constable, " I was 
 ashamed of myself, that at our parting my heart was so 
 weak and his so strong, that he was obliged to comfort me, 
 who should rather at that time have comforted him. But 
 God and cleanliness of conscience is a comfort which no 
 earthly prince can give." 
 
 Francis E. Cooke 
 
 105 
 
 He [Cranmer] seemed to repel the force of the fire, and 
 to overlook the torture by strength of thought. 
 
 Jeremy Collier 
 
 106 
 
 The next morning, being Thursday, the 29th of October 
 (1618), Sir Walter Raleigh was conducted by the sheriffs 
 of Middlesex, to the Old Palace Yard in Westchester, where 
 there was a large scaffold erected before the parliament- 
 house for his execution. . . . He mounted the scaffold with 
 a cheerful countenance, and saluted the lords, knights, and 
 gentlemen of his acquaintance there present. The procla- 
 mation being made of an officer for silence, he began his 
 speech as follows: 
 
 " I thank God, that he has sent me to die in the light, 
 and not in darkness. I likewise thank God that he 
 has suffered me to die before such an assembly of honour- 
 able witnesses, and not obscurely in the Tower; where, 
 for the space of thirteen years together, I have been op- 
 pressed with many miseries. And I return thanks, that my 
 fever hath not taken me at this time, as I prayed to him 
 it might not, that I might clear myself of some accusations 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 65 
 
 unjustly laid to my charge, and leave behind me the testi- 
 mony of a true heart to my king and country. . . . 
 
 " But this I here speak, it is no time for me to flatter 
 or fear princes, I, who am subject only unto death: and 
 for me, who have now to do with God alone, to tell a lie 
 to get the favour of the king were in vain: and yet, if 
 ever I spake disloyally or dishonestly of the king, either 
 to this Frenchman or any other, ever intimated the least 
 thought hurtful or prejudicial of him, the Lord blot me out 
 of the book of life. . . . 
 
 "And now I entreat, that you all will join with me in 
 prayer to that great God of heaven whom I have grievously 
 offended, being a man full of vanity, who has lived a sin- 
 ful life in such callings as have been most inducing to it: 
 for I have been a soldier, sailor, and a courtier, which 
 are courses of wickedness and vice; that his almighty 
 goodness will forgive me; that he will cast away my sins 
 from me; and that he will receive me into everlasting life: 
 so I take my leave of you all, making my peace with God." 
 
 The proclamation having been made, that all men should 
 depart the scaffold, he prepared himself for death, giving 
 away his hat and cape and money to some attendants who 
 stood near him. When he took leave of the lords and 
 other gentlemen, he entreated the lord Arundel to desire 
 the king, that no scandalous writings to defame him might 
 be published after his death ; concluding, " I have a long 
 journey to go, therefore must take my leave." Then having 
 put off his gown and doublet, he called to the headsman to 
 shew him the ax, which not being suddenly done, he said: 
 " I prithee, let me see it. Dost thou think that I am afraid 
 of it? " Having fingered the edge of it a little, he returned 
 it, and said smiling to the sheriff, " This is a sharp medicine, 
 but it is a sound cure for all diseases." And having en- 
 treated the company to pray to God to assist and 
 
66 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 strengthen him, the executioner kneeled down and asked 
 him forgiveness; which Raleigh, laying his hand upon his 
 shoulder, granted. Then being asked which way he 
 would lay himself on the block, he answered, " So the 
 heart be right, it is no matter which way the head lies." 
 As he stooped to lay himself along, and reclined his head, 
 his face being toward the east, the headsman spread his 
 own cloak over him. After a little pause, he gave the 
 sign that he was ready for the stroke by lifting up his 
 hand. . . . 
 
 William Oldys 
 
 107 
 
 E'en such is time! which takes on trust 
 Our youth, our joys, and all we have. 
 And pays us naught but age and dust; 
 Which, in the dark and silent grave. 
 When we have wander 'd all our ways. 
 Shuts up the story of our days; 
 And from this grave, this earth, this dust, 
 My God shall raise me up, I trust! 
 
 Walter Raleigh^ 
 
 108 
 
 You shall receive, my dear wife, my last words in these 
 my last lines. My love I send you, that you may keep it 
 when I am dead; and my counsel that you may remember 
 it when I am no more. I would not, with my will, present 
 you sorrows, dear Bess; let them go to the grave with me, 
 and be buried in the dust: And seeing that it is not the 
 will of God that I shall see you any more, bear my de- 
 struction patiently, and with an heart like yourself. First 
 
 1 Verse found in his Bible. Said to have been written the night 
 before his death. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 67 
 
 I send you all the thanks which my heart can conceive, 
 or my words express, for your many travels and cares 
 for me, which, though they have not taken effect, as you 
 wished, yet my debt to you is not the less; but pay I never 
 shall in this world. Secondly, I beseech you, for the love 
 you bear me living, that you do not hide yourself many 
 days, but by your travels seek to help my miserable for- 
 times, and the right of your poor child; your mourning 
 cannot avail me, who am but dust. Thirdly, you shall 
 understand that my lands were conveyed to my child; 
 the writings were drawn at midsummer, as divers can wit- 
 ness; and I trust my blood will quench their malice who 
 desired my slaughter, that they will not seek to kill you 
 and yours with extreme poverty. To what friend to direct 
 you, I know not; for all mine have left me in the true 
 time of trial. Most sorry am I that, being surprised by 
 death, I can leave you no better estate; God hath pre- 
 vented all my determinations, that great God, which work- 
 eth all in all. If you can live free from want, care for 
 no more, for the rest is but vanity. Love God, and begin 
 betimes; in him shall you find true, everlasting and end- 
 less comfort. . . . Teach your son also to serve and fear 
 God, whilst he is young, that the fear of God may grow 
 in him. Then will God be an husband to you, and a 
 father to him; an husband and a father that can never 
 be taken from you. Dear wife, I beseech you for my soul's 
 sake. Pay all poor men. When I am dead, no doubt but 
 you will be much fought unto, for the world thinks I was 
 very rich. Have a care to the fair pretences of men, for 
 no greater misery can befall you in this life than to be- 
 come a prey unto the world, and after to be despised. 
 As for me, I am no more yours, nor you mine; death hath 
 cut us asunder, and God hath divided me from the world, 
 and you from me. Remember your poor child, for his 
 
68 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 father's sake, who loved you in his happiest estate. I sued 
 for my life, but God knows it was for you and yours that 
 I desired it. For know it, my dear wife, your child is 
 the child of a true man who in his own respect despiseth 
 death and his mishapen and ugly forms. I cannot write 
 much; God knows how hardly I steal this time when all 
 are asleep. And it is also time for me to separate my 
 thoughts from the world. Beg my dead body, which living 
 was denied you; and either lay it in Sherburne, or in 
 Exeter Church, by my father and mother. I can say no 
 more. 
 
 Time and death call me away. The everlasting God, 
 powerful, infinite and inscrutable, God almighty, who is 
 goodness itself, the true light and life, keep you and yours, 
 and have mercy upon me, and forgive my persecutors and 
 false accusers, and send us to meet in his glorious King- 
 dom. My dear wife, farewell; bless my boy, pray for me; 
 and let my true God hold you both in his arms. 
 
 Walter Raleigh 
 
 109 
 
 Give me my scallop-shell of quiet, 
 
 My staff of faith to walk upon, 
 My scrip of joy, immortal diet. 
 
 My bottle of salvation. 
 My gown of glory, hope's true gage, 
 And thus I'll take my pilgrimage. 
 
 Blood must be my body's balmer. 
 While my soul, like quiet palmer, 
 Trav'leth tow'rd the land of heaven; 
 No other balm will here be given. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 69 
 
 Over the silver mountains 
 
 Where spring the nectar fountains, 
 
 There will I kiss 
 
 The bowl of bliss. 
 And drink mine everlasting fill 
 Upon every milken hill; 
 My soul will be a-dry before, 
 But after, it will thirst no more. 
 
 I'll take them first 
 
 To quench my thirst. 
 And taste of nectar's suckets. 
 
 At those clear wells 
 
 Where sweetness dwells. 
 Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets. 
 
 Then by that happy, blestful day. 
 
 More peaceful pilgrims I shall see, 
 That have cast off their rags of clay. 
 
 And walk apparell'd fresh like me. 
 
 And when our bodies and all we 
 Are fill'd with immortality. 
 Then the bless'd parts we'll travel, 
 Strow'd with rubies thick as gravel, 
 Ceilings of diamond, sapphire flowers, 
 High walls of coral, pearly bowers. 
 
 From thence to heaven's bribeless hall, 
 
 Where no corrupted voices brawl. 
 
 No conscience molten into gold, 
 
 No forg'd accuser bought or sold. 
 
 No cause deferr'd, no vain-spent journey, 
 
 For there Christ is the King's attorney; 
 
70 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Who pleads for all without degrees, 
 And he hath angels, but no fees. 
 
 And when the twelve grand million jury, 
 Of our sins, with direful fury. 
 Against our souls black verdicts give, 
 Christ pleads his death, and then we live. 
 
 Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader! 
 Unblotted lawyer ! true proceeder ! 
 Thou would'st salvation e'en for alms, 
 Not with a bribed lawyer's palms. 
 
 And this is mine eternal plea 
 
 To him that made heav'n, earth and sea; 
 
 That, since my flesh must die so soon, 
 
 And want a head to dine next noon, 
 
 Just at the stroke, where my veins start and spread. 
 
 Set on my soul an everlasting head! 
 
 Then am I ready, like a palmer fit. 
 To tread those bless'd parts which before I writ 
 Of death and judgment, heav'n and hell, 
 Who oft doth think, must needs die well. 
 
 Walter Raleigh 
 
 110 
 
 " Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man ; 
 we shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in 
 England as I trust shall never be put out." 
 
 He [Hugh Latimer] received the flame as it were em- 
 bracing it. After he had stroked his face with his hands, 
 and as it were bathed them a little in the fire, he soon died 
 as it appeared with very little pain or none. 
 
 Execution of Hugh Latimer 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 71 
 
 111 
 
 Halt, passenger, take heed, what do you see — 
 This tomb doth show for what some men did die: 
 Here lies interr'd the dust of those who stood 
 'Gainst perjury, resisting unto blood; 
 Adhering to the covenants and laws 
 Establishing the same; which was the cause 
 Their lives were sacrificed. . . . 
 . . . for them no cause was to be found 
 Worthy of death; but only they were found 
 Constant and steadfast, zealous, witnessing 
 For the prerogatives of Christ their King. . . . 
 They did endure the wrath of enemies: 
 Reproaches, torments, deaths, and injuries. 
 But yet they're those who from such troubles came. 
 And now triumph in glory with the Lamb. 
 
 From May 27, 1661, that the most noble Marquis of 
 Argyle was beheaded, to the 17th February, 1668, that 
 Mr. James Renwick suffered, were one way or other 
 murdered and destroyed for the same cause about eighteen 
 thousand, of whom were executed at Edinburgh about an 
 hundred of noblemen, gentlemen, ministers, and others, 
 noble martyrs for Jesus Christ. The most of them lies 
 here. 
 
 Epitaph 
 
 112 
 
 We are perhaps about to give our blood and our lives 
 in the cause of our Master, Jesus Christ. It seems that 
 His goodness will accept this sacrifice, as regards me, in 
 expiation of my great and numberless sins, and that He will 
 thus crown the past services and ardent desires of all our 
 
72 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Fathers here. . . . Blessed be His name for ever that He 
 has chosen us, among so many better than we, to aid Him 
 to bear His cross in this land! In all things, His holy 
 will be done; if He wishes us to die at this moment, 
 how happy the hour for us! if He wishes to spare us for 
 other labours, may we still be blessed; if you hear that 
 God has crowned the little we have done with death, and 
 thus fulfilled our desires, bless Him: for it is for Him that 
 we long to live and die, and He it is who gives us grace 
 to do it. Finally, if some of us survive, I have given 
 orders what they shall do. . . . As for myself, if God gives 
 me grace to go to heaven, I shall pray for them, for the 
 poor Hurons, and shall not forget Your Reverence. . . . 
 
 Jean de Breheuf 
 
 113 
 
 In Teheran there was a man whose name was Mollah 
 Mehdi Kandi. He was well-known as a pleasure-lover. 
 He chased the phantom of every delight, and gratified all 
 the promptings of self. All the paraphernalia of luxury 
 and comfort were at his disposal. With these qualities he 
 combined a high order of intelligence, a ready wit, a rare 
 humour, a wide range of knowledge and useful information. 
 He was a happy conversationalist, and was endowed with a 
 care-free disposition. For all these things the princes and 
 society admired and loved him. No reception or enter- 
 tainment was ever complete without his presence, for he 
 excited fun and mirth and put everybody in a good humour. 
 He dressed like a dandy, and his beautiful home could 
 boast of a rich and varied wardrobe with the stamp of 
 the latest fashion. His home was the centre of the in- 
 tellectuals of the day. He gathered around him all that 
 was fashionable and polite. Poetry and literature were 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 73 
 
 much cultivated in their meetings. He was respected and 
 loved by all the younger element of the. Court and society 
 circles. 
 
 In such surroundings the Light of the Sun of Reality 
 broke forth, and without any hesitation he embraced the 
 religion of the Bab. Hearing about the event of the 
 Fortress of Tabarassi he left everything and sallied out to 
 join those who were besieged in the Fortress. 
 
 When he was living in Teheran, there was a man by the 
 name of Yousoff Bey who was not only his neighbour but 
 his associate in all his gaieties and giddy pleasures. . . . 
 He was the son of Beyjan Bey who brought Fatahli Shaw 
 and established him upon the throne. By mere accident 
 the government entrusted an important commission to 
 Yousoff Bey for Mazandran. After the fulfilment of his 
 official duty he returned to Teheran. One day he was in- 
 vited to a reception, and in the course of conversation the 
 events of the Fortress of Tabarassi were discussed by those 
 who were present. When every one had finished the stock 
 of ill-digested, wild information, Yousoff Bey told the fol- 
 lowing story. . . . 
 
 As I knew and loved Mollah Mehdi from childhood, 
 and was greatly attached to him, when I arrived at Mazan- 
 dran, after finishing my mission, I went to the camp of the 
 Prince and Abbas Kuli Khan. With a large army they had 
 set siege to the Fortress without any evident result. As 
 these two generals were my friends, I got from them a 
 military permit to pass through the ranks of the soldiers 
 and visit my old friend in the Fortress. My first object 
 was to go there and free him from the horrors of starva- 
 tion and death, that, released from all these sufferings 
 and tribulations, he might return to Teheran, and infuse in 
 us the old spirit of fun and delight. When I approached 
 the Fortress I sent a man ahead of me to knock at the gate 
 
74 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 and inform the guard that we were on a peaceful mission, 
 desiring to meet Mollah Mehdi Kandi. But he saw me 
 from a rampart, and, recognizing me, he ran down and 
 opened the gate and I entered. 
 
 At once I was extremely touched by his outward ap- 
 pearance. He had a white, simple nightcap on his head, 
 and wore a long, white robe made of cheap cloth: his feet 
 were bare. A long, ponderous sword hung on a curious 
 girdle wrought in iron. I was so affected by this that I 
 sat down and wept. At last, controlling my tears and pity, 
 I said to him: 
 
 " I have come here to free thee from these evil surround- 
 ings. Since I have seen thee my heart is torn to pieces. 
 I cannot see thee in this condition. Come, friend, come 
 — let us go back to Teheran, where the merry company and 
 the laughing friends await thee." 
 
 He laughed: then immediately became serious and said: 
 
 "Man! What art thou talking about? I have come 
 here to sacrifice my life, not to save it! But if thou art 
 a sincere friend of mine, come and listen to me! These 
 fleeting days shall pass away; all the pleasures, joys and 
 happiness of this ephemeral world shall come to an end, 
 and, ere long, thou shalt die and go under the earth. 
 Therefore come with me and join thy hand with mine and 
 sacrifice thy life in this Divine Arena! " 
 
 I answered: "Really, I may just as well believe that 
 thou hast lost thy reason! What kind of counsel is this 
 that thou art giving me? " 
 
 He said : " The enemies of Hossein attributed the same 
 thing to him on the Plain of Karbela. If thou didst realize 
 thou wouldst see that thou hast no better friend than I in 
 this wide world." 
 
 In short, I found that all my persistence and persuasion 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 75 
 
 could not move him. I was going to speak again when he 
 said: 
 
 "Please! Don't push me against the wall! I have 
 fully made up my mind. God forbid that I should leave 
 this Fortress. I have found this place so that through 
 self-sacrifice I may attain to the Most Great Bounty." 
 
 I said : " What power is in this place that keeps thee so 
 fast? " 
 
 He answered, with the fire of enthusiasm in his eyes: 
 
 " The power of self-sacrifice ! " 
 
 For a long time I was at a loss what to say. Finally 
 I said: "Mollah Mehdi! If thou dost not desire to 
 come out for thy sake have pity on thy children and thy 
 wife. On the eve of my departure from Teheran thy wife 
 came to me with thy little boy and entreated me to do my 
 utmost to release thee. Thy children were crying all the 
 time, saying : * We want our father ! We want our 
 father! ' Their crying and lamentation are yet ringing in 
 my ears. Come friend, have pity on thy little children and 
 thy wife. Listen to the pleadings of their young, innocent 
 voices. Dost thou not hear them? "... 
 
 After a few moments of silence, during which deep 
 emotion played upon his face, he thundered out with a 
 resonant voice: 
 
 "Man! What do I want to do with wife and children! 
 I have given them as trusts into the Hands of God ! He is 
 their Father! Go, go! and leave me to my fate! Go and 
 live with thy wife and children! Go and chase the will 
 o' the wisp of pleasure for a few days longer ! Go and be 
 satisfied with these phantasmal appearances! Mine, mine, 
 is the chalice of self-sacrifice! Mine, mine is the wine of 
 martyrdom! Mine, mine is the fire of self-immolation! " 
 
 Abdul Baha 
 
76 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 114 
 
 . . . An old and blood-bespattered man, half -dead from 
 the wounds inflicted but a few hours before; a man lying 
 in the cold and dirt, without sleep for fifty-five nerve- 
 wrecking hours, without food for nearly as long, with the 
 dead bodies of two sons almost before his eyes, the piled 
 corpses of his seven slain comrades near and far, a wife 
 and a bereaved family listening in vain, and a Lost Cause, 
 the dream of a lifetime, lying dead in his heart. Around 
 him was a group of bitter, inquisitive Southern aristocrats 
 and their satellites, headed by one of the foremost leaders 
 of subsequent secession. 
 
 " Who sent you — who sent you? " these inquisitors in- 
 sisted. 
 
 " No man sent me — I acknowledge no master in human 
 form! " 
 
 " What was your object in coming? " 
 
 " We came to free the slaves." 
 
 " How do you justify your acts? " 
 
 "You are guilty of a great wrong against God and 
 humanity and it would be perfectly right for any one to 
 interfere with you so far as to free those you wilfully and 
 wickedly hold in bondage. I think I did right; and that 
 others will do right who interfere with you at any time 
 and at all times. I hold that the Golden Rule, ' Do unto 
 others as ye would that others should do imto you,' applies 
 to all who would help others to gain their liberty." . . . 
 
 " Do you consider this a religious movement? " 
 
 " It is in my opinion the greatest service man can render 
 to God." 
 
 " Do you consider yourself an instrument in the hands 
 of Providence? " 
 
 "I do." 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 77 
 
 "Upon what principles do you justify your acts?" 
 
 " Upon the Golden Rule. I pity the poor in bondage 
 that have none to help them. That is why I am here; 
 not to gratify any personal animosity, revenge, or vindic- 
 tive spirit. It is my sympathy with the oppressed and the 
 wronged, that are as good as you and as precious in the 
 sight of God." . . . 
 
 " Who are your advisers in this movement? " 
 
 " I have numerous sympathizers throughout the entire 
 North. ... I want you to understand that I respect the 
 rights of the poorest and weakest of coloured people, op- 
 pressed by the slave system, just as much as I do those of 
 the most wealthy and powerful. That is the idea that has 
 moved me and that alone. We expected no reward except 
 satisfaction of endeavouring to do for those in distress and 
 greatly oppressed as we would be done by. The cry of dis- 
 tress of the oppressed is my reason, and the only thing that 
 prompted me to come here." . . . 
 
 " Brown, suppose you had every nigger in the United 
 States, what would you do with them? " 
 
 " Set them free." ... 
 
 " To set them free would sacrifice the life of every man 
 in this commimity." 
 
 "I do not think so." 
 
 "I know it; I think you are fanatical." 
 
 " And I think you are fanatical. Whom the gods would 
 destroy they first make mad, and you are mad." . . . 
 
 Governor Wise interrupted : " Mr. Brown, the silver 
 of your hair is reddened by the blood of crime, and you 
 should eschew these hard words and think upon eternity. 
 You are suffering from wounds perhaps fatal; and should 
 you escape death from these causes, you must submit to 
 a trial which may involve death. Your confessions justify 
 the presumption that you will be found guilty; and even 
 
78 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 now you are committing a felony mider the laws of Vir- 
 ginia, by uttering sentiments like these. It is better you 
 should turn your attention to your eternal future than be 
 dealing in denunciations which can only injure you." 
 
 John Brown replied : " Governor, I have from all ap- 
 pearances not more than fifteen or twenty years the start 
 of you in the journey to that eternity of which you kindly 
 warn me; and whether my time here shall be fifteen months, 
 or fifteen days, or fifteen hours, I am equally prepared 
 to go. There is an eternity . behind and an eternity be- 
 fore; and this little spark in the centre, however long, is 
 but comparatively a minute. The difference between your 
 tenure and mine is trifling, and I therefore tell you to be 
 prepared. I am prepared. You have a heavy responsi- 
 bility, and it behooves you to prepare more than it does 
 me." 
 
 TV, E. Burghardt Du Bois 
 
 115 
 
 At eleven o'clock on Friday, December 2nd, John Brown 
 was brought out of the jail accompanied by Sheriff 
 Campbell and assistants, and Capt. Avis, the jailer. 
 
 Sheriff Campbell bid the prisoner farewell in his cell, 
 the latter returning thanks for the sheriff's kindness, and 
 speaking of Capt. Pate as a brave man. 
 
 The prisoner was then taken to the cell of Copeland 
 and Green ; he told them to stand up like men and not to be- 
 tray their friends; he then handed them a quarter each, 
 saying he had no more use for money and bid them adieu. 
 He then visited Cook and Coppie, who were chained to- 
 gether, and remarked to Cook, " You have made false 
 statements." Cook asked, " What do you mean? " 
 Brown answered, "Why, by stating that I sent you to 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 79 
 
 Harper's Ferry." Cook replied, " Did you not tell me at 
 Pittsburg to come to Harper's Ferry and see if Forbes 
 had made any disclosures?" Brown: "No, sir; you 
 know I protested against your coming." Cook replied: 
 " Capt. Brown, we remember differently," at the same time 
 dropping his head. 
 
 Brown then turned to Coppie, and said, " Coppie, you 
 also made false statements, but I am glad to hear that you 
 have contradicted them. Stand up like a man." He also 
 handed him a quarter. He shook both by the hand, and 
 they parted. 
 
 The prisoner was then taken to Stephens' cell and they 
 kindly interchanged greetings. Stephens said, " Good-bye, 
 Captain, I know you are going to a better land." Brown 
 replied, " I know I am." Brown told him to bear up and 
 not betray his friends, giving him a quarter. 
 
 The prisoner then told the Sheriff he was ready, his 
 arms were pinioned, and with a black slouch hat on, and 
 the same clothes he wore during the trial, he proceeded to 
 the door, apparently calm and cheerful. . . . 
 
 On the way to the scaffold Mr. Saddler, an undertaker, 
 who was in the wagon with him remarked : " Capt. Brown, 
 you are a game man." He answered, " Yes, I was so trained 
 up ; it was one of the lessons of my mother — but it is hard 
 to part from friends, though newly made." He then re- 
 marked, " This is a beautiful country ; I never had the 
 pleasure of seeing it before." 
 
 As he came out the six companies of infantry and one 
 troop of horse, with General Taliaferro and his entire 
 staff, were deploying in front of the jail, whilst an open 
 wagon with a pine box, in which was a fine oak coffin, 
 was waiting for him. 
 
 Brown looked around and spoke to several persons he 
 recognized, and walking down the steps, took a seat on 
 
80 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 the cofl&n box along with the jailer, Avis. . . . Brown was 
 accompanied by no ministers, he desiring no religious serv- 
 ices. . . . 
 
 On reaching the gallows he observed Mr. Hunter and 
 Mayor Green standing near, to whom he said, " Gentlemen, 
 good-bye," his voice not faltering. 
 
 The prisoner walked up the steps firmly, and was the 
 first man on the gallows. Avis and Sheriff Campbell stood 
 by his side, and after shaking hands and bidding an af- 
 fectionate adieu, he thanked them for their kindness. 
 When the cap was put over his face, and the rope around 
 his neck, Avis asked him to step forward on the trap. He 
 replied, "You must lead me, I cannot see." The rope 
 was adjusted, and the military order given, " Not ready 
 yet." The soldiers marched, countermarched and took 
 position as if an enemy were in sight, and were thus oc- 
 cupied for nearly ten minutes, the prisoner standing all the 
 time. Avis inquired if he was not tired. Brown said, 
 "No, not tired; but don't keep me waiting longer than is 
 necessary." 
 
 While on the scaffold. Sheriff Campbell asked him if he 
 would take a handkerchief in his hand to drop as a signal 
 when he was ready. He replied, " No, I do not want it — 
 but do not detain me any longer than is absolutely neces- 
 
 ^* Contemporary Account of the Event 
 
 116 
 
 My Dearly Beloved Wife, Sons and Daughters, Every one — 
 As I now begin what is probably the last letter I shall 
 ever write to any of you, I conclude to write you all at 
 the same time. ... I am waiting the hour of my public 
 murder with great composure of mind, and cheerfulness, 
 feeling the strongest assurance that in no other possible 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 81 
 
 way could I be used to so much advance the cause of God 
 and of humanity, and that nothing that either I or all my 
 family have sacrificed or suffered will be lost. The re- 
 flection that a wise and merciful as well as just and holy 
 God rules not only the affairs of this world but of all 
 worlds, is a rock to set our feet upon under all circum- 
 stances, even those most severely trying ones into which 
 our own follies and wrongs have placed us. I have now 
 no doubt but that our seeming disaster will ultimately re- 
 sult in the most glorious success. So my dear shattered 
 and broken family, be of good cheer, and believe and trust 
 in God, with all your heart and with all your soul, for 
 he doeth all things well. Do not feel ashamed on my ac- 
 count; nor for one moment despair of the cause, or grow 
 weary of well doing. I bless God; I never felt stronger 
 confidence in the certain and near approach of a bright 
 morning and glorious day. . . . 
 
 John Brown 
 
 117 
 
 Now these are my ideas. They constitute a part of my- 
 self. I cannot divest myself of them, nor would I if I 
 could. If you think that you can crush out these ideas 
 that are gaining ground more and more every day, if you 
 think that you can crush them out by sending us to the 
 gallows, if you would once more have people suffer the 
 penalty of death because they dare to tell the truth, then 
 I say you may call your hangman and turn me and my 
 friends over to him. We have not told anything but the 
 truth. I defy you to show us where we have told a lie. 
 I shall die proudly and defiantly in the Cause of Truth, 
 as so many martyrs have done whom I could name to you 
 and among them Christ. Why, the number cannot be 
 
82 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 even estimated of those who have fallen in this path, and 
 we are ready. 
 
 August Spies 
 
 118 
 
 ... I have no fear nor shrinking; I have seen death so 
 often that it is not strange or fearful to me. . . . 
 
 I thank God for this ten weeks' quiet before the end. 
 . . . Life has always been hurried and full of difficulty. 
 . . . This time of rest has been a great mercy. . . . 
 
 They have all been very kind to me here. But this I 
 would say, standing as I do in view of God and eternity, 
 I realize that patriotism is not enough. I must have no 
 hatred or bitterness toward any one. . . . 
 
 Good-bye! We shall meet again. 
 
 Edith Cavell 
 
 119 
 
 ... He [Karl Liebknecht] got what belonged to him. 
 He got death. What better thing could come to man 
 than the right kind of death? What kind of life can equal 
 some kinds of death? He didn't go out looking for what 
 he got. But something went out looking for and got him. 
 . . . The super-saviours can be got on very easy terms 
 if you plan right. But after you've done them, you find 
 they trouble you more than ever when you've nailed their 
 coffins down. John Brown's body song has inspired the 
 heroism of races. Karl Liebknecht's soul song will invoke 
 the cataclysm of an international brotherhood. . . . We 
 are already facing the traditions of a proletarian pilgrim- 
 age. His name is becoming the talisman of a noble inten- 
 tion. It has assumed such realities of reassurance as to 
 strengthen every latent passion for social amelioration. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 83 
 
 Some men seem to live only to die. He, on the contrary, 
 died only to live. As he fell back in that mob done to death 
 by the implements of a barbarian past, I can imagine his 
 old father in the shadows with outstretched arms seizing 
 him and crying, " Well done, Karl ! It's a blessed day. 
 You've put it on the calendar for ever." It was worth 
 while. Nothing seemed so like Karl's life as his death. 
 And nothing seemed so like his death as his life. They 
 must be proud of each other. 
 
 Horace Trauhel 
 
 120 
 
 Servant of God, well done! well hast thou fought 
 
 The better fight, who single hast maintained 
 
 Against revolted multitudes the cause 
 
 Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms, 
 
 And for the testimony of truth hast borne 
 
 Universal reproach, far worse to bear 
 
 Than violence; for this was all thy care — 
 
 To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds 
 
 Judg'd thee perverse. . . . 
 
 John Milton 
 
 121 
 
 When a man dies faithfully and laudably ... it is 
 still death he is avoiding. For he submits to some part of 
 death, for the very purpose of avoiding the whole. . . . 
 He submits to the separation of soul and body, lest the ^ 
 soul be separated from God. . . . Wherefore death is in- 
 deed . . . good to none while it is being actually suffered 
 . . . but it is meritoriously endured for the sake of re- 
 taining or winning what is good. 
 
 St. Augustine 
 
84 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 122 
 
 I understand the large hearts of heroes, 
 
 The courage of present times and all times . . . 
 
 The disdain and calmness of martyrs, 
 
 The mother of old, condemned for a witch, burnt with dry 
 
 wood, her children gazing on . . . 
 I am the mashed fireman with breast-bone broken. 
 Tumbling walls buried me in their debris. 
 Heat and smoke I inspired, I heard the yelling shouts of 
 
 my comrades, 
 I heard the distant click of their picks and shovels. 
 They have cleared the beams away, they tenderly lift me 
 
 forth. . . . 
 
 Walt Whitman 
 
 123 
 
 We worship the destroyer. We despise or at least ignore 
 the builder. . . . You look with awe upon a battlefield. 
 Do you not look with as much awe upon a tunnel? Here 
 is an honest battle. A battle with the rocks. . . . Here 
 is a battle in which no other takes up his arms against a 
 brother. Yet this battle, too, has its victims. And you 
 look on and think and say nothing. . . . You look down 
 into these holes in the groimd and your pulse is undis- 
 turbed. . . . What is the matter? . . . 
 
 Some men die that you may live. Some on scafifolds 
 Some on crosses. Some on battlefields. Some in tunnels 
 Why should not the tunnel be as holy as the cross? . . 
 You can understand Jesus on the cross. You can under 
 stand Savonarola burned at the stake. You can under 
 stand John Brown, executed at Harper's Ferry. Why do 
 you fail to understand this somebody sacrificed in the 
 tunnel? I do not say that the cross and the stake and the 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 85 
 
 scaffold have tricked you. But I do say that the tunnel 
 has tricked you. . . . For if you fail to understand the 
 tunnel you deny all martyrdom. . . . 
 
 He died humbly crushed underneath a rock. They have 
 brought him out of the ground. His face is pale but 
 satisfied. Your city of millions will not stay in its heavy 
 round to regard his anonymous visage. Yet this unknown 
 man has saved your city. But for him your city could 
 not exist. All labour lies there prostrate in his inert form. 
 Come out of your churches, all of you, and worship here. 
 Leave your creeds behind. This is creed enough. Wor- 
 ship here. Here is religion enough. 
 
 Horace Traubel 
 
 124 
 
 ... the dignity of death — the only earthly dignity 
 that is not artificial — the only safe one. The others are 
 traps that beguile to humiliation. 
 
 Death — the only immortal who treats us all alike, whose 
 pity and whose peace and whose refuge are for all — the 
 soiled and the pure — the rich and the poor — the loved 
 and the unloved. 
 
 Mark Twain 
 
 125 
 
 The ways of Death are soothing and serene 
 And all the words of Death are grave and sweet. 
 From camp and church, the fireside and the street. 
 She beckons forth — and strife and song have been. 
 
 A summer night descending cool and green 
 And dark on daytime's dust and stress and heat, 
 The ways of Death are soothing and serene 
 And all the words of Death are grave and sweet. 
 
86 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 glad and sorrowful, with triumphant mien 
 And radiant faces look upon and greet 
 This last of all your lovers, and to meet 
 Her kiss, the Comforter's, your spirit lean — 
 The ways of Death are soothing and serene. 
 
 William E, Henley 
 
 126 
 
 thou the last fulfilment of life. Death, my death, come 
 and whisper to me! 
 
 Day after day have I kept watch for thee; for thee have 
 I borne the joys and pangs of life. 
 
 All that I am, that I have, that I hope and all my 
 love have ever flowed towards thee in depth of secrecy. 
 One final glance from thine eyes and my life will be ever 
 thine own. 
 
 The flowers have been woven and the garland is ready 
 for the bridegroom. After the wedding the bride shall 
 leave her home and meet her lord in the solitude of night. 
 
 Rabindranath Tagore 
 
 127 
 
 1 have got my leave. Bid me farewell, my brothers! 
 I bow to you all and take my departure. 
 
 Here I give back the keys of my door — and I give up 
 all claims to my house. I only ask for last kind words 
 from you. 
 
 We were neighbours for long, but I received more than 
 I could give. Now the day has dawned and the lamp 
 that lit my dark corner is out. A summons has come and 
 I am ready for my journey. 
 
 Rabindranath Tagore 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 87 
 
 128 
 
 Ah, well, friend Death, good friend thou art. 
 
 Thy only fault thy lagging gait. 
 Mistaken pity in thy heart 
 
 For timorous ones that bid thee wait. 
 
 Do quickly all thou hast to do, 
 
 Nor I nor mine will hindrance make; 
 
 I shall be free when thou art through; 
 I grudge thee nought that thou must take! 
 
 Helen Hunt Jackson 
 
 129 
 
 ... I hold 
 That if it be 
 Less than enough to any soul to know 
 Itself immortal, immortality 
 In all its boundless spaces will not find 
 A place designed 
 So small, so low. 
 That to a fittting home such soul can go. 
 
 Out to the earthward brink 
 Of that great tideless sea 
 Light from Christ's garments streams. 
 Cowards who fear to tread such beams 
 The angels can but pity when they sink. 
 Believing thus, I joy although I lie in dust. 
 I joy, not that I ask or choose. 
 But simply that I must. 
 
 I love and fear not; and I cannot lose 
 
88 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 One instant, this great certainty of peace. 
 Long as God ceases not, I cannot cease; I must arise. 
 
 Helen Hunt Jackson 
 
 130 
 
 Let me live out my years in heat of blood! 
 Let me die drunken with the dreamer's wine! 
 Let me not see this soul-house built of mud 
 Go toppling to the dust — a vacant shrine! 
 
 Let me go quickly like a candle light 
 Snuffed out just at the heyday of its glow! 
 Give me high noon — and let it then be night! 
 Thus would I go. 
 
 And grant me, when I face the grisly Thing, 
 One haughty cry to pierce the gray Perhaps! 
 Let me be as a time-swept fiddlestring 
 That feels the Master-Melody — and snaps! 
 
 John G. Neihardt 
 
 131 
 
 Give me to die unwitting of the day. 
 And stricken in Life's brave heat, with senses clear: 
 Not swathed and couched until the lines appear 
 Of Death's wan mask upon the withering clay, 
 But as that old man eloquent made way 
 From earth, a nation's conclave hushed anear; 
 Or as the chief whose fates, that he may hear 
 The victory, one glorious moment stay. 
 Or, if not thus, then with no cry in vain, 
 No ministrant beside to ward and weep, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 89 
 
 Hand upon helm I would my quittance gain 
 In some wild turmoil of waters deep, 
 And sink content into a dreamless sleep 
 (Spared grave and shroud) below the ancient main. 
 
 E, C, Stedman 
 
 132 
 
 Death, thou'rt a cordial old and rare: 
 Look how compounded, with what care! 
 Time got his wrinkles reaping thee 
 Sweet herbs from all antiquity. 
 
 David to thy distillage went, 
 Keats, and Gotama excellent, 
 Omar Khayyam, and Chaucer bright, 
 And Shakespeare for a king-delight. 
 
 Then, Time, let not a drop be spilt: 
 Hand me the cup whene'er thou wilt; 
 'Tis thy rich stirrup-cup to me; 
 I'll drink it down right smilingly. 
 
 Sidney Lanier 
 
 133 
 
 So mayst thou die as I do; fear and pain 
 Being subdued. Farewell! Farewell! Farewell! 
 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley 
 
 134 
 
 Natural death is as it were a haven and a rest to us 
 after long navigation. And the noble Soul is like a good 
 mariner; for he, when he draws near to port, lowers his 
 sail and enters it softly with gentle steerage. . . . And 
 
90 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 herein we have from our own nature a great lesson of 
 suavity; for in such a death as this there is no grief nor 
 any bitterness; but as a ripe apple is lightly and with- 
 out violence loosened from its branch, so our soul with- 
 out grieving departs from the body in which it hath been. 
 
 Dante 
 
 135 
 
 Happy, Agricola! Not only in the splendour of your 
 life, but in the seasonableness of your death. With resig- 
 nation and cheerfulness, from the testimony of those who 
 were present in your last moments, did you meet your 
 fate. ... If there is any place for the departed spirits 
 of the righteous; if, as philosophers suppose, exalted souls 
 do not perish with the body, may you repose in peace, 
 and call us, your household, from vain regret ... to the 
 contemplation of your virtues which allow no place for 
 mourning. 
 
 Tacitus 
 
 136 
 
 . . . From that time, such as he had been in all combats, 
 serene, self-possessed, and occupied without anxiety only 
 with what was necessary to sustain them — such also he 
 was in that last conflict. Death appeared to him no more 
 frightful, pale and languishing, than amid the fires of 
 battle and in the prospect of victory. While sobbings 
 were heard all around him, he continued, as if another 
 than himself were their object, to give his orders; and if 
 he forbade their weeping, it was not because it was a dis- 
 tress to him, but simply a hindrance. 
 
 The manner in which he began to acquit himself of his 
 religious duties, deserves to be recounted throughout the 
 world; not because it was particularly remarkable; but 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 91 
 
 rather because it was, so to speak, not such; for it seemed 
 singular that a Prince so much under the eye of the world, 
 should furnish so little to spectators. Do not then, expect 
 those magniloquent words which serve to reveal, if not a 
 concealed pride, at least an agitated soul, which combats 
 or dissembles its secret trouble. The Prince of Conde 
 knew not how to utter such pompous sentences; in death, 
 as in life, truth ever formed his true grandeur. 
 
 ... All were in tears, and weeping aloud. The Prince 
 alone was unmoved; trouble came not into that asylum 
 where he had cast himself. . . . Tranquil in the arms of 
 his God, he waited for his salvation, and implored His sup- 
 port until he finally ceased to breathe. . , . 
 
 James Benigne Bossuet 
 
 137 
 
 So live, that when thy summons comes to join 
 The innumerable caravan, which moves 
 To that mysterious realm, where each shall take 
 His chamber in the silent halls of death. 
 Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, 
 Scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothed 
 By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, 
 Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
 About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. 
 
 William Cullen Bryant 
 
 138 
 
 I ask not that my bed of death 
 
 From bands of greedy heirs be free; 
 
 For these besiege the latest breath 
 
 Of fortune's favoured sons, not me. . . • 
 
92 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 I ask but that my death may find 
 The freedom to my life denied; 
 Ask but the folly of mankind 
 Then, then at last, to quit my side. 
 
 Spare me the whispering, crowded room, 
 The friends who come, and gape, and go; 
 The ceremonious air of gloom — 
 All, which makes death a hideous show! 
 
 Nor bring, to see me cease to live. 
 Some doctor full of phrase and fame, 
 To shake his sapient head, and give 
 The ill he cannot cure a name. 
 
 Nor fetch, to take the accustom'd toll 
 Of the poor sinner bound for death, 
 His brother-doctor of the soul, 
 To canvass with official breath 
 
 The future and its viewless things — 
 
 That undiscovered mystery 
 
 Which one who feels death's winnowing wings >^ 
 
 Must needs read clearer, sure, than hel 
 
 Bring none of these, but let me be. 
 While all around in silence lies. 
 Moved to the window near, and see 
 Once more, before my dying eyes, 
 
 Bathed in the sacred dews of morn 
 
 The wide aerial landscape spread — 
 
 The world which was ere I was bom. 
 
 The world which lasts when I apa deadj , . . 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 93 
 
 There let me gaze, till I become 
 In soul, with what I gaze on, wed! 
 To feel the miiverse my home; 
 To have before my mind — instead 
 
 Of the sick room, the mortal strife, 
 The turmoil for a little breath — 
 The pure eternal course of life. 
 Not human combatings with death! 
 
 Thus, feeling, gazing, might I grow 
 Composed, refreshed, ennobled, clear; 
 Then willing let my spirit go 
 To work or wait elsewhere or here. 
 
 Matthew Arnold 
 
 139 
 
 Now while I sat in the day and looked forth, 
 
 Now in the close of the day with its light and the fields of 
 
 spring, and the farmers preparing their crops. 
 In the large unconscious scenery of my land with its lake 
 
 and forests, ... 
 Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift passing, 
 
 and the voices of children and women . . . 
 
 . . . lo, then and there, 
 Falling upon them all and among them all, enveloping me 
 
 with the rest, 
 Appeared the cloud, appeared the long black trail. 
 And I knew death, its thought, and the sacred knowledge of 
 
 death. 
 
 Then with the knowledge of death as walking one side of 
 me. 
 
94 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 And the thought of death close walking the other side of 
 
 me, 
 And I in the middle as with companions, and as holding 
 
 the hands of companions, 
 I fled forth to the hiding receiving night that talks not, 
 Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in 
 
 the dimness. 
 To the solemn shadowy cedars and ghostly pines so still. 
 
 And the singer so shy to the rest received me. 
 
 The gray-brown bird I know received us comrades three, 
 
 And he sang the carol of death, and a verse for him I love. 
 
 From deep secluded recesses. 
 
 From the fragrant cedars and the ghostly pines so still, 
 
 Came the carol of the bird. 
 
 And the charm of the carol wrapt me. 
 
 As I held as if by their hands my comrades in the night, 
 
 And the voice of my spirit tallied the song of the bird. 
 
 Come, lovely and soothing Death, 
 
 Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving. 
 
 In the day, in the night, to all, to each. 
 
 Sooner or later delicate Death. 
 
 Praised be the fathomless universe. 
 
 For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious; 
 And for love, sweet love — but praise! praise! praise! 
 For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death. 
 
 Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet. 
 Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome? 
 Then I chant it for thee — / glorify thee above all; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 95 
 
 / bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come 
 unfalteringly. 
 
 Approach, Strong Deliveress, 
 
 When it is so — when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing 
 
 the dead. 
 Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee. 
 Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death. 
 
 From me to thee glad serenades. 
 
 Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee — adornments and 
 
 feastings for thee. 
 And the sights of the open landscape, and the high-spread 
 
 sky, are fitting. 
 And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night. 
 
 The night, in silence, under many a star; 
 
 The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose 
 
 voice I know; 
 And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veiled Death, 
 And the body gratefully nestling close to thee. 
 
 Over the tree-tops I float thee a song! 
 
 Over the rising and sinking waves — over the myriad fields 
 
 and the prairies wide; 
 Over the dense packed cities all, and the teeming wharves 
 
 and ways, 
 I float this carol with joy, with joy to thee, Death. 
 
 Walt Whitman 
 
 140 
 
 Thou Eternal One, we who are doomed to die lift 
 up our souls to thee for strength, for Death has passed us 
 
96 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 in the throng of men and touched us, and we know that 
 at some turn of our pathway he stands waiting to take us 
 by the hand and lead us — we know not whither. We 
 praise thee that to us he is no more an enemy but thy 
 great angel and our friend, who alone can open for some 
 of us the prison house of pain and misery. . . . Yet we are 
 but children, afraid of the dark and the unknown, and we 
 dread the parting from the life that is so sweet and from 
 the loved ones who are so dear. 
 
 Grant us of thy mercy a valiant heart, that we may tread 
 the road with head uplifted and a smiling face. May 
 we do our work to the last with a wholesome joy, and 
 live our lives with an added tenderness because the days 
 of love are short. ... If our spirit droops in loneliness, 
 uphold us by thy companionship. When all the voices of 
 love grow faint and drift away, thy everlasting arms will 
 still be there. Thou art the father of our spirits; from 
 thee we have come; to thee we go. . . . 
 
 Walter Rauschenbusch 
 
PART II 
 IMMORTAL LIFE 
 
There is, I know not how, in the minds of men, a certain 
 presage as it were, of a future existence. And this takes 
 the deepest root, and is most discoverable in the greatest 
 geniuses and most exalted souls, 
 
 Cicero 
 
IMMORTAL LIFE 
 
 141 
 
 Where there is eternal light, in the world where the sun 
 is placed, in that immortal, imperishable world, place me, 
 Sonia ! Where the secret place of heaven is, where these 
 mighty waters are, there make me immortal! Where life 
 is free, . . . where the worlds are radiant, there make 
 me immortal! . . . Where there is happiness and delight, 
 where joy and pleasure reside, where the desires of our 
 desire are attained, there make me immortal! 
 
 Hindus 
 
 142 
 
 Man never dies. The soul inhabits the body for a time, 
 and leaves it again. The soul is myself; the body is only 
 my dwelling place. Birth is not birth: there is a soul al- 
 ready existent when the body comes to it. Death is not 
 death: the soul merely departs and the body falls. It is 
 because men see only their bodies that they love life and 
 hate death. 
 
 Buddhist Scriptures 
 
 143 
 
 The soul is not born; it does not die. It was not pro- 
 duced from any one, nor was any produced from it. 
 Unborn, eternal, it is not slain, though the body is slain. 
 
 Buddhist Scriptures 
 99 
 
100 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 144 
 
 The soul is the principle of life which the Sovereign 
 Wisdom employed to animate bodies. Matter is inert and 
 perishable. The soul thinks, acts and is immortal. . . . 
 There is another invisible, external existence superior to 
 this visible one, which does not perish when all things 
 perish. 
 
 Bhagavadgita 
 145 
 
 The God of the Dead waits enthroned in immortal light 
 to welcome the good into his kingdom of joy: to the homes 
 he had gone to prepare for them, where the One Being 
 dwells beyond the stars. 
 
 Vedas 
 146 
 
 The soul lives after the body dies. The soul passes 
 through the gate; he makes a way in the darkness to his 
 Father. He has pierced the heart of evil, to do the things 
 of his Father. He has come a prepared Spirit. He says: 
 Hail, thou Self -Created ! Do not turn me away. I am one 
 of thy types of earth. I have not privily done evil against 
 any man; I have not been idle; I have not made any to 
 weep; I have not murdered; I have not defrauded; I have 
 not committed adultery. I am pure. 
 
 (The Judge of the Dead answers) Let the soul pass 
 on. He is without sin; he lives upon truth. He has made 
 his delight in doing what men say, and what the gods 
 wish. He has given food to the hungry, drink to the 
 thirsty, and clothes to the naked. His lips are pure, and 
 his hands are pure. His heart weighs right in the balance. 
 The departed fought on earth the battle of the good gods, 
 as his Father, the Lord of the Invisible World, had com- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 101 
 
 manded him. God, the protector of him who has 
 brought his cry unto thee, make it well with him in the 
 world of Spirits. 
 
 Egyptian Book of the Dead 
 
 147 
 
 These have found grace in the eyes of the Great God. 
 They dwell in the abodes of glory, where the heavenly life 
 is led. The bodies which they have abandoned will repose 
 for ever in their tombs, while they will enjoy the presence 
 of the Great God. 
 
 Writing in Egyptian Tomb 
 
 148 
 
 The virtuous man rejoices in this world, and he will re- 
 joice in the next world: in both worlds hath he joy. He 
 rejoices, he exults, seeing the virtue of his deeds. 
 
 As kindred, friends and dear ones salute him who hath 
 travelled far and returned home safe, so will good deeds 
 welcome him who goes from this world and enters an- 
 other, 
 
 Buddha 
 149 
 
 . . . Souls risen from the grave will know each other, 
 and say. That is my father, or my brother, my wife, or my 
 sister. 
 
 The man who has constantly contended against evil, 
 morally and physically, outwardly and inwardly, may fear- 
 lessly meet death; well assured that radiant Spirits will 
 lead him across the luminous bridge into a paradise of 
 eternal happiness. 
 
 Zoroaster 
 
102 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 150 
 
 Verily, man's lot is cast amid destruction. Save those 
 who believe and do the things which be right, and enjoin 
 truth, and enjoin steadfastness on each other. 
 
 Verily, we have made all that is on earth as its adorn- 
 ment, that we might make trial who among mankind would 
 excel in works. 
 
 All that is with you passeth away, but that which is 
 with God abideth. . . . 
 
 The grave is the first stage of the journey into eternity. 
 
 Mohammed 
 151 
 
 They live, who lie in the grave. 
 
 Sophocles 
 152 
 
 'Tis true, 'tis certain; man though dead retains 
 Part of himself; the immortal mind remains. 
 
 Hom£r 
 153 
 
 The soul of the deceased, although it live 
 Indeed no longer, yet doth it still retain 
 A consciousness which lasts for ever, lodged 
 In the eternal scene of its abode. 
 The liquid ether. 
 
 Euripides 
 
 154 
 
 The immortality of the soul has been established beyond 
 the reach of doubt. . . . But to understand its real nature, 
 we must look at the soul not . . . after it has been marred 
 by its associations with the body, and by other evils; but 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 103 
 
 we must carefully contemplate it by the aid of reasoning, 
 when it appears in unsullied purity; and then its sur- 
 passing beauty will be discovered. . . . We have given a 
 true account of the soul in its present appearance. But 
 we have looked at it in a state like that of the sea-god 
 Glaukos, whose original nature can no longer be readily 
 discerned by the eye, because the old members of his body 
 have been either broken off, or crushed and in every way 
 marred by the action of the waves, and because extraneous 
 substances, like shell-fish and seaweed and stones, have 
 grown to him, so that he bears a closer resemblance to any 
 wild beast whatever than to his natural self. The soul, 
 as we are contemplating it, has been reduced to a similar 
 state by a thousand evils. But we ought to fix our atten- 
 tion on one part of it exclusively ... on its love of 
 wisdom, that we may learn to what it clings, and with 
 w^hat it desires to have intercourse, in view of its close con- 
 nexion with the divine, the immortal, and the eternal, and 
 what it would become if it invariably pursued the 
 divine. . . . 
 
 Plato 
 
 155 
 
 Whatsoever that be within us that feels, thinks, and 
 animates, is something celestial, divine, and consequently 
 imperishable. 
 
 Aristotle 
 
 156 
 
 My body must descend to the place ordained, but my 
 soul will not descend; being a thing immortal, it will 
 ascend on high, where it will enter a heavenly abode. 
 
 Heraclitus 
 
104 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 157 
 
 When thou shah have laid aside thy body, thou shalt rise, 
 freed from mortality, and become a god of the kindly skies. 
 
 Pythagoras 
 158 
 
 " In what way shall we bury you," said Crito. 
 
 " However you wish," [Socrates] replied, " only you 
 must catch me first and see that I don't slip away. . . . 
 Why, my friends, I can't convince Crito that I am this 
 Socrates, the one who talks with you and argues at length. 
 He thinks I am that other whom presently he shall see lying 
 dead, and so he asks how he shall bury me. All the words 
 I have spoken to show that when I drink the poison I shall 
 no longer remain with you, but shall go away to some 
 blessed region of the happy dead — all my words of com- 
 fort for y®u and for myself are thrown away on him. . . . 
 I would have Crito bear the matter more lightly, and not 
 be troubled at my supposed sufferings when he sees my 
 body burned or interred, nor say at the funeral that he is 
 laying out Socrates, or carrying Socrates to the grave, or 
 burying him. For you must know, my dearest Crito, that 
 wrong words are not only a fault in themselves, but in- 
 sinuate evil into the soul. Be brave, therefore, and say 
 you are burying my body; and indeed you may bury it 
 as seems good to you, and as custom directs. . . . 
 
 " We are permitted, nay, obliged to pray the gods to 
 grant us a happy journey from this world to the other. 
 So I pray, and so may it be." 
 
 Plato 
 159 
 
 Let us hasten — let us fly — 
 Where the lovely meadows lie; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 105 
 
 Where the living waters flow; 
 Where the roses bloom and blow. 
 Heirs of immortality, 
 Segregated, safe and pure, 
 Easy, sorrowless, secure; 
 Since our earthly course is run, 
 We behold a brighter sun. 
 Holy lives — a holy vow — 
 Such rewards await us now. 
 
 Aristophanes 
 
 160 
 
 Then whosoever have been of good courage to the abid- 
 ing steadfast thrice on either side of death, and have re- 
 frained their souls from all iniquity, travel the road of 
 Zeus unto the tower of Kronos; there around the islands 
 of the blest the ocean breezes blow, and golden flowers 
 are glowing, some from the land on trees of splendour, 
 and some the water feedeth, with wreaths whereof they en- 
 twine their hands. ... By happy lot travel all imto an 
 end that giveth them rest from toils. 
 
 Pindar 
 
 161 
 
 glorious day, when I shall remove from this confused 
 crowd to join the divine assembly of souls! For I shall go 
 not only to meet great men, but also my own son. His 
 spirit, looking back upon me, departed to that place whither 
 he knew that I should soon come; and he has never deserted 
 me. If I iiave born his loss with courage, it is because 
 I consoled myself with the thought that our separation 
 would not be for long. 
 
 Cato 
 
106 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 162 
 
 From this life I depart as from a temporary lodging, 
 not as from a home. For nature has assigned it to us as an 
 inn to sojourn in, not a place of habitation. glorious 
 day! when I shall depart to that divine company and as- 
 semblage of spirits, and quit this troubled and polluted 
 scene. ... If I am wrong in this, that I believe the souls 
 of men to be immortal, I willingly delude myself: nor do 
 I desire that this mistake, in which I take pleasure, should 
 be wrested from me as long as I live. . . . 
 
 Cicero 
 
 163 
 
 When I consider the faculties with which the human soul 
 is endowed — its amazing celerity, its wonderful power of 
 recollecting past events, its sagacity in discerning the 
 future, together with its numberless discoveries in the arts 
 and sciences — I feel a conscious conviction that this active, 
 comprehensive principle cannot possibly be of a mortal 
 nature. 
 
 And as this increasing activity of the soul derives its 
 energy from its own intrinsic and essential powers, without 
 receiving it from any foreign or external impulse, it neces- 
 sarily follows that its activity must continue for ever. I 
 am induced to embrace this opinion, not only as agree- 
 able to the best deductions of reason, but also in deference 
 to the authority of the noblest and most distinguished 
 philosophers. 
 
 I consider this world as a place which Nature never in- 
 tended for my permanent abode; and I look on my de- 
 parture from it, not as being driven from my habitation, 
 but simply as leaving an inn. 
 
 Cicero 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 107 
 
 164 
 
 This life is only a prelude to eternity, where we are 
 to expect a new life, and another state of things. We 
 have no prospect of heaven here, but at a distance. Let us 
 therefore expect our last hour with courage — the last, I 
 say, to our bodies but not to our minds. The day which we 
 fear as our last, is but the birthday of our eternity. What 
 we fear as a rock proves to be a harbour, in many cases 
 to be desired, never to be refused. . . . That which we call 
 death is but a pause or suspension; in truth, a progress into 
 life. Only our thoughts look downward upon the body, 
 and not forward upon things to come. ... A great soul 
 takes no delight in staying with the body; it considers 
 whence it came, and knows whither it is to go. We shall 
 live in our bodies as if we were only to lodge in them this 
 night, and to leave them tomorrow. ... It is the care of a 
 wise and a good man to look to his manners and actions, 
 and rather how well he lives than how long. For to die 
 sooner or later is not the business, but to die well or ill; 
 for death brings us to immortality. 
 
 Seneca 
 
 165 
 
 Not by lamentations and mournful chants ought we to 
 celebrate the funeral of a good man, but by hymns; for, 
 in ceasing to be numbered with mortals, he enters upon the 
 heritage of a diviner life. 
 
 Plutarch 
 
 166 
 
 The messenger you sent to tell me of the death of our 
 daughter missed his way. But I heard of it through an- 
 other. 
 
108 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 I pray you let all things be done without ceremony or 
 timorous superstition. And let us bear our affliction with 
 patience. I do know very well what a loss we have had; 
 but, if you should grieve overmuch, it would trouble me still 
 more. She was particularly dear to you; and when you 
 call to mind how bright and innocent she was, how amiable 
 and mild, then your grief must be peculiarly bitter. . . . 
 
 But should the sweet remembrance of those things which 
 so delighted us when she was alive, only afflict now when 
 she is dead? Or is there danger that, if we cease to mourn, 
 we shall forget her? . . . Since she is gone where she 
 feels no pain, let us not indulge in too much grief. The 
 soul is incapable of death. And she, like a bird not long 
 enough in her cage to become attached to it, is free to fly 
 away to a purer air. . . . Since we cherish a trust like 
 this, let our outward actions be in accord with it, and let 
 us keep our hearts pure and our minds calm. 
 
 Plutarch 
 
 167 
 
 Mother, leave thy grief, remembering the soul which 
 Zeus has rendered immortal and undecaying to me for all 
 time, and has carried now into the starry sky. 
 
 Epitaph 
 
 168 
 
 Dying, thou art not dead! Thou art gone to a happier 
 
 country, 
 And in the isles of the blest thou rejoicest . . . and thou 
 
 shalt find not 
 Hunger or thirst any more, but, unholpen of man and un- 
 
 heedful, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 109 
 
 Spotless and fearless of sin, thou exultest in view of 
 
 Olympus; 
 Yea, and thy gods are thy light, and their glory is ever upon 
 
 thee. 
 
 Greek Anthology 
 
 169 
 
 Men said within themselves, reasoning not aright. 
 Short and sorrowful is our life and there is no healing 
 when a man cometh to his end. ... By mere chance were 
 we bom, and hereafter we shall be as though we had never 
 been: . . . the breath in our nostrils is smoke, and while 
 our heart beateth reason is a spark which being extinguished 
 the body shall be turned into ashes and the spirit shall be 
 dispersed as thin air; ... our life shall pass away as the 
 traces of a cloud and shall be scattered as is a mist when 
 it is chased by the beams of the sun and overcome by the 
 heat thereof. 
 
 Thus reasoned they and they were led astray. . . . For 
 God created man to be immortal, and made him in the 
 image of his own eternity. . . . The souls of the righteous 
 are in the hands of God, and there can no evil touch them. 
 In the sight of the unwise they seem to die and their going 
 from us is thought to be destruction; but they are in peace, 
 for their hope is full of immortality. 
 
 The Wisdom of Solomon 
 
 170 
 
 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, be- 
 lieve also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions : 
 if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare 
 a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, 
 
110 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that where I 
 am, there ye may be also. 
 
 Jesus 
 
 171 
 
 Some man will say, How are the dead raised up, and 
 with what body do they come? 
 
 Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, ex- 
 cept it die: and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not 
 that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of 
 wheat, or of some other grain: but God giveth it a body as 
 it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. 
 
 All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of 
 flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and 
 another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and 
 bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and 
 the glory of the terrestial is another. There is one glory 
 of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another 
 glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star 
 in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. 
 
 It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption : 
 . . . it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is 
 sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. 
 
 There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. 
 . . . Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that 
 which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. 
 . . . As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: 
 and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. 
 And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also 
 bear the image of the heavenly. 
 
 Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot 
 inherit the kingdom of God ; neither doth corruption inherit 
 incorruption. . . . For this corruptible must put on incor- 
 ruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 111 
 
 So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, 
 and this mortal shall have put on inunortality, then shall be 
 brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swal- 
 lowed up in victory. 
 
 death, where is thy sting? grave, where is thy 
 victory? 
 
 Paul 
 
 172 
 
 . . . Those men who have forsaken human instruction, 
 and having become well-disposed disciples of God, and 
 having arrived at a comprehension of knowledge acquired 
 without labour, have passed over to the immortal a most 
 perfect race of beings, and have so received an inheritance 
 better than the former generations of created men. . . . 
 There is also another proof that the mind is immortal, 
 which is of this nature : — There are some persons whom 
 God, advancing to higher degrees of improvement, has 
 enabled to soar above all species and genera, having placed 
 them near himself; as he says to Moses, "But stand thou 
 here with me." . . . Nor do I ever believe that the soul 
 itself while awaiting this event was conscious of its own 
 improvement, inasmuch as it was at that time becoming 
 gradually divine, for God, in the case of those persons 
 whom he is about to benefit, does not take him who is to 
 receive the advantage into his counsels, but is accustomed 
 rather to pour his benefits ungrudgingly upon him with- 
 out his having any previous anticipation of them. 
 
 Philo 
 
 173 
 
 As some poor exile on a distant shore. 
 With sorrowful eye surveys the country o'er. 
 And oft looks back, and oft recalls to mind 
 
112 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 The pleasing coast and friends he left behind, 
 
 Unwilling views the cheerful light of day, 
 
 And in ideal prospects pines away; 
 
 So grieves my soul while absent and distrest. 
 
 She roams an exile from her place of rest. 
 
 Oh! haste the period, when from body free, 
 
 This wretched captive shall return to thee; 
 
 Shall once more recognize her kindred soil, 
 
 And prove the blessing of her former toil; 
 
 Plac'd where no change impairs, no griefs corrode, . 
 
 And shining 'midst the immortal gods a god. 
 
 Plotinus 
 
 174 
 
 If our flesh shrinks from prison, if it abhors everything 
 which denies it the power of roaming about ; when it seems, 
 indeed, to be always going forth, with its little powers of 
 hearing or seeing what is beyond itself, how much more 
 does our soul desire to escape from that prison house of the 
 body, which, being free with movement like the air, goes 
 whither we know not, and comes whence we know not. 
 We know, however, that it survives the body, and that 
 being set free from the bars of the body, it sees with clear 
 gaze those things which before, dwelling in the body, it 
 could not see. . . . So, then, if death frees us from the 
 miseries of this world, it is certainly no evil, inasmuch 
 as it restores liberty and excludes suffering. 
 
 St. Ambrose 
 
 175 
 
 For why should I weep for thee, my most loving brother? 
 . . . For I have not lost but changed my intercourse 
 with thee; before we were inseparable in the body, — now 
 we are undivided in affection; for thou remainest with 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 113 
 
 me and ever wilt remain. . . . The ox seeks his fellow and 
 conceives itself incomplete, and by frequent lowing shows 
 its tender longing, if perchance that one is wanting with 
 whom it has been wont to draw the plough. ... In work 
 I was inferior, but in love more closely bound; not so 
 much fit through my strength as endurable through thy 
 patience. 
 
 . . . The strong spirit of our brotherhood had so in- 
 fused itself into each of us, that there was no need to 
 prove our love by caresses; but our minds being conscious 
 of our affection, we, satisfied with our inward love, did 
 not seem to require the show of caresses, whom the very ap- 
 pearance of each other fashioned for mutual love; for we 
 seemed I know not by what spiritual stamp or bodily like- 
 ness, to be the one in the other. . . . 
 
 As a certain evening was drawing on, I was complain- 
 ing that thou didst not revisit me when at rest, thou [who] 
 wast wholly present always. So that, as I lay with my 
 limbs bathed in sleep, thou wast alive to me; I could say: 
 "What is death, my brother? "... So then, I hold thee, 
 my brother, and neither death nor time shall tear thee from 
 me. . . . For we have not ever been long separated from 
 each other, but thou wast always sure to return. Since thou 
 oanst not return again, I will go to thee; it is just that 
 I should repay the kindness and take my turn. 
 
 To thee. Almighty God, I commend this guileless soul. 
 I offer beforehand these first libations of myself. I come 
 to Thee with this pledge of life. Cause me not to re- 
 main too long a debtor to such an amount. I can bear it, 
 if I shall be soon compelled to pay it. 
 
 Go before us to that home common and waiting for all, 
 and certainly now longed for by me beyond others. Pre- 
 pare a common dwelling for him with whom thou hast 
 dwelt, and as here we have had all things in common, so 
 
114 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 there, too, let us know no divided rights. Do not, I pray 
 thee, long put off him who is desirous of thee, expect him 
 who is hastening to thee, help him who is hurrying, and 
 if I seem to thee to delay too long, summon me. 
 
 St. Ambrose 
 
 176 
 
 Where is he, the impeller of my work, whose voice was 
 sweeter than the swan's last song? . . . Though I am loth 
 to give way and comfort my feelings, tears flow down 
 my cheeks and in spite of the teachings of virtue and the 
 hope of the resurrection, a passion of regret crushes my 
 too yielding mind. . . . The immortality of the soul and 
 its continuation after the dissolution of the body — truths 
 of which Pythagoras dreamed . . . and which Socrates dis- 
 cussed in prison to console himself . . . are now the 
 familiar themes of Indian and of Persian, of Goth and of 
 Egyptian. 
 
 . . . What can we do, my soul? Whither must we turn? 
 . . . Are you so preoccupied with grief, so hindered by 
 sobs, that you forget all logical sequence? ... I have read 
 the consolatory writings of Plato, Diogenes, Clitomachus, 
 Carneades, Posidonius, who at diff'erent times strove by 
 book or letter to lessen the grief of various persons. Con- 
 sequently, were my own wit to dry up, it could be watered 
 anew from the fountains which these have opened. . . . 
 We know indeed that Nepotian is with Christ and that he has 
 joined the choirs of the saints. What here with us he 
 groped after on earth afar ofif and sought for to the best 
 of his judgment, there he sees nigh at hand so that he can 
 say: " as we have heard so have we seen in the city of the 
 Lord of hosts, in the city of our God." Set a limit, I pray 
 you, to your sorrow and remember the saying " in nothing 
 overmuch." Bind up for a little while your wound and 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 115 
 
 listen to the praises of one in whose virtues you have always 
 delighted. . . . Where now are that handsome face and 
 dignified figure with which as with a fair garment his 
 beautiful soul was clothed? The lily began to wither, alas! 
 when the south wind blew, and the purple violet slowly 
 faded into paleness. Yet while he burned with fever and 
 while the fire of sickness was drying up the fountains of 
 his veins, gasping and weary he still tried to comfort his 
 sorrowing uncle. His countenance shone with gladness, 
 and while all around him wept, he and he only smiled. 
 He flung aside his cloak, put out his hand, saw what others 
 failed to see, and even tried to rise that he might welcome 
 new comers. You would have thought that he was start- 
 ing on a journey instead of dying and that in place of 
 leaving all his friends behind him he was merely passing 
 from some to others. 
 
 St. Jerome 
 
 177 
 
 He had understanding of righteousness, and discerned 
 great and marvellous wonders; and he prevailed with the 
 Most High, and is numbered among the saintly company. 
 
 Church Service 
 
 178 
 
 Where miracles are there tears ought not to be. . . . 
 In the case of our dead, likewise, a great mystery is cele- 
 brating. . . . Wouldst thou learn that thou mayst know, 
 that this is no time for tears? ... As if leaving her dwell- 
 ing, the soul goes forth, speeding her way to her own 
 Lord, and dost thou mourn? Why then thou shouldst do 
 this on the birth of a child; for this in fact is also a birth, 
 and a better than that. For here she goes forth to a very 
 difi'erent light, is loosed as from a prison-house, comes off 
 
116 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 as from a contest. . . . For as the Sun arises clear and 
 bright, so the soul, leaving the body with a pure conscience, 
 shines joyously. Not such the spectacle of Emperor as he 
 comes in state to take possession of the city, not such the 
 hush of awe, as when the soul, having quitted the body, 
 is departing in company with Angels. Think what the soul 
 must then be! in what amazement, what wonder, what de- 
 light! 
 
 St. John Chrysostom 
 
 179 
 
 There is coming a reaping, Death, that will leave thee 
 bare: and the Watchers shall go forth as reapers, and make 
 thee desolate. . . . Does not the seed teach thee, which de- 
 cays and dies: and is cut off from hope, yet from the rain, 
 recovers hope? . . . The babe in the womb confutes thee, 
 which is as buried there; to me it proclaims life from the 
 dead, but to thee despoiling. The despised flower despises 
 thee, for it is shut up and passed over: yet though lost, 
 it is not lost, but blossoms again. The chick cries out 
 from the egg, wherein it is buried: and the graves are rent 
 by a Voice and the body arises. 
 
 Ephraem Syrus 
 
 180 
 
 Is it a misfortune to pass from infancy to youth? Still 
 less can it be a misfortune to go from this miserable life 
 to that truer life into which we are introduced by death. 
 Our first changes are connected with the progressive de- 
 velopment of life. The new change which death effects is 
 only the passage to a more desirable perfection. 
 
 Gregory of Nyssa 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 117 
 
 181 
 
 ... As the eye, by virtue of the bright ray which is in 
 fellowship with the light, and by its innate capacity draws 
 to itself that which is akin to it, . . . so was it needful 
 that a certain afiinity with the Divine should be mingled 
 with the nature of man, in order that by means of this cor- 
 respondence it might aim at that which was native to it. 
 . . . Thus, then, it was needful for man, born for the en- 
 joyment of Divine good, to have something in his nature 
 akin to that in which he is to participate. . . . Since, then, 
 one of the excellences connected with the Divine nature 
 is also eternal existence, it was altogether needful that the 
 equipment of our nature should not be without the further 
 gift of this attribute, but should have in itself the immortal, 
 that by its inherent faculty it might both recognize what is 
 above it, and be possessed with a desire for the divine and 
 eternal life. 
 
 Gregory of Nyssa 
 
 182 
 
 A state of happiness ought to be perfect, so that there 
 can be nothing which can harass, or lessen, or change it. 
 Nor can anything be judged happy in other respect, unless 
 it be incorruptible. But nothing is incorruptible but that 
 which is immortal. Immortality therefore is alone happy, 
 because it can neither be corrupted nor destroyed. But 
 if virtue falls within the power of man, which no one can 
 deny, happiness also belongs to him. For it is impossible 
 for a man to be wretched who is endued with virtue. If 
 happiness falls within his power, then immortality, which 
 is possessed of the attribute of happiness, also belongs 
 to him. 
 
 The chief good, therefore, is found to be immortality 
 
118 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 alone, which pertains to no other animal or body; nor can 
 it happen to any one without the virtue of knowledge, that 
 is, without the knowledge of God and justice. 
 
 Lactantius 
 
 183 
 
 That the soul is made immortal is a further point. . . . 
 This can be made clear once for all from the action of 
 the soul in the body. For if even when united and coupled 
 with the body, it is not shut in or commensurate with the 
 small dimensions of the body . . . much more shall its life 
 continue after the death of the body. . . . For this is the 
 reason why the soul thinks of and bears in mind things 
 immortal and eternal, namely, because it is itself immortal. 
 Just as, the body being mortal, its senses also have mortal 
 things as their objects, so, since the soul contemplates 
 and beholds immortal things, it follows that it is immortal 
 and lives for ever. For ideas and thoughts about im- 
 mortality never desert the soul, but abide in it, and are as 
 it were the fuel in it which ensures its immortality. . . . 
 
 Athanasius 
 
 184 
 
 It is plain that the human soul is of such a character that, 
 if it diligently observes that end for which it exists, it at 
 some time lives in blessedness, truly secure from death 
 itself and from every other trouble. 
 
 Hence the soul that has once begun to enjoy supreme 
 Blessedness will be eternally blessed. 
 
 But undoubtedly all human souls are of the same nature. 
 Hence, since it is established that some are immortal, every 
 human soul must be immortal. 
 
 Su Anselm 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 119 
 
 185 
 
 In the heavenly kingdom the souls of the Saints are re- 
 joicing, who followed the footsteps of Christ their Master, 
 and since for love of Him they freely poured forth their 
 life-blood, therefore with Christ they reign for ever and 
 ever. 
 
 Church Service 
 
 186 
 
 Holy is the true light, and passing wonderful, lending 
 radiance to them that endured in the heat of the conflict: 
 from Christ they inherit a home of unfading splendour, 
 wherein they rejoice with gladness evermore. 
 
 Church Service 
 
 187 
 
 ... In that place they shall forget this world. There 
 they have no want; and they shall love one another with 
 an abundant love. In their bodies there shall be no 
 heaviness, and lightly shall they fly as doves to their 
 windows. . . . Fervent in their heart will be the love of 
 each other; and hatred will not be fixed within them at 
 all. . . . The air of that region is pleasant and glorious, 
 and its light shines out, and is goodly and gladsome. . . . 
 Spacious is the region, nor is it limited, yet its inhabitants 
 shall see its distance even as that which is near. In that 
 place there is no deficiency, but fulness and perfection. 
 
 Aphraates 
 
 188 
 
 . . . The supreme good of the city of God is perfect and 
 eternal peace, . . . the peace of freedom from all evil, in 
 
120 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 which immortals ever abide, who can deny that this future 
 life is most blessed? . . . But the actual possession of the 
 happiness of this life, without the hope of what is beyond, 
 is but a false happiness and profound misery. For the 
 true blessings of the soul are not now enjoyed; for that 
 is no true wisdom which does not direct all its prudent 
 observations and just arrangements, to that end in which 
 God shall be all in all in a secure eternity and perfect 
 peace. There we shall enjoy the gifts of nature . . . gifts 
 not only good but eternal. There the virtues shall no 
 longer be struggling against any vice or evil, and shall en- 
 joy the reward of victory, the eternal peace which no 
 adversary shall disturb. This is the final blessedness, this 
 the ultimate consummation, the unending end. Here, in- 
 deed, we are said to be blessed when we have such peace 
 as can be enjoyed in a good life; but such blessedness 
 is mere misery compared to that final felicity. 
 
 St. Augustine 
 
 189 
 
 The true Jerusalem above, the holy town is there, 
 
 Whose duties are so full of joy, whose joy so free from 
 
 care; 
 "Where disappointment cometh not to check the longing 
 
 heart. 
 And where the heart, in ecstasy, hath gained her better part. 
 
 glorious King, happy state, palace of the blest! 
 sacred place and holy joy, and perfect heavenly rest, 
 To thee aspire thy citizens in glory's bright array 
 And what they feel and what they know they strive in vain 
 to say. 
 
 Abelard 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 121 
 
 190 
 
 There we shall taste how gracious the Lord is, see the 
 beauties of his holiness, the lustre of his Saints, and the 
 glories of his Palace and Throne. 
 
 There the saints' love shall never grow cold, their hopes 
 and expectations shall never languish by delays, for in God 
 all good shall be present with them and they shall all 
 partake in common of the same wisdom and power and 
 righteousness and peace. 
 
 No difference of language shall be there heard, but all 
 things uniform and hearts harmonious; the same disposi- 
 tions and the same affections. In the overflowing River 
 of this Pleasure there will be gratification to the full, the 
 perfection of bliss, and glory and gladness. 
 
 The desires of beholding and possessing thee will be ever 
 fresh and growing, and the delights of thee ever new and 
 entertaining. In thee our understandings will be enlight- 
 ened, in thee our affections ever purified, so as to know 
 and love the truth ever more and more. 
 
 Now we see bodies with the eyes of our body; we form 
 ideas of bodies by the powers of the Soul ; but then we shall 
 see God himself with a clear intuitive knowledge. 
 
 St. Bernard 
 
 191 
 
 most blessed mansion of the city which is above! 
 most clear day of eternity, which night obscureth not, but 
 the highest truth ever enlighteneth ! day ever joyful, 
 ever secure, and never changing into a contrary state! . . . 
 
 To the saints it shineth, glowing with everlasting bright- 
 ness, but to those that are pilgrims on the earth, it ap- 
 peareth only afar off, and as it were through a glass. 
 
 merciful Jesu, when shall I stand to behold thee? 
 
122 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 . . . When shall I be with thee in thy kingdom, which thou 
 hast prepared for thy beloved from all eternity? 
 
 Thomas a Kempis 
 
 192 
 
 The eternal manifestation of the divine light is called 
 the kingdom of heaven and the habitation of holy angels 
 and souls. . . . 
 
 But the soul sinketh down in the hope of divine grace 
 and standeth like a fair rose in the midst of thorns, until 
 the kingdom of this world falleth off from it in the death 
 of the body; and then doth it become first truly and really 
 manifest in the love of God having nothing more to hinder 
 or molest it. . . . 
 
 And though indeed the bestial body must putrifie and 
 rot, yet its power and virtue liveth and in the meanwhile 
 there grow out of its power in its Mother, fair beautiful 
 Roses, blossoms and flowers ; though it were quite burned up 
 and consimied in the Fire, yet its power and virtue standeth 
 in the four elements in the word and the soul qualifieth, 
 mixeth and uniteth therewith ; for the Soul is in Heaven and 
 the same heaven is everywhere even in the midst or centre 
 of the Earth. 
 
 Jakob Boehme 
 
 193 
 
 The nature of the soul is so simple that space cannot 
 hinder it. . . . 
 
 Its [the soul's] ardent longing for God compels it to 
 follow after Him, as fire follows its own nature until it 
 has consumed and transformed into itself the object upon 
 which it seized. . . . 
 
 The eternity of God knows neither first nor last, it is 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 123 
 
 an everlasting present in which the life and the works of 
 God take place, for God Himself is this now. . . . 
 
 The fruit of those [good] works remains in the spirit; 
 and although the work and the time are not eternal, never- 
 theless the spirit from which they proceeded, lives, and 
 the fruit of the work, but without the work and the time, 
 is full of grace. 
 
 Meister Eckhart 
 
 194 
 
 my God! how happy is the soul of which thou art the 
 delight, since it can abandon itself to loving thee, not only 
 without scruple, but also with merit! How firm and 
 durable is its happiness, since its expectation will never be 
 frustrated, because thou wilt never be destroyed, and neither 
 life nor death will ever separate it from the object of its 
 desires, . . . the [just] will subsist eternally in the eternal 
 and self-subsistent object to which they are closely bound! 
 Oh! how happy are those who with an entire liberty, and 
 irresistible inclination of their will, love perfectly and 
 freely that which they are obliged to love necessarily! 
 
 Pascal 
 
 195 
 
 . . . Let us no longer regard a man as having ceased to 
 live, although nature suggests it; but as beginning to live, 
 as truth assures. Let us no longer regard his soul as 
 perished and reduced to nothingness, but as quickened and 
 united to the sovereign life; and let us thus correct, by at- 
 tention to these truths, the sentiments of error so deeply 
 implanted in ourselves and those emotions of horror so 
 natural to mankind. 
 
 Pascal 
 
124 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 196 
 
 It has been urged, that the soul having been created 
 only to be united to the body, it is so limited to this 
 society, that its borrowed existence must cease when the 
 association with the body terminates. But it is speaking 
 wildly, and without proof, thus to assume that the soul 
 has been created with an existence confined solely to the 
 time of its society with the body. . . . We perceive that 
 the existence of the body is not confined to the duration of 
 its society with the soul. After death has severed this con- 
 nection, the body still exists, even to its most minute par- 
 ticles. We see two things only — the one, that the body is 
 separated and disintegrated; this cannot happen to the 
 soul, which is simple, indivisible, and void of arrange- 
 ment; the other, that the body moves no longer with de- 
 pendence on the thoughts of the soul. Should we not con- 
 clude, then, in the same manner, and with much greater 
 reason, that the soul continues to exist on its side, and that 
 it then commences to think, independently of the operations 
 of the body. 
 
 Fenelon 
 
 197 
 
 When one dies one feels the separation of the soul from 
 his body. When the soul thus separates itself, there is no 
 longer any sensation; he is without life, and death makes 
 a separation from all. But, when the man is raised up, 
 he feels himself revivified. When he is reanimated, he ex 
 periences in his new state that God is the soul of his soul 
 the life of his life, in such way that he makes himself the 
 as it were, natural principle of it, without the soul's feel 
 ing or perceiving it by reason of its unity or intimateness 
 
 Madame Guy on 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 125 
 
 198 
 
 I have had a presentiment that you would not survive 
 this illness. I lose in you my most faithful, and the only 
 friend on whom I could rely, in the persecutions which 
 threaten me. I feel my loss but rejoice in your happiness. 
 I could envy you. Death only lends a helping hand to rend 
 away the veil, which hides infinite beauties. Our Lord has 
 strongly cemented our souls. May the benediction of the 
 divine Master rest upon you. Go, blessed soul, and re- 
 ceive the recompense prepared for all those, who are wholly 
 the Lord's. Go, we separate in the name of the Lord; 
 I cannot say a last adieu, for we shall be for ever united 
 in Him. I hope in the goodness of God to be present 
 with you in heart and spirit, at the time of your departure, 
 and to receive with you, the divine Master who is waiting 
 for you. Be my ambassador in the courts above, and say 
 to Him I love Him. 
 
 Madame Guyon 
 
 199 
 
 . . . And when, Virgin, I shall come to die, 
 
 Remember that the poet is but a child, 
 
 And hush me with the little drowsy song 
 
 That soothed Him when His eyes with dreams were wild 
 
 And the vague mystery of the night was by. 
 
 He was a frightened child . . . nay, your eyes throng 
 
 With memories . . . and let it not be long, 
 
 The drowsiness; but croon. 
 
 And bring deep slumber soon. 
 
 And now it seems to me — oh, is it wrong — 
 
 I feel your tears fall on my tired head. . . . 
 
 And when I fall, seeing I wear your sleeve, 
 
 Succour me, Holy One, 
 
126 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Sun that outshines the sun! 
 
 Permit not that I faint alone and grieve. 
 
 Commend me to your Son that, when I cease 
 
 To breathe this air, He may, 
 
 True God and Man, plunge deep my soul in peace. 
 
 Petrarch 
 
 200 
 
 Let be, calling bird and rippling lake; 
 
 And, crystal cymbals of the running streams, 
 
 Cease your intolerable clash that seems 
 
 Her cries and laughter: for my soul's awake. 
 
 And all my helpless verse into the heart-break 
 
 Of song springs up. Nay, what is that? There gleams 
 
 A Silken Something where the wild rose teems, 
 
 I thought her in the clay, by some mistake. 
 
 Not understanding heaven; but rosy, tanned, 
 
 She's there — that movement — all the red and white: 
 
 " No tears ! No tears ! You do not understand 
 
 That, when I seemed to have closed my eyes that night, 
 
 I merely opened them upon a land 
 
 Like one great flower — Infinity — the Light." 
 
 PetTarch 
 
 201 
 
 Closer and closer come the golden calls — 
 
 My Lady's honied, nerve-convincing note: 
 
 How well I know its cadences by rote. 
 
 As they come lingering from the jasper walls; 
 
 And all my stoicism, how it falls! 
 
 When I look in a mirror — strange, remote, 
 
 A face looks up, on whose wan tints I gloat 
 
 And say: " How soon now you will deck Death's halls! " 
 
 If I could only know the when, the where. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 127 
 
 Of loosing this poor gown, so slight, so frail, 
 And yet so heavy with mortality. 
 The when, the where, of leaving my dim jail 
 The world, and meeting, high up in the air, 
 My Lord and Lady, who do wait me there! 
 
 Petrarch 
 
 202 
 
 splendour of God ! by means of which I saw 
 The lofty triumph of the realm veracious, 
 Give me the power to say how it I saw! 
 
 There is a light above, which visible 
 Makes the Creator unto every creature, 
 Who only in beholding Him has peace, 
 
 And it expands itself in circular form 
 To such extent, that its circumference 
 Would be too large a girdle for the sun. 
 
 The semblance of it is all made of rays 
 Reflected from the top of Primal Motion, 
 Which takes therefrom vitality and power 
 
 And as a hill in water at its base 
 
 Mirrors itself, as if to see its beauty 
 When aflBuent most in verdure and in flowers, 
 
 So, ranged aloft all round about the light, 
 
 Mirrored I saw in more ranks than a thousand 
 All who above there have from us returned. 
 
 And if the lowest row collect within it 
 So great a light, how vast the amplitude 
 Is of this Rose in its extremest leaves! 
 
 My vision in the vastness and the height 
 Lost not itself, but comprehended all 
 The quantity and quality of that gladness. . . . 
 
 In fashion then as if a snow-white rose 
 
 Displayed itself to me the saintly host, . . . 
 
128 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Their faces had they all of living flame, 
 
 And wings of gold, and all the rest so white 
 No snow unto that limit doth attain. . . . 
 
 This realm secure and full of gladsomeness, 
 Crowded with ancient people and with modern, 
 Unto one mark had all its look and love. 
 
 Dante 
 
 203 
 
 Whene'er the idol of these eyes appears 
 Unto my musing heart so weak and strong. 
 Death comes between her and my soul ere long 
 Chasing her thence with troops of gathering fears. 
 
 Nathless this violence my spirit cheers 
 
 With better hope than if she had no wrong; 
 
 While Love invincible arrays the throng 
 
 Of dauntless thoughts, and thus harangues his peers: 
 
 But once, he argues, can a mortal die; 
 
 But once be born: and he who dies afire. 
 What shall he gain if erst he dwell with me? 
 
 That burning love whereby the soul flies free, 
 Doth lure each fervent spirit to aspire 
 Like gold refined in flame to God on high. 
 
 Michael Angela 
 
 204 
 
 So friendly is the fire to flinty stone. 
 
 That, struck therefrom and kindled to a blaze, 
 It burns the stone, and from the ash doth raise 
 What lives thenceforward binding stones in one: 
 
 Kiln-hardened this resists both frost and sun. 
 Acquiring higher worth for endless days — 
 As the purged soul from hell returns with praise. 
 Amid the heavenly host to take her throne. 
 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 129 
 
 E'en so the fire struck from my soul, that lay 
 Close-hidden in my heart, may temper me, 
 Till burned and slaked to better life I rise. 
 
 If, made mere smoke and dust, I live today, 
 Fire-hardened I shall live eternally; 
 Such gold, not iron, my spirit strikes and tries. 
 
 Michael Angela 
 
 205 
 
 Now you see that the hope and the desire of return- 
 ing home and to one's former state is like the moth to the 
 light, and that the man who with constant longing waits 
 with joy each new spring time, each new summer, each 
 new month and new year — deeming that the things he 
 longs for are ever too late in coming — does not perceive 
 that he is longing for his own destruction. But this desire 
 is the very quintessence, the spirit of the elements, which 
 finding itself imprisoned with the soul is ever longing 
 to return from the human body to its giver. And you must 
 know that this same longing is that quintessence, insep- 
 arable from nature, and that man is the image of the world. 
 
 Leonardo da Vinci 
 
 206 
 
 The soul can never be corrupted with the corruption 
 of the body, but is in the body as it were the air which 
 causes the sound of the organ, where, when a pipe bursts, 
 the wind would cease to have any good effect. 
 
 Leonardo da Vinci 
 
 207 
 
 What is our true resurrection and renewment? Even 
 that God should reserve us and set us in his kingdom; that 
 when he has made us to wayfare through this world, and 
 
130 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 to pass through fire and water and all other afflictions, 
 we may in the end be exempted from all the miseries of this 
 world, and be made partakers of his life and glory. . . . 
 
 We truly hear that the Kingdom of God shall be stuffed 
 full with brightness, joy, felicity and glory. . . . 
 
 Seeing that we have such promises at God's hand, and 
 such assurance in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, we 
 ought to fight manfully against the dreadfulness of death. 
 
 Christ, therefore, is risen again, that he might have us 
 companions of the life to come. He was raised up of the 
 Father — he was raised up by the power of the Spirit, 
 which is common to us, unto the office of quickening. 
 
 John Calvin 
 
 208 
 
 ... Plain it is that every one that dieth, departeth either 
 in the faith of Christ Jesus, or departeth in incredulity; 
 plain it is, that they that depart in the true faith of Christ 
 Jesus rest from their labours, and from death do go to life 
 everlasting. 
 
 The departed are in peace, and rest from their labours; 
 not that they sleep, and come to a certain oblivion (as 
 some fantastic heads do affirm) , but that they are delivered 
 from all fear, all torment, and all temptation, to which 
 we and all God's elect are subject in this life. 
 
 John Knox 
 
 209 
 
 Woods, hills, and rivers, now are desolate 
 Sith he is gone, the which then all did grace; 
 And all the fields do wail their widow state, 
 Sith death their fairest flower did late deface; 
 The fairest flower in field that ever grew 
 Was Astrophel; that was we all may rue . . , 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 131 
 
 Break now your girlonds, ye shepherds' lasses! 
 Sith the fair flower which them adorned is gone; 
 The flower which them adorned is gone to ashes, 
 Never again let lass put girlond on: 
 Instead of girlond wear sad cypress now, 
 And bitter elder broken from the bough. 
 
 We ever sing the love-lays which he made; 
 Who ever made such lays of love as he? 
 We ever read the riddles which he said 
 Unto yourselves to make you merry glee: 
 Your merry glee is now laid all abed. 
 Your merry maker now, alas! is dead. 
 
 Death, the devourer of all world's delight. 
 Hath robbed you and reft from me my joy; 
 Both you and me, and all the world, he quite 
 Hath robbed of joyance, and left sad annoy. 
 Joy of the world, and shepherd's pride, was he; 
 Shepherds, hope never like again to see. 
 
 O Death ! that hast us of such riches reft. 
 Tell us, at least, what hath thou with it done? 
 What is become of him whose flower here left 
 Is but the shadow of his likeness gone? 
 Scarce like the shadow of that which he was. 
 Nought like, but that he like a shade did pass. 
 
 But that immortal spirit, which was decked 
 
 With all the dowries of celestial grace. 
 
 By sovereign choice from th* heavenly quires select, 
 
 And lineally derived from angels' race, 
 
 what is now of it become? aread: 
 
 Aye me! can so divine a thing be dead. 
 
132 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Ah! no: it is not dead, ne can it die. 
 But lives for aye in blissful paradise. 
 Where like a new-born babe it soft doth lie 
 In bed of lilies, wrapt in tender wise. 
 And compassed all about with roses sweet. 
 And dainty violets from head to feet. 
 
 There thousand birds, all of celestial brood, 
 To him do sweetly carol day and night, 
 And with strange notes, of him well understood. 
 Lull him asleep in angel-like delight; 
 Whilst in sweet dream to him presented be 
 Immortal beauties, which no eye may see. 
 
 But he them sees, and takes exceeding pleasure 
 Of their divine aspects, appearing plain. 
 And kindling love in him above all measure; 
 Sweet love, still joyous, never feeling pain; 
 For what so goodly form he there doth see 
 He may enjoy, from jealous rancour free. 
 
 There liveth he in everlasting bliss. 
 Sweet spirit! never fearing more to die, 
 Ne dreading harm from any foes of his, 
 Ne fearing savage beasts' more cruelty. 
 Whilst we here wretches wail his private lack. 
 And with vain vows do often call him back. 
 
 But live thou there still, happy, happy Spirit! 
 And give us leave thee here to lament; 
 Not thee that dost thy heaven's joys inherit. 
 But our own selves, that here in dole are drent. 
 Thus do we weep and wail, and wear our eyes, 
 Mourning in others our own miseries. 
 
 Edmund Spenser 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 133 
 
 210 
 .... I believe that the souls of those that die in the Lord 
 are blessed, and rest from their labours, and enjoy the sight 
 of God. . . . 
 
 Francis Bacon 
 
 211 
 
 . . . Christ said to Martha, "I am the resurrection and 
 the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead 
 (mark, though he were dead) yet shall he live (mark, 
 live though he be dead) ; and whosoever liveth, and 
 believeth in me, shall never die." . . . This is the true and 
 substantial belief. . . . The true servants of God have 
 their fruits unto holiness, and their end is everlasting life. 
 
 George Fox 
 
 212 
 
 After this it was noised abroad that Mr. Valiant-for-Truth 
 was sent for by a summons. ... When he understood it, 
 he called for his friends, and told them of it. Then, said 
 he, " I am going to my Father's; and though with great 
 diflSculty I have got hither, yet now I do not repent me 
 of all the trouble I have been at to arrive where I am. 
 My sword I give to him that shall succeed me in my 
 pilgrimage, and my courage and skill to him that can get 
 it. My marks and scars I carry with me, to be a witness 
 for me that I have fought His battles who will now be 
 my reward." When the day that he must go hence 
 was come, many accompanied him to the river-side, into 
 which as he went, he said, " Death, where is thy sting? " 
 And as he went down deeper, he said, " Grave, where is 
 thy victory? " So he passed over, and all the trumpets 
 sounded for him on the other side. 
 
 John Bunyan 
 
134 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 213 
 
 . . . Weep no more, 
 For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead. 
 Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor. 
 So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed. 
 And yet anon repairs his drooping head. 
 And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 
 Flames in the forehead of the morning sky: 
 So Lycidas, sunk low, but mounted high . . . 
 Where other groves and other streams along . . . 
 [He] hears the unexpressive nuptial song. 
 In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love. 
 There entertain him all the Saints above, 
 In solemn troops, and sweet societies. 
 That sing, and singing in their glory move, 
 And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes. 
 
 John Milton 
 
 214 
 
 . . . death like sleep, 
 A gentle wafting to immortal life. 
 
 John Milton 
 
 215 
 
 One short sleep past we wake eternally, 
 
 And Death shall be no more; Death thou shalt die. 
 
 John Donne 
 
 216 
 
 . . . Many things prove it palpably absurd to conclude 
 that we shall cease to be at death. . . . There is nothing 
 to be thought strange in our being able to exist in another 
 state of life. And that we are now living beings affords a 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 135 
 
 strong probability that we shall continue so; unless there is 
 some positive ground, and there is 'none from reason or 
 analogy, to think death will destroy us. . . . Indeed [a per- 
 suasion of this kind] can have no other ground than some 
 such imagination as that of our gross bodies being ourselves, 
 which is contrary to experience. Experience too most 
 clearly shows us the folly of concluding from the body 
 and the living agent affecting each other mutually, that 
 the dissolution of the former is the destruction of the latter. 
 There are remarkable instances of their not affecting each 
 other, which lead us to a contrary conclusion. The sup- 
 position, then, which in all reason we are to go upon, is 
 that our living nature will continue after death. . . ." 
 
 Bishop Butler 
 
 217 
 
 . . . It [is] uncertain what the state -of separation [is]; 
 . . . but it is ten to one that when we die, we shall j&nd the 
 state of affairs wholly differing from all our opinions here, 
 and that no man or sect hath guessed anything at all of it 
 as it is. . . . However it be, it is certain they [the de- 
 parted] are not dead; and though we no more see the 
 souls of our dead friends than we did when they were alive, 
 yet we have reason to believe them to know more things 
 and better. . . . 
 
 Jeremy Taylor 
 
 218 
 
 . . . There is something in us that can be without us, 
 and will be after us. ... I believe that the whole frame 
 of a beast doth perish, and is left in the same state after 
 death as before it materialled into life: that the souls of 
 men know neither contrary nor corruption; that they 
 subsist beyond the body, and outlive death by the privilege 
 
136 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 of their proper natures, and without a miracle; that the 
 souls of the faithful, as they leave earth, take possession 
 of heaven. . . 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne 
 
 219 
 
 . . . That souls remain after they are separated from 
 their bodies ... is a most ancient tradition. . . . Neither 
 can we find any argument drawn from nature which over- 
 throws this . . . tradition. . . . Nay, there are many not 
 inconsiderable arguments for the contrary; such as the 
 absolute power every man has over his own actions; a 
 natural desire of immortality; the power of conscience, 
 which comforts him when he has performed any good 
 actions, though never so difl&cult; and, on the contrary, tor- 
 ments him when he has done any bad thing, especially 
 at the approach of death. ... If then the soul be of such 
 a nature, [it] contains no principles of corruption; and 
 God has given us many tokens by which we ought to under- 
 stand that his will is, it should remain after its body. . . . 
 
 Hugo Grotius 
 
 220 
 
 How can it enter into the thoughts of man, that the 
 soul, which is capable of such immense perfections, and 
 of receiving new improvements to all eternity, shall fall 
 away into nothing almost as soon as it is created? Are 
 such abilities made to no purpose? . . . Were a human 
 soul thus at a stand in her accomplishments, were her 
 faculties to be full blown, and incapable of further en- 
 largements, I could imagine it might fall away insensibly, 
 and drop at once into a state of annihilation. But can we 
 believe a thinking being that is in a perpetual progress 
 of improvements, and travelling on from perfection to per- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 137 
 
 fection, after having just looked abroad into the works 
 of its Creator, and made a few discoveries of his infinite 
 goodness, wisdom and power, must perish at her first set- 
 ting out, and in the very beginning of her inquiries? 
 
 . . . There is not, in my opinion, a more pleasing and 
 triumphant consideration in religion, than this of the 
 perpetual progress which the soul makes towards the per- 
 fection of its nature, without ever arriving at a period 
 in it. To look upon the soul as going on from strength to 
 strength, to consider that she is to shine for ever with new 
 accessions of glory, and brighten to all eternity; that she 
 will be still adding virtue to virtue, and knowledge to 
 knowledge; carries in it something wonderfully agreeable 
 to that ambition which is natural to the mind of man. 
 Nay, it must be a prospect pleasing to God himself, to see 
 his creation for ever beautifying in his eyes, and drawing 
 nearer to him, by greater degrees of resemblance. 
 
 . . . With what astonishment and veneration may we 
 look into our own souls, where there are such hidden 
 stores of virtue and knowledge, such inexhausted sources 
 of perfection? . . . The soul, considered with its Creator, 
 is like one of those mathematical lines that may draw 
 nearer to another to all eternity without a possibility of 
 touching it: and can there be a thought so transporting, 
 as to consider ourselves in these perpetual approaches to 
 him, who is not only the standard of perfection but of 
 happiness! 
 
 Joseph Addison 
 
 221 
 
 He [God] is not eternity or infinity, but eternal and 
 infinite; he is not duration or space, but he endures and 
 is present. He endures for ever and is everywhere present ; 
 and by existing always and everywhere, he constitutes dura- 
 
138 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 tion and space. Every soul that has perception is, though 
 in different times and in different organs of sense and 
 motion, still the same indivisible person. There are given 
 successive parts in duration, co-existent parts in space, but 
 neither the one nor the other in the person of a man or his 
 thinking principle; and much less can there be found in 
 the thinking substance of God. 
 
 Sir Isaac Newton 
 
 222 
 
 . . . Eternity is the very essence of God, in so far as 
 this involves necessary existence. Imagination is the idea 
 wherewith the mind contemplates a thing as present, yet 
 this idea indicates rather the present disposition of the 
 human body than the nature of the eternal thing. There- 
 fore emotion is imagination in so far as it indicates the 
 present disposition of the body; therefore the mind is, only 
 while the body endures, subject to emotions which are 
 attributable to passions. Hence it follows that no love 
 save intellectual love is eternal. ... If we look to men's 
 general opinion we shall see that they are indeed con- 
 scious of the eternity of the mind, but that they confuse 
 eternity with duration and ascribe it to the imagination or 
 the memory which they believe to remain after death. 
 
 God is absolutely infinite, that is, the nature of God re- 
 joices in infinite perfection; and such rejoicing is ac- 
 companied by the idea of himself, that is, the idea of his 
 own cause: now this is what we have described as in- 
 tellectual love. 
 
 This love of the mind must be referred to the activities 
 of the mind; it is itself, indeed, an activity whereby the 
 mind regards itself accompanied by the idea of God as 
 cause; that is, an activity whereby God, in so far as can 
 be explained through the human mind, regards himself 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 139 
 
 accompanied by the idea of himself; therefore, this love 
 of the mind is part of the infinite love wherewith God 
 loves himself. 
 
 Hence it follows that God, in so far as he loves him- 
 self, loves man, and consequently, that the love of God 
 towards man, and the intellectual love of the mind towards 
 God, are identical. From what has been said we clearly 
 understand, wherein our salvation, or blessedness, or free- 
 dom consists; namely, in the constant and eternal love 
 towards God, and in God's love toward men. 
 
 Spinoza 
 
 223 
 
 God, out of his infinite mercy, . . . bestows eternal life 
 on mortal man. . . . This may serve to explain the . . . 
 sons of God, who are . . . like their Father, made after 
 his image and likeness. For this image, to which they 
 [are] conformed, [is] immortality and eternal life. 
 
 John Locke 
 
 224 
 
 It belongs only to the supreme Reason, whom nothing 
 escapes, distinctly to comprehend all the infinite and to' see 
 all the reasons and all the consequences. All that we can 
 do in regard to infinites is to know them confusedly, and 
 to know at least distinctly that they are such, otherwise 
 we judge very wrongly of the beauty and grandeur of the 
 universe; so also we could not have a sound Physics ex- 
 plaining the nature of bodies in general, and still less 
 a proper Pneumatology comprising the knowledge of God, 
 of souls, and of simple substances in general. 
 
 This knowledge of insensible perceptions serves also to 
 explain why and how two souls, human or otherwise, of 
 one and the same species never come forth perfectly alike 
 
140 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 from the hands of the Creator and have always each its 
 original relation to the points of view which it will have 
 in the universe. But this it is which already follows from 
 the remarks I have made about two individuals, viz.: 
 that their difference is always more than numerical. There 
 is, moreover, another point of importance, in respect to 
 which I am obliged to deviate not only from the opinions 
 of our author [Locke] but also from those of the majority 
 of modern philosophers: I believe with the majority of 
 the ancients that all genii, all souls, all simple created sub- 
 stances, are always joined to a body, and that there are 
 never souls entirely separated. I have a priori reasons 
 for my view, but the doctrine will be found to have this 
 advantage, that it resolves all the philosophical difficulties 
 as to the condition of souls, their perpetual conservation, 
 their immortality and their operation. The difference be- 
 tween one of their states and another, never being and 
 never having been other than that of more sensible to less 
 sensible, of more perfect to less perfect, or the reverse, this 
 doctrine renders their past or future state as explicable 
 as that of the present. One feels sufficiently, however little 
 reflection he makes, that this is rational, and that a leap 
 from one state to another infinitely different could not 
 be natural. I am astonished that by leaving the natural 
 without reason, the schoolmen have been willing purposely 
 to plunge themselves into very great difficulties, and to 
 supply matter for apparent triumphs of the strong-minded, 
 all of whose reasons fall at once by this explanation of 
 things, in which there is no more difficulty in conceiving 
 the conservation of souls than there is in conceiving the 
 change of the caterpillar into the butterfly, and the con- 
 servation of thought in sleep, to which Jesus Christ has 
 divinely well compared death. I have already said also 
 that sleep could not last always and that it will last least 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 141 
 
 or almost not at all in the case of rational souls who are 
 always destined to preserve the personality which has been 
 given them in the City of God, and consequently remem- 
 brance; and this in order to be more susceptible of chastise- 
 ments and recompenses. And I add further that in gen- 
 eral no derangement of the visible organs is capable of 
 throwing things into entire confusion in the animal or of 
 destroying all the organs and depriving the soul of all its 
 organic body and of the ineffaceable remains of all preced- 
 ing traces. . . . The perplexity into which men have fallen 
 by their ignorance . . . has caused us, in my opinion, 
 to neglect the natural explanation of the conservation of 
 the soul. This has done much harm to natural religion, 
 and has caused many to believe that our immortality was 
 only a miraculous grace of God. . . . 
 
 If any one should say that God may add the faculty 
 of thinking to the prepared mechanism, I should reply 
 that if this were done, and if God adds this faculty to matter 
 without putting therein at the same time a substance which 
 was the subject of inhesion of this same faculty, i.e., 
 without adding thereto an immaterial soul, it would be 
 necessary that matter should be miraculously exalted in 
 order to receive a power of which it is naturally incapable. 
 ... It is enough that it cannot be maintained that matter 
 thinks without putting into it an imperishable soul or a 
 miracle, and that thus the immortality of our souls follows 
 from what is natural, since their extinction can be main- 
 tained only by a miracle, whether by exalting matter or by 
 annihilating the soul. 
 
 Leibnitz 
 
 225 
 
 If the immortality of the soul were an error, I should 
 be sorry not to believe it. I avow that I am not so 
 
142 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 humble as the atheist; I know not how they think, but 
 for me, I do not wish to exchange the idea of immortality 
 against that of the beatitude of one day. I delight in 
 believing myself as immortal as God himself. Independ- 
 ently of revealed ideas, metaphysical ideas give me a vigour- 
 ous hope of my eternal wellbeing, which I would never 
 renounce. 
 
 Montesquieu 
 
 226 
 
 Man lives for ever, because he is capable of being con- 
 joined with God by love and faith; every one is capable of 
 this. 
 
 Emanuel Swedenborg 
 
 227 
 
 When the body is no longer able to discharge its func- 
 tions in the natural world, corresponding to the thoughts 
 and affections of its spirit which it has from the spiritual 
 world, then man is said to die. . . . Yet man does not die, 
 but is only separated from the bodily part which he had 
 for use in the world, and the man himself lives. It is said 
 that the man himself lives, because man is not man from 
 the body, but from the spirit, since the spirit thinks in 
 man, and thought with affection makes man. From this it 
 is plain that man when he dies, only passes from one 
 world to another. Hence it is that death ... in its in- 
 ternal sense, signifies resurrection and continuation of life. 
 
 Emanuel Swedenborg 
 
 228 
 
 The metaphysical arguments for the immortality of the 
 soul are . . . inconclusive; . . . the moral arguments or 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 143 
 
 those derived from the analogy of nature are strong and 
 convincing. 
 
 David Hume 
 229 
 
 It must be so — Plato, thou reasonest well! 
 
 Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 
 
 This longing after immortality? 
 
 Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror, 
 
 Of falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul 
 
 Back on herself, and startles at destruction? 
 
 'Tis the divinity that stirs within us; 
 
 'Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter. 
 
 And intimates eternity to man. 
 
 Joseph Addison 
 230 
 
 My words and thoughts do both expresse this notion, 
 That Life hath with the sun a double motion. 
 The first is straight, and our diurnal friend; 
 The other hid, and doth obliquely bend. 
 
 One life is wrapt in flesh, and tends to earth; 
 The other winds toward Him, Whose happie birth 
 Taught me to live here so that still one eye 
 Should aim and shoot at that which is on high; 
 Quitting with daily labour all my pleasure. 
 To gain at harvest an eternal Treasure. 
 
 George Herbert 
 231 
 
 Vital spark of heav'nly flame! 
 Quit, oh quit this mortal frame: 
 Trembling, hoping, ling'ring, flying. 
 Oh the pain, the bliss of dying! 
 
144 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Cease, fond Nature, cease thy strife, 
 And let me languish into life. 
 
 Hark! they whisper; Angels say, 
 Sister Spirit, come away. 
 What is this absorbs me quite? 
 Steals my senses, shuts my sight. 
 Drowns my spirits, draws my breath? 
 Tell me, my Soul, can this be Death? 
 
 The world recedes, it disappears! 
 
 Heav'n opens on my eyes! my ears 
 
 With sounds seraphic ring: 
 
 Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly! 
 
 Grave! Where is thy Victory? 
 
 Death! Where is thy Sting? 
 
 Alexander Pope 
 
 232 
 
 They are all gone into the world of light! 
 
 And I alone sit lingering here; 
 Their very memory is fair and bright, 
 
 And my sad thoughts doth clear. . . , 
 
 I see them walking in an air of glory, 
 Whose light doth trample on my days: 
 
 My days, which are at best but dull and hoary, 
 Mere glimmering and decays. . . . 
 
 Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the just, 
 
 Shining nowhere, but in the dark; 
 What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust, 
 
 Could man outlook that mark! 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 145 
 
 He that hath found some fledged bird's nest, may know 
 
 At first sight, if the bird be flown; 
 But what fair well or grove he sings in now 
 
 That is to him unknown. 
 
 And yet, as Angels in some brighter dreams 
 
 Call to the soul, when man doth sleep; 
 So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes, 
 
 And into glory peep. 
 
 H. Vaughan 
 
 233 
 
 Thou, as a gallant bark from Albion's coast 
 
 (The storms all weathered and the ocean crossed) 
 
 Shoots into port at some well-havened isle, 
 
 Where spices breathe, and brighter seasons smile, 
 
 There sits quiescent on the floods that show 
 
 Her beauteous form reflected clear below. 
 
 While airs impregnated with incense play 
 
 Around her, fanning light her streamers gay: 
 
 So thou, with sails how swift! hast reached the shore, 
 
 " Where tempests never beat nor billows roar," 
 
 And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide 
 
 Of life, long since has anchored by thy side. . . . 
 
 William Cowper 
 
 234 
 
 Should Fate command me to the farthest verge 
 Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, 
 Rivers unknown to song . . . 'tis nought to me, 
 Since God is ever present, ever felt. 
 In the void waste as in the city full, 
 
146 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 And where he vital spreads there must be joy. 
 When even at last the solemn Hour shall come, 
 And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, 
 I cheerful will obey; there, with new powers, 
 With rising wonders sing: I cannot go 
 Where Universal Love not smiles around, 
 Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their sons; 
 From seeming Evil still educing Good, 
 And better thence again, and better still, 
 In infinite progression. — But I lose 
 Myself in Him, in Light ineffable. . . . 
 
 James Thomson 
 
 235 
 
 In Nature everything is connected, like body and spirit. 
 Our future destination is a new link in the chain of being, 
 which connects itself with the present link most minutely, 
 and by the most subtle progression; as our earth is con- 
 nected with the sim, and as the moon is connected with the 
 earth. 
 
 When death bursts the bonds of limitation, God will 
 transplant us, like flowers, into quite other fields, and 
 surround us with entirely different circumstances. Who 
 has not experienced what new faculties are given to the 
 soul by a new situation — faculties which, in our old 
 comer, in the stifling atmosphere of old circumstances and 
 occupations, we had never imagined ourselves capable of. 
 
 In these matters we can do nothing but conjecture. But 
 wherever I may be, through whatever worlds I may be 
 led, I know that I shall for ever remain in the hands 
 of the Father who brought me hither, and who calls me 
 further on. 
 
 Herder 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 147 
 
 236 
 
 All, all on earth is ^adow, all beyond 
 Is substance; the reverse is folly's creed: . . . 
 This is the bud of being, the dim dawn, 
 The twilight of our day, the vestibule. 
 Life's theatre as yet is shut, and death, 
 Strong death, alone can heave the massy bar, 
 This gross impediment of clay remove. 
 And make us embryos of existence free. 
 From real life, but little more remote, 
 Is he not yet a candidate for light. 
 The future embryo, slumb'ring in his sire. 
 Embryos we must be, till we burst the shell. 
 Yon ambient azure shell, and spring to life. 
 The life of Gods, transport! and of man. 
 
 Edward Young 
 
 237 
 
 . . . Tell me, ye shining hosts 
 That navigate a sea that knows no storms, 
 Beneath a vault unsullied with a cloud, 
 If from your elevation, whence ye view 
 Distinctly scenes invisible to man, 
 And systems of whose birth no tidings yet 
 Have reached this nether world, ye spy a race 
 Favoured as ours, transgressors from the womb. 
 And hasting to a grave, yet doomed to rise. 
 And to possess a brighter heaven than yours? 
 As one who long detained on foreign shores 
 Pants to return, and when he sees afar 
 His country's weather-bleached and battered rocks 
 From the green wave emerging, darts an eye 
 Radiant with joy towards the happy land, 
 
148 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 So I with animated hopes behold, 
 
 And many an aching wish, your beamy fires, 
 
 That show like beacons in the blue abyss, 
 
 Ordained to guide the embodied spirit home, 
 
 From toilsome life to never-ending rest. 
 
 Love kindles as I gaze, I feel desires 
 
 That give assurance of their own success, 
 
 And that, infused from Heaven, must thither tend. 
 
 William Cowper 
 
 238 
 
 Two things there are which, the oftener and the more 
 steadfastly we consider them, fill the mind with an ever 
 new and ever rising admiration and reverence: the starry 
 heaven above, the moral law within. Both I contemplate 
 lying clear before me, and connect both immediately with 
 the consciousness of my own existence. The one begins 
 from the place I occupy in the outer world of sense; 
 expands, beyond the bounds of imagination, the connec- 
 tion of my body with it into a union with worlds rising 
 beyond worlds, and systems blending into systems; and 
 protends it also into the illimitable times of their periodic 
 movement, their commencement and duration. The other 
 begins with my invisible self, with my personality, and 
 represents me in a world truly infinite, indeed, but whose 
 infinity can be tracked out only by the intellect, and my 
 connection with which ... I am compelled to recognize 
 as universal and necessary. In the former, the first view 
 of a countless multitude of worlds annihilates, as it were, 
 my importance as an animal creation. The other, on the 
 contrary, immeasurably elevates my worth as an intelli- 
 gence; and this through my personality, in which the moral 
 law reveals to me a life independent of the animal king- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 149 
 
 dom, . . . which is not restricted by the conditions and 
 limits of this life, but stretches out into eternity. 
 
 Immanuel Kant 
 
 239 
 
 In perceiving the order, the prodigious skill, and the 
 mechanical and geometrical laws that reign in the imi- 
 verse, their causes and the innumerable ends of all things, 
 I am seized with admiration and respect. I immediately 
 judge that if the works of man, even my own, compel me 
 to acknowledge an intelligence within us, I should acknowl- 
 edge one far more superior actuating the multitude of so 
 many works. I admit of this supreme intelligence, without 
 fearing that I shall be obliged to change my opinion. 
 Nothing staggers me with respect to this axiom, every work 
 demonstrates a workman. 
 
 Is this intelligence eternal ? Doubtless, for whether I 
 admit or reject the eternity of matter, I cannot reject the 
 eternal existence of its supreme artisan; and it is evident 
 that if it exists at present, it ever has existed. . . . 
 
 We are far from pretending to any certainty that what 
 we call " soul " in the brutes perishes with them; we are 
 well assured matter never perishes at all; and we are of 
 opinion that it is possible God may have endowed animals 
 with somewhat that may retain to all eternity, if God so 
 please, the faculty of forming ideas. We are very far 
 from asserting that the thing is really and certainly so; 
 and it belongs not to man to be so confident of himself; 
 but we dare not set bounds to the power of the Deity. 
 We say it is extremely probable that the brutes, which are 
 mere matter, may have received from Him a certain por- 
 tion of intelligence. We discover daily certain properties 
 of matter; that is to say, so many gifts of the Deity, whereof 
 we had no manner of conception. 
 
150 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 , . . There is undoubtedly some property in light, which 
 distinguishes it from all other kinds of matter: it would 
 seem that light is a kind of middle substance between bodies 
 and the other kinds of entities, of which we are wholly 
 ignorant. It is very probable that those other species of 
 matter are themselves a certain middle rank which leads to 
 other creatures, and that there may be, in this maimer, a 
 certain chain of substances which rise to infinity. 
 
 This idea seems to us worthy of the greatness of God, if 
 ever any was or can be so. Among these substances He 
 might no doubt have chosen one, in order to place it in our 
 body, which is known by the name of " the human soul " ; 
 the sacred books which we have read tell us this soul is 
 immortal. Reason in this point agrees with revelation; 
 for how is it possible that any substance should perish? 
 And if all nature is destroyed, yet being must ever exist. 
 We cannot conceive such a thing as the creation of a sub- 
 stance; and it is equally impossible for us to form any 
 idea of its annihilation. 
 
 . . . Let us, therefore, live in peace like brothers who 
 adore one common father. . . . We have but a span of 
 existence to enjoy. Let us then enjoy it in peace, without 
 falling together by the ears for quibbles and knotty ques- 
 tions, which will be better resolved on our entering that 
 boundless ocean of eternity, which begins the moment our 
 hour-glass is entirely spent. 
 
 Voltaire 
 
 240 
 
 I believe in God as fully as I believe in any other truth. 
 If God exists, he is perfect; if he is perfect, he is wise, al- 
 mighty and just; if he is just and almighty, my soul is im- 
 mortal. 
 
 /. /. Rousseau 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 151 
 
 241 
 
 There is nothing more awful than to attempt to cast 
 a glance among the clouds and mists which hide the broken 
 extremity of the celebrated bridge in Mirza. Yet, when 
 every day brings us nigher that termination, one would 
 almost think our views should become clearer. Alas! it is 
 not so : there is a curtain to be withdrawn, a veil to be rent, 
 before we shall see things as they really are. There are 
 few, I trust, who disbelieve the existence of a God; nay, 
 I doubt if at all times, and in all moods, any single in- 
 dividual ever adopted that . . . creed, though some have 
 professed it. With the belief of a Deity, that of the im- 
 mortality of the soul ... is indissolubly linked. . . . 
 There is a God, and a just God — a judgment and a future 
 life — and all who own so much, let them act according to 
 the faith that is in them. 
 
 Sir Walter Scott 
 
 242 
 
 Unfading Hope! when life's last embers burn. 
 When soul to soul, and dust to dust return! 
 Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour! 
 Oh! then, thy kingdom comes! Immortal Power! 
 What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly 
 The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye! 
 Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey 
 The morning dream of life's eternal day. . . . 
 
 Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume 
 The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb; 
 Melt, and dispel, ye spectre-doubts, that roll 
 Cimmerian darkness o'er the parting soul! 
 Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay, 
 
152 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Chased on his night-steed by the star of day ! 
 The strife is o'er — the pangs of nature close, 
 And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes. 
 
 Soul of the just! companion of the dead! 
 Where is thy home, and whither art thou fled? 
 Back to its heavenly source thy being goes. 
 Swift as the comet wheels to whence he rose. . . . 
 From planet whirl'd to planet more remote. 
 He visits realms beyond the reach of thought; 
 But wheeling homeward, when his course is run, 
 Curbs the red yoke, and mingles with the sun ! 
 So hath the traveller of earth unfurl'd 
 Her trembling wings, emerging from the world; 
 And o'er the path by mortal never trod. 
 Sprung to her source, the bosom of her God! 
 
 Thomas Campbell 
 
 243 
 
 A being in whom the thought of immortality can arise, 
 cannot be mortal. 
 
 /. P. Richter 
 
 244 
 
 I should be the very last man to dispense with faith 
 in a future life. I have a firm conviction that the soul 
 is an existence of an indestructible nature, whose working 
 is from eternity to eternity. It is like the sun, which seems 
 indeed to set, but really never sets, shining on in unchange- 
 able splendour. 
 
 Goethe 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 153 
 
 245 
 
 To me the eternal existence of my soul is proved from 
 my idea of activity. If I work incessantly till my death, 
 nature is bound to give me another form of existence when 
 the present can no longer sustain my spirit. 
 
 Goethe 
 
 246 
 
 The belief in immortality is by no means incompatible 
 with atheism: for the same Necessity which in this life 
 threw my shining dewdrop of Me into a flower-bell and 
 under a sun, can repeat the process in a second life; in- 
 deed, it can embody me more easily the second time than 
 the first. 
 
 /. P. Richter 
 
 247 
 
 I trouble not myself about the manner of future exist- 
 ence. I content myself with believing, even to positive 
 conviction, that the Power which gave me existence is 
 able to continue it in any form and in any manner he 
 pleases, either with or without this body; and it appears 
 more probable to me that I shall continue to exist here- 
 after, than that I should have existence as I now have, be- 
 fore that existence began. 
 
 Thomas Paine 
 
 248 
 
 The consciousness of existence is the only conceivable 
 idea we can have of another life, and the continuance of 
 that consciousness is immortality. The consciousness of 
 
154 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 existence or the knowing that we exist, is not necessarily 
 confined to the same form, nor to the same matter, even 
 in this life. 
 
 We have not in all cases the same form, nor in any case 
 the same matter that composed our bodies twenty or thirty 
 years ago; and yet we are conscious of being the same 
 persons. . . . We know not how much, or rather how little, 
 of our composition it is, and how exquisitely fine that little 
 is, that creates in us this consciousness of existence; and 
 all beyond is like the pulp of a peach, distinct and sepa- 
 rate from the vegetative speck in the kernel. Who can say 
 by what exceedingly fine action of fine matter it is that a 
 thought is produced in what we call the mind? And 
 yet that thought when produced, as I now produce the 
 thought I am writing, is capable of becoming immortal, and 
 is the only production of man that has that capacity. 
 
 Thomas Paine 
 
 249 
 
 The body of Benjamin Franklin, printer (like the cover 
 of an old book, its contents torn out, and stripped of its 
 lettering and gilding), lies here food for worms, but the 
 work itself shall not be lost, for it will (as he believed) 
 appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, 
 corrected and amended by the author. 
 
 Benjamin Franklin 
 
 250 
 
 Life is a state of embryo, a preparation for life. A 
 man is not completely born until he has passed through 
 death. 
 
 Benjamin Franklin 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 155 
 
 251 
 
 All Death is Nature in Birth, and in Death itself ap- 
 pears visibly the exaltation of Life. There is no destruc- 
 tive principle in Nature, for Nature throughout is pure 
 unclouded Life; it is not Death that kills, but the more un- 
 clouded Life which concealed behind the former, bursts 
 forth into new development. Death and Birth are but the 
 struggle of Life with itself to assume a more glorious and 
 congenial form. And my death, — how can it be aught 
 else, since I am not a mere show and semblance of life, 
 but bear within me the one original, true and essential 
 Life? It is impossible to conceive that Nature should 
 annihilate a life which does not proceed from her; — the 
 Nature which exists for me and not I for her. . . . Even 
 because she destroys me must she animate me anew; it 
 is only my Higher Life, unfolding itself in her, before 
 which my present life can disappear; and what mortals 
 call Death is the visible appearance of this second Life. 
 Did no reasonable being who has once beheld the light 
 of this world die, there would be no ground to look with 
 faith for a new heavens and a new earth; the only pos- 
 sible purpose of Nature, to manifest and maintain Reason, 
 would be fulfilled here below, and her circle would be 
 completed. But the very act by which she consigns a 
 free and independent being to death, is her own solemn 
 entrance, intelligible to all Reason, into a region beyond 
 this act itself, and beyond the world-sphere of existence 
 which is thereby closed. Death is the ladder by which my 
 spiritual vision rises to a new Life and a new Nature. 
 
 Every one of my fellow creatures who leaves this earthly 
 brotherhood and whom, because he is my brother, my 
 spirit cannot regard as annihilated, draws my thoughts 
 after him beyond the grave ; — he is still, and to him 
 
156 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 there belongs a place. While we mourn for him here 
 below, — as, in the dim realms of our Consciousness there 
 might be mourning when a man bursts from them into the 
 light of this world's sun, — above there is rejoicing that a 
 man is born into that world, as we citizens of the earth 
 receive with joy those who are born unto us. When I 
 shall one day follow, it will be but joy for me; sorrow 
 shall remain behind in the sphere I shall have left. 
 
 Fichte 
 
 252 
 
 I do not, by empty words of consolation, want to tear 
 open again the wounds of your sorrow, but there is one 
 consolation for both of us, that the time is not distant when 
 our suffering and mourning bodies will be lain at rest for 
 a happy reunion with those we have loved and lost, and 
 we shall love for ever and never lose again. 
 
 Thomas Jefferson 
 
 253 
 
 But is this continuation of the person possible? After 
 the dissolution of the body, can anything of us remain? 
 In truth, the moral person which acts well or ill, ... is 
 united to a body, makes use of it, and, in a certain measure, 
 depends upon it, but is not it. The body is composed of 
 parts, may decrease or increase; is divisible, essentially 
 divisible and even infinitely divisible. But that some- 
 thing that has consciousness of itself, that says /, me, that 
 feels itself to be free and responsible, does it not also feel 
 that there is in it no division, that it is a being one and 
 simple? ... It remains identical to itself under the 
 diversity of the phenomena that manifest it. That iden- 
 tity, that indivisibility of the person, is its spirituality. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 157 
 
 Spirituality is, therefore, the very essence of the person. 
 . . . The spirituality of the soul is the necessary founda- 
 tion of immortality. 
 
 Whatever he [man] does, whatever he feels, whatever 
 he thinks, he thinks upon the infinite, loves the infinite, 
 tends to the infinite. This need of the infinite is the 
 mainspring of scientific curiosity, the principle of all dis- 
 coveries. Love also stops and rests only there. ... Fi- 
 nally, like thought and love, human activity is without limits. 
 Who can say where it shall stop? Behold this world al- 
 most known. Soon another world will be necessary for 
 us. Man is journeying toward the infinite which is always 
 receding before him, which he always pursues. He con- 
 ceives it, he feels it, he bears it, thus to speak, in himself, 
 — how should his end be elsewhere? Hence that uncon- 
 querable instinct of immortality, that universal hope of 
 another life to which all worships, all poesies, all tradi- 
 tions bear witness. We tend to the infinite with all our 
 powers; death comes to interrupt the destiny that seeks 
 its goal, and overtakes it unfinished. It is, therefore, likely 
 that there is something after death, since in death nothing 
 in us is terminated. . . . My perfection, my moral per- 
 fection, that of which I have the clearest idea and the 
 most invincible need, for which I feel that I am born, — 
 in vain I call for it, in vain I labour for it; it escapes me, 
 and leaves me only hope. Shall this hope be deceived? 
 ... A being that should remain incomplete and unfinished, 
 that should not attain the end which all his instincts pro- 
 claim for him, would be a monster in the eternal order, — 
 a problem much more difficult to solve than the difficulties 
 which have been raised against the immortality of the 
 soul. In our opinion, this tendency of all our desires and 
 all the powers of the soul towards the infinite, elucidated 
 by the principle of final causes, is a serious and important 
 
158 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 confirmation of the moral proof and metaphysical proof 
 of another life. 
 
 M. Victor Cousin 
 
 254 
 
 Then is nature itself nothing less than the ladder oi 
 resurrection, which, step by step, leads upwards, or rather 
 is carried from the abyss of eternal death up to the apex 
 of light in the heavenly illumination. For, understanding 
 it in this sense, it is impossible to think of nature without 
 remembering at the same time the divine hand which has 
 built this pyramid, and which, along this ladder, brings 
 life out of death. This view, moreover, accounts for the 
 fact, that a state of slumber is essential to nature — and 
 furnishes an explanation why this perpetually-recurring 
 collapse into sleep, which to us appears so near akin 
 to death, should be nature's proper character. And just 
 as the consuming fire of death appears in the more highly 
 organized beings to be somewhat subdued and restrained, 
 mitigated or exalted into the quickening warmth of life, 
 so also sleep is only the more than half enlightened brother 
 of death. And indeed as such, and the lovely messenger 
 of hope to immortal spirits, was he ever regarded and de- 
 scribed by the ancients; but that which for them was little 
 more than a beautiful image of poetry, is for us the pro- 
 foundest of truths. 
 
 Frederick von Schlegel 
 
 255 
 
 How wonderful is Death, 
 Death and his brother Sleep! 
 One, pale as yonder waning moon 
 With lips of lurid blue! 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 159 
 
 The other, rosy as the mom 
 When throned on ocean's wave 
 
 It blushes o'er the world: 
 Yet both so passing wonderful! 
 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley 
 
 256 
 
 We watched her breathing thro' the night, 
 
 Her breathing soft and low. 
 And in her breast the wave of life 
 
 Kept heaving to and fro. 
 
 So silently we seemed to speak, 
 
 So slowly moved about, 
 As we had lent her half our powers 
 
 To eke her living out. 
 
 Our very hopes belied our fears, 
 
 Our fears our hopes belied — 
 We thought her dying when she slept. 
 
 And sleeping when she died. 
 
 For when the mom came dim and sad 
 
 And chill with early showers. 
 Her quiet eyelids closed — she had 
 
 Another morn than ours. 
 
 Thomas Hood 
 
 257 
 
 Asia — Oh, mother! wherefore speak the name of death? 
 Cease they to love, and move, and breathe, and 
 
 speak, 
 Who die? 
 
 I 
 
160 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 The Earth — It would avail not to reply : 
 
 Thou art immortal, and this tongue is known 
 But to the uncommunicating dead. 
 Death is the veil which those who live call life: 
 They sleep, and it is lifted. . . . 
 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley 
 
 258 
 
 I weep for Adonais — he is dead! 
 
 Oh weep for Adonais! though our tears 
 
 Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head! 
 
 And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years 
 
 To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers, 
 
 And teach them thine own sorrow ! Say : " With me 
 
 Died Adonais; till the Future dares 
 
 Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be 
 
 An echo and a light unto eternity! "... 
 
 Oh weep for Adonais — he is dead! 
 Wake, melancholy Mother, wake and weep! 
 Yet wherefore? Quench within their burning bed 
 Thy fiery tears, and let thy loud heart keep 
 Like his, a mute and uncomplaining sleep; 
 For he is gone, where all things wise and fair 
 Descend; — oh, dream not that the amorous Deep 
 Will yet restore him to the vital air; 
 Death feeds on his mute voice, and laughs at our de- 
 spair. . . . 
 
 Oh weep for Adonais! — The quick Dreams, 
 The passion-winged Ministers of thought. 
 Who were his flocks, whom near the living streams 
 Of his young spirit fed, and whom he taught 
 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 161 
 
 The love which was its music, wander not — 
 
 Wander no more, from kindling brain to brain, 
 
 But droop there, whence they sprung; and mourn their 
 
 lot 
 Round the cold heart, where, after their sweet pain, 
 They ne'er will gather strength, or find a home again. . . . 
 
 Alas! that all we loved of him should be, 
 But for our grief, as if it had not been. 
 And grief itself be mortal ! Woe is me ! 
 Whence are we, and why are we? of what scene 
 The actors or spectators? Great and mean 
 Meet massed in death, who lends what life must borrow. 
 As long as skies are blue, and fields are green. 
 Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow, 
 Month follow month with woe, and year wake year with 
 sorrow. . . . 
 
 [Yet] peace ! he is not dead, he doth not sleep — 
 
 He hath awakened from the dream of life — 
 
 'Tis we, who lost in stormy visions, keep 
 
 With phantoms an unprofitable strife, 
 
 And in mad trance, strike with our spirit's knife 
 
 Invulnerable nothings. — We decay 
 
 Like corpses in a charnel; fear and grief 
 
 Convulse us and consume us day by day, 
 
 And cold hopes swarm like worms within the living clay. 
 
 He has outsoared the shadow of our night, 
 Envy and calumny and hate and pain. 
 And that unrest which men miscall delight, 
 Can touch him not and torture not again; 
 From the contagion of the world's slow stain 
 He is secure, and now can never mourn 
 
162 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 A heart grown cold, a head grown grey in vain; 
 Nor, when the spirit's self has ceased to burn, 
 With sparkless ashes load an unlamented urn. 
 
 He lives, he wakes — 'tis Death is dead, not he; 
 Mourn not for Adonais. — Thou young Dawn, 
 Turn all thy dew to splendour, for from thee 
 The spirit thou lamented is not gone; 
 Ye caverns and ye forests, cease to mourn! 
 Cease ye faint flowers and fountains, and thou Air 
 Which like a mourning veil thy scarf hadst thrown 
 O'er the abandoned Earth, now leave it bare 
 Even to the joyous stars which smile on its despair! 
 
 He is made one with Nature: there is heard 
 His voice in all her music, from the moan 
 Of thunder to the song of night's sweet bird; 
 He is a presence to be felt and known 
 In darkness and in light, from herb and stone, 
 Spreading itself where'er that Power may move 
 Which has withdrawn his being to its own; 
 Which wields the world with never wearied love. 
 Sustains it from beneath, and kindles it above. 
 
 He is a portion of the loveliness 
 
 Which once he made more lovely ; he doth bear 
 
 His part, while the one Spirit's plastic stress 
 
 Sweeps through the dull dense world, compelling there 
 
 All new successions to the forms they wear; 
 
 Torturing the unwilling dross that checks its flight 
 
 To its own likeness, as each mass may bear; 
 
 And bursting in its beauty and its might 
 
 From trees and beasts and men into the Heaven's light. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 163 
 
 The splendours of the firmanent of time 
 
 May be eclipsed, but are extinguished not; 
 
 Like stars to their appointed height they climb 
 
 And death is a low mist which cannot blot 
 
 The brightness it may veil. When lofty thought 
 
 Lifts a young heart above its mortal lair, 
 
 And love and life contend in it, for what 
 
 Shall be its earthly doom, the dead live there 
 
 And move like winds of light on dark and stormy air. . . . 
 
 The One remains, the many change and pass; 
 
 Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly; 
 
 Life, like a dome of many-colored glass. 
 
 Stains the white radiance of Eternity, 
 
 Until Death tramples it to fragments. — Die, 
 
 If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek! 
 
 Follow where all is fled! . . . 
 
 That Light whose smile kindles the Universe, 
 That Beauty in which all things work and move, 
 That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse 
 Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love 
 Which through the web of being blindly wove 
 By man and beast and earth and air and sea, 
 Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of 
 The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me, 
 Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality. 
 
 The breath whose might I have invoked in song 
 Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven, 
 Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng 
 Whose sails were never to the tempest given; 
 The massy earth and sphered skies are riven! 
 I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar; 
 
164 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Whilst burning through the inmost veil of Heaven, 
 
 The soul of Adonais, like a star, 
 
 Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are. 
 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley 
 
 259 
 
 The thought of immortality is a luminous sea in which 
 he who bathes is all surrounded by stars. 
 
 /. P, Richter 
 
 260 
 
 . . . Believe thou, my soul, 
 Life is a vision shadowy of Truth; 
 And vice, and anguish, and the wormy grave. 
 Shapes of a dream! The veiling clouds retire. 
 And lo! the throne of the redeeming God, 
 Forth flashing imimaginable day, 
 Wraps in one blaze earth, heaven and deepest hell. 
 
 Contemplant Spirits ! ye that hover o'er 
 With untired gaze the immeasurable fount 
 Ebullient with creative Deity! 
 And ye of plastic power, that interfused 
 Roll through the grosser and material mass 
 In organizing surge! Holies of God! ... 
 I haply journeying my inmiortal course 
 Shall sometime join your mystic choir. . . . 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 
 
 261 
 
 ... To me the past presents 
 No object for regret; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 165 
 
 To me the present gives 
 
 All cause for full content. 
 The future? — it is now the cheerful noon, 
 And on the sunny-smiling fields I gaze 
 
 With eyes alive to joy: 
 
 When the dark night descends, 
 I willingly shall close my weary lids. 
 In sure and certain hope to wake again. 
 
 Robert Southey 
 
 262 
 
 When coldness wraps this suffering clay, 
 
 Ah! whither strays the immortal mind? 
 It cannot die, it cannot stray. 
 
 But leaves its darkened dust behind. 
 Then, unembodied, doth it trace 
 
 By steps each planet's heavenly way? 
 Or fill at once the realms of space, 
 
 A thing of eyes, that all survey? 
 
 Eternal, boundless, undecayed, 
 
 A thought unseen, but seeing all, 
 All, all in earth, or skies displayed, 
 
 Shall it survey, shall it recall: 
 Each fainter trace that memory holds 
 
 So darkly of departed years, 
 In one broad glance the soul beholds, 
 
 And all, that was, at once appears. 
 
 Before Creator peopled earth. 
 
 Its eye shall roll through chaos back; 
 
 And where the furthest heaven had birth, 
 The spirit trace its rising track, 
 
166 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 And where the future mars or makes, 
 
 Its glance dilate o'er all to be, 
 While sun is quenched or system breaks, 
 
 Fixed in its own Eternity. 
 
 Above or Love, Hope, Hate or Fear, 
 
 It lives all passionless and pure: 
 An age shall fleet like earthly years; 
 
 Its years as moments shall endure. 
 Away, away, without a wing, 
 
 O'er all, through all, its thought shall fly; 
 A nameless and eternal thing. 
 
 Forgetting what it was to die. 
 
 Lord Byron 
 
 263 
 
 There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, 
 The earth, and every common sight. 
 To me did seem 
 Apparelled in celestial light. 
 The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
 It is not now as it hath been of yore; — 
 Turn wheresoe'er I may. 
 By night or day. 
 The things which I have seen I now can see no more. 
 
 II 
 
 The Rainbow comes and goes 
 And lovely is the Rose, 
 The Moon doth with delight 
 Look round her when the heavens are bare. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 167 
 
 Waters on a starry night 
 
 Are beautiful and fair; 
 The sunshine is a glorious birth; 
 But yet I know, where'er I go, 
 That there hath past away a glory from the earth. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song 
 And while the young lambs bound 
 As to the tabor's sound, 
 To me alone there came a thought of grief: 
 A timely utterance gave that thought relief, 
 
 And I again am strong: 
 The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep; 
 No more shall grief of mine the season wrong; 
 I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng. 
 The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep, 
 And all the earth is gay; 
 Land and sea 
 Give themselves up to jollity, 
 And with the heart of May 
 Doth every Beast keep holiday; — 
 Thou Child of Joy, 
 Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy 
 Shepherd-boy! 
 
 IV 
 
 Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call 
 
 Ye to each other make; I see 
 The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee; 
 
 My heart is at your festival. 
 
 My head hath its coronal. 
 
168 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 The fulness of your bliss, I feel — I feel it all. 
 
 Oh evil day! if I were sullen 
 
 While Earth herself is adoring 
 This sweet May-morning, 
 
 And the Children are culling 
 On every side, 
 
 In a thousand valleys far and wide, 
 
 Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm, 
 And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm; - 
 
 I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! 
 — But there's a Tree, of many, one, 
 A single Field which I have looked upon. 
 Both of them speak of something that is gone: 
 
 The Pansy at my feet 
 
 Doth the same tale repeat: 
 Whither is fled the visionary gleam? 
 Where is it now, the glory and the dream? 
 
 Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: 
 The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, 
 
 Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
 And Cometh from afar: 
 
 Not in entire forgetfulness, 
 
 And not in utter nakedness. 
 But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
 
 From God, who is our home: 
 Heaven lies about us in our infancy! 
 Shades of the prison-house begin to close 
 
 Upon the growing boy, 
 But He beholds the light, and whence it flows, 
 
 He sees it in his joy; 
 The Youth, who daily farther from the east 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 169 
 
 Must travel, still is Nature's Priest, 
 
 And by the vision splendid 
 
 Is on his way attended; 
 At length the Man perceives it die away, 
 And fade into the light of common day. 
 
 VI 
 
 Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; 
 Yearning she hath in her own natural kind, 
 And, even with something of a Mother's mind, 
 
 And no unworthy aim. 
 
 The homely Nurse doth all she can 
 To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man, 
 
 Forget the glories he hath known, 
 And that imperial palace when he came. 
 
 VII 
 
 Behold the Child among his new-born blisses, 
 A six years' Darling of a pigmy size! 
 See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies. 
 Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses. 
 With light upon him from his father's eyes! 
 See, at his feet, some little plan or chart. 
 Some fragment from his dream of human life. 
 Shaped by himself with newly-learned art; 
 
 A wedding or a festival, 
 
 A mourning or a funeral; 
 
 And this hath now his heart; 
 
 And unto this he frames his song: 
 Then will he fit his tongue 
 To dialogues of business, love, or strife; 
 
 But it will not be long 
 
170 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Ere this be thrown aside, 
 
 And with new joy and pride 
 The little Actor cons another part; 
 Filling from time to time his "humourous stage" 
 With all the Persons, down to palsied Age, 
 That Life brings with her in her equipage; 
 
 As if his whole vocation 
 
 Were endless imitation. 
 
 VIII 
 
 Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie 
 
 Thy Soul's immensity; 
 Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep 
 Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind, 
 That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep, 
 Haunted for ever by the eternal mind, — 
 
 Mighty Prophet! Seer blest! 
 
 On whom those truths do rest. 
 Which we are toiling all our lives to find, 
 In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave; 
 Thou, over whom thy Immortality 
 Broods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave, 
 A Presence which is not to be put by; 
 Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might 
 Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height. 
 Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke 
 Thy years to bring the inevitable yoke, 
 Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife? 
 Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight, 
 And custom lie upon thee with a weight. 
 Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life! 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 171 
 
 IX 
 
 joy! that in our embers 
 Is something that doth live, 
 That nature yet remembers 
 What was so fugitive! 
 The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
 Perpetual benediction: not indeed 
 For that which is most worthy to be blest — 
 Delight and liberty, the simple creed 
 Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest. 
 With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast; 
 Not for these I raise 
 The song of thanks and praise; 
 But for those obstinate questionings 
 Of sense and outward things. 
 Fallings from us, vanishings; 
 Blank misgivings of a Creature 
 Moving about in worlds not realized, 
 High instincts before which our mortal Nature 
 Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised: 
 But for those first affections. 
 Those shadowy recollections. 
 Which, be they what they may. 
 Are yet the fountain light of all our day, 
 Are yet a master light of all our seeing; 
 
 Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make 
 Our noisy years seem moments in the being 
 Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake, 
 
 To perish never; 
 Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour, 
 
 Nor Man nor Boy, 
 Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 
 Can utterly abolish or destroy! 
 
172 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Hence in a season of calm weather 
 
 Though inland far we be, 
 Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea 
 
 Which brought us hither, 
 
 Can in a moment travel thither, 
 And see the Children sport upon the shore. 
 And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. 
 
 Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing, a joyous song! 
 
 And let the young Lambs bound 
 
 As to the tabor's soimd! 
 We in thought will join your throng. 
 
 Ye that pipe and ye that play. 
 
 Ye that through your hearts today 
 
 Feel the gladness of the May! 
 What though the radiance which was once so bright 
 Be now for ever taken from my sight. 
 
 Though nothing can bring back the hour 
 Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; 
 
 We will grieve not, rather find 
 
 Strength in what remains behind; 
 
 In the primal sympathy 
 
 Which having been must ever be; 
 
 In the soothing thoughts that spring 
 
 Out of human suffering; 
 
 In the faith that looks through death. 
 In the years that bring the philosophic mind. 
 
 XI 
 
 And 0, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves, 
 Forebode not any severing of oiur loves! 
 Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 173 
 
 I only have relinquished one delight 
 
 To live beneath your more habitual sway. 
 
 I love the Brooks which down their channels fret, 
 
 Even more than when I tripped lightly as they; 
 
 The innocent brightness of a new-born Day 
 
 Is lovely yet; 
 The Clouds that gather round the setting sun 
 Do take a sober colouring from an eye 
 That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; 
 Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
 Thanks to the himaan heart by which we live. 
 Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears. 
 To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
 Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 
 
 William Wordsworth 
 
 264 
 
 Life, I repeat, is energy of love 
 Divine or human; exercised in pain. 
 In strife, and tribulation ; and ordained. 
 If so approved and sanctified, to pass. 
 Through shades and silent rest, to endless joy. 
 
 William Wordsworth 
 
 265 
 
 Beneath the waning moon I walk at night. 
 And muse on human life — for all around 
 
 Are dim uncertain shapes that cheat the sight. 
 And pitfalls lurk in shade along the ground, 
 
 And broken gleams of brightness, here and there, 
 
 Glance through, and leave unwarmed the deathlike air. 
 
 The trampled earth returns a sound of fear — 
 A hollow sound, as if I walked on tombs; 
 
174 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 And lights, that tell of cheerful homes, appear 
 
 Far off, and die like hope amid the glooms 
 A mournful wind across the landscape flies, 
 And the wide atmosphere is full of sighs. 
 
 And I, with faltering footsteps, journey on, 
 Watching the stars that roll the hours away, 
 
 Till the faint light that guides me now is gone. 
 And, like another life, the glorious day 
 
 Shall open o'er me from empyreal height. 
 
 With warmth, and certainty, and boundless light. 
 
 William Cullen Bryant 
 
 266 
 
 Mysterious Night! when our first Parent knew 
 
 Thee from report divine, and heard thy name. 
 
 Did he not tremble for this lovely frame, 
 
 This glorious canopy of light and blue? 
 
 Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew. 
 
 Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame, 
 
 Hesperus with the host of heaven came; 
 
 And lo. Creation widened in man's view. 
 
 Who could have thought such darkness lay concealed 
 
 Within thy beams, Sun? or who could find. 
 
 Whilst fly and leaf and insect stood revealed. 
 
 That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind? 
 
 Why do we then shun Death with anxious strife? 
 
 If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life? 
 
 Blanco White 
 
 267 
 
 How full, how bright, are the evidences of this grand 
 truth! How weak are the common arguments which 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 175 
 
 scepticism arrays against it! To me there is but one ob- 
 jection against immortality . . . and this arises from the 
 very greatness of the truth. My mind sometimes sinks 
 under its weight, is lost in its immensity; I scarcely dare 
 believe that such a good is placed within my reach. When 
 I think of myself as existing through all future ages, as 
 surviving this earth and that sky, as exempted from every 
 imperfection and error of my present being ... as com- 
 prehending with my intellect and embracing in my affec- 
 tions an extent of creation compared with which the earth 
 is a point . . . when this thought of my future comes 
 to me, whilst I hope, I also fear; the blessedness seems 
 too great; the consciousness of present weakness and un- 
 worthiness is almost too strong for hope. But when in 
 this frame of mind I look round on the creation, and see 
 there the marks of an omnipotent goodness, to which noth- 
 ing is impossible, and from which everything may be 
 hoped; when I see around me the proofs of an Infinite 
 Father who must desire the perpetual progress of his in- 
 tellectual offspring; when I look next at the human mind, 
 and see what powers a few years have unfolded, and dis- 
 cern in it the capacity of everlasting improvement ... I 
 can and do admit the almost overpowering thought of the 
 everlasting life, growth, felicity of the human soul. 
 
 William Ellery Channing 
 
 268 
 
 The immortality of the soul must not be represented as 
 first entering the sphere of reality only at a later stage; 
 it is the actual present quality of Spirit; Spirit is eternal, 
 and for this reason is already present. Spirit, as possessed 
 of freedom, does not belong to the sphere of things limited ; 
 it, as being what thinks and knows in an absolute way, has 
 
176 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 the Universal for its object; this is eternity, which is not 
 simply duration, as duration can be predicated of 
 mountains, but knowledge. 
 
 . . . Man is immortal in consequence of knowledge, 
 for it is only as a thinking being that he is not a mortal 
 animal soul and is a free, pure soul. Reasoned knowledge, 
 thought, is the root of his life, of his immortality as a 
 totality in himself. The animal soul is sirnk in the life of 
 the body, while Spirit, on the other hand, is a totality in 
 itself. 
 
 Hegel 
 
 269 
 
 Here is this wonderful thought [of immortality]. But 
 whence came it? Who put it in the mind? It was not 
 I, it was not you; it is elemental — belongs to thought and 
 virtue, and whenever we have either, we see the beams 
 of this light. When the Master of the universe has points 
 to carry in his government, he impresses his will in the 
 structure of minds. . . . 
 
 . . . Wherever man ripens, this audacious belief 
 presently appears. ... As soon as thought is exercised, 
 this belief is inevitable; as soon as virtue glows, this belief 
 confirms itself. It is a kind of summary or completion of 
 man. . . . The doctrine is not sentimental, but is grounded 
 in the necessities and forces we possess. 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson 
 
 270 
 
 Man is greater than his expectations, a spirit incarnate, 
 and is at once the occupant of two worlds. The Person 
 is immortal. 
 
 . . . Were man personally finite, he could not conceive of 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 177 
 
 infinity; were he mortal, he could not think immortality. 
 Whatever had a beginning comes of necessity to its end, 
 since it has not the principle of perpetuity inherent in it- 
 self. And there is that in man which cannot think an- 
 nihilation, but thinks continuance. All life is eternal; 
 there is no other. 
 
 A, Bronson Alcott 
 
 271 
 
 It is the belief of mankind that we shall all live for 
 ever. This is not a doctrine of Christianity alone. It 
 belongs to the human race. You may find nations so rude 
 that they live houseless, in caverns of the earth; nations 
 that have no letters, not knowing the use of bows and ar- 
 rows, fire, or even clothes; but no nation without a belief 
 in inmiortal life. ... 
 
 Immortality is a fact of man's nature. ... It comes to 
 our consciousness as naturally as the notions of time and 
 space. . . . What is thus in man is writ there of God, who 
 writes no lies. ... I feel the longing after immortality — 
 a desire essential to my nature, deep as the foundation 
 of my being; I find the same desire in all men. I feel 
 conscious of immortality ; that I am not to die — no, never 
 to die, though often to change. I cannot believe this de- 
 sire and consciousness are felt only to mislead, to beguile, 
 to deceive me. I know God is my Father; and the Father 
 of the nations. Can the Almighty deceive his children? 
 For my own part, I can conceive of nothing which shall 
 make me more certain of my immortality. I ask no argu- 
 ment from learned lips. No miracle could make me more 
 sure; no, not if the sheeted dead burst cerement and shroud, 
 and rising forth from their honoured tombs stood here 
 before me — the disenchanted dust once more enchanted 
 with that fiery life; no, not if the souls of all my sires 
 
178 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 since time began came thronging romid, and with 
 miraculous speech told me they lived and I should also live. 
 I could only say, " I knew all this before; why waste your 
 heavenly speech? " 
 
 Theodore Parker 
 
 272 
 
 . . . Spontaneous or considered, the result of thought, 
 clear or confused, apparent or hidden, admitted or re- 
 pelled, powerful or feeble, permanent or transitory, the 
 idea of man's immortality is found in every mind; there 
 is no man who does not feel, or propose, to do things 
 whose final object is beyond the tomb, which he would 
 not do, he would not intend, and he would not feel the 
 desire to do, if the idea of immortality was not in him. 
 . . . The instinct of immortality is implied in [the] feeling 
 of the want of eternal justice, and necessarily precedes 
 it. . . . Under their [the disbelievers'] careless levity and 
 contempt, there yet subsists and makes itself felt, from 
 time to time, the desire for the re-establishment of moral 
 order, invincible in the human soul, but still it is no more 
 than an inconsequent and blind desire, since it bases it- 
 self no longer on the only idea which explains and sustains 
 it [like a foundation] — the Idea of Immortality. . . . 
 
 It is considered that the Idea of Immortality comes from 
 the insufficiency of the actual world to satisfy the human 
 soul, from that immensity of desire which devours the soul 
 and cannot even be extinguished by happiness itself, always 
 below the measure of expectation and search or exhausted 
 by the very enjoyment itself, or ready to escape from its 
 grasp or possession. Thence comes, it is argued, that Idea 
 of Immortality which opens to the soul perspectives with- 
 out limits, and transports it into a world as infinite as its 
 desires. ... It is true the world does not satisfy man, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 179 
 
 the only one of created beings who feels himself straitened 
 in his dwelling and superior to his actual condition. But 
 this sentiment, however, does not discover the hope of 
 Immortality in order to satisfy itself; it merely reveals, 
 and is only itself, or the consequence. It is the instinct 
 of an infinite nature which pushes the ambition of the soul 
 beyond the limits of a finite world; it is because this in- 
 finite nature feels itself immortal that it aspires to things 
 which are not transitory. 
 
 . . . The philosophers . . . undertake to clear up, 
 elucidate the natural beliefs, to complete, systematize, ex- 
 plain them, and reconcile the facts which reveal them- 
 selves therein, to solve the problems which they present. 
 . . . They have built up, in the name of this idea [Im- 
 mortality] systems which cannot bear examination, and 
 by having been metamorphosed into a scientific hypothesis, 
 it has fallen into a sort of contempt among those who have 
 looked on (the process) and have considered it only under 
 this (one) phase. 
 
 It is easy to show that the greater part of the objections 
 which the Idea of Immortality of the Soul encounter arise 
 from this metamorphosis, and from the illegitimate use 
 which science has wished to make of the instinctive belief 
 of humanity. 
 
 Happily, humanity is stronger than science and has com- 
 pelled it sooner or later to retrace its steps from the 
 error into which it has fallen. Not only has the Idea of 
 Immortality refused to permit itself to be reduced to this 
 role of hypothesis, to which some of its defenders have 
 wished to assign it; not only has it continued to reside at 
 the bottom of the (well of truth in the) human conscience, 
 simple, pure, divested of every characteristic of scienti- 
 fic explanation ; it has done more — it has penetrated into 
 the very system directed against it, and into the very 
 
180 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 bosom of inimical hypothesis. If a close examination be 
 instituted of these doctrines, which, in ancient and modern 
 times, in Asia and Europe, have made a profession of 
 repelling the Idea of Immortality, this Idea will be found 
 therein more or less indirect, more or less concealed, but 
 always invincible in the instinctive perceptions of men, 
 and insinuating itself under one form or another in the 
 very thought which denies it. So that science, very far 
 from having invented it, is subject to it, and harbours or 
 conceals it at the very moment it attempts to banish it. 
 
 . . . Man receives the Idea of Immortality neither from 
 experience nor from science. The exterior world does not 
 furnish him with the Idea; his mind does not invent it. 
 It is from the depths of his soul that it wells up within 
 him; he feels it, he perceives it, he knows himself to he 
 immortal, 
 
 F, P, G. Guizot 
 
 273 
 
 . . . Wilt thou not ope thy heart to know 
 
 "What rainbows teach, and sunsets show? 
 
 Verdict which accumulates 
 
 From lengthening scroll of human fates. 
 
 Voice of earth to earth returned. 
 
 Prayers of saints that inly burned — 
 
 Saying, What is excellent. 
 
 As God lives is permanent; 
 
 Hearts are dust, hearts^ loves remain; 
 
 Heart's love will meet thee again. 
 
 Revere the Maker; fetch thine eye 
 
 Up to his style, and manners of the sky. 
 
 Not of adamant and gold 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 181 
 
 Built he heaven stark and •cold; 
 No, but a nest of bending reeds, 
 Flowering grass and scented weeds; 
 Or like a traveller's fleeing tent, 
 Or bow above the tempest bent; 
 Built of tears and sacred flames, 
 And virtue reaching to its aims; 
 Built of furtherance and pursuing. 
 Not of spent deeds, but of doing. 
 Silent rushes the swift Lord 
 Through ruined systems still restored, 
 Broadsowing, bleak and void to bless, 
 Plants with worlds the wilderness; 
 Waters with tears of ancient sorrow 
 Apples of Eden ripe tomorrow. 
 House and tenant go to ground. 
 Lost in God, in Godhead found. 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson 
 
 274 
 
 ... Heaven! Is the white Tomb of our Loved One, 
 who died from our arms, and had to be left behind us 
 there, which rises in the distance, like a pale, mournfully 
 receding Mile-stone, to tell how many toilsome uncheered 
 miles we have journeyed on alone — but a pale spectral 
 Illusion? . . . Know of a truth that only the Time-shadows 
 have perished, or are perishable; that the real Being of 
 whatever was, and whatever is, and whatever will be, is 
 even now and for ever. . . . Are we not Spirits, that are 
 shaped into a body, into an Appearance; and that fade 
 away again into air and Invisibility? This is no metaphor, 
 it is a simple scientific fact; . . . Round us ... is 
 Eternity. . . . But whence?— ^0 Heaven, whither? Sense 
 
182 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 knows not; Faith knows not; only that it is through Mystery 
 to Mystery, from God to God. 
 
 Thomas Carlyle 
 
 275 
 
 No coward soul is mine, 
 No trembler in the world's storm-trouhled sphere: 
 
 I see Heaven's glories shine, 
 And faith shines equal, arming me from fear. 
 
 Vain are the thousand creeds 
 That move men's hearts: unutterably vain; 
 
 Worthless as withered weeds, 
 Or idlest froth amid the boundless main, 
 
 To waken douht in one 
 Holding so fast by thine infinity; 
 
 So surely anchored on 
 The steadfast rock of immortality. 
 
 With wide-emh racing love 
 Thy spirit animates eternal years. 
 
 Pervades and broods above. 
 Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears. 
 
 Though earth and man were gone. 
 And suns and universes ceased to be. 
 
 And Thou were left alone. 
 Every existence would exist in Thee. 
 
 There is no room for Death, 
 Nor atom that his might could render void: 
 
 Thou — Thou art Being and Breath 
 And what Thou art may never be destroyed. 
 
 Emily Bronte 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 183 
 
 276 
 
 Destruction and salvation are the hands 
 
 Upon the face of time. When both unite, 
 
 The day of death dawns. Every orb exists 
 
 Unto its preappointed end: . . . 
 
 . . . The world shall perish as a worm 
 
 Upon destruction's path; the universe 
 
 Evanish like a ghost before the sun, 
 
 Yea like a doubt before the truth of God, 
 
 Yet nothing more than death shall perish. Then, 
 
 Rejoice ye souls of God . . . 
 
 In Him ye are immortal as Himself! 
 
 Philip James Bailey 
 
 211 
 
 . , . When Earth shall pass away with all 
 
 Her pride and pomp of sin. 
 The City builded without hands 
 
 Shall safely shut me in. 
 All the rest is but vanity 
 
 Which others strive to win: 
 Where their hopes end my joys begin. 
 
 I will not look upon a rose 
 
 Though it is fair to see: 
 The flowers planted in Paradise 
 
 Are budding now for me: 
 Red roses like love visible 
 
 Are blowing on their tree, 
 Or white like virgin purity. 
 
 I will not look upon the sun 
 Which setteth night by night: 
 
 ■ 
 
184 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 In the untrodden courts of heaven 
 My crown shall be more bright. 
 
 Lo in the New Jerusalem 
 Founded and built aright 
 
 My very feet shall tread on light. 
 
 Christina Rossetti 
 
 278 
 
 ... I go from earth to heaven 
 
 A dim uncertain road, 
 A houseless pilgrim through the world 
 
 Unto a sure abode: 
 While evermore an Angel 
 
 Goes with me day and night, 
 A ministering spirit 
 
 From the land of light, 
 My holy fellow-servant sent 
 
 To guide my steps aright. . . • 
 
 If her spirit went before me 
 
 Up from night to day, 
 It would pass me like the lightning 
 
 That kindles on its way. 
 I should feel it like the lightning 
 
 Flashing fresh from heaven: 
 I should long for heaven sevenfold more, 
 
 Yea and sevenfold seven: 
 Should pray as I have not prayed before, 
 
 And strive as I have not striven. ... 
 
 She will learn new love in heaven, 
 
 Who is so full of love; 
 She will learn new depths of tenderness 
 
 Who is tender as a dove. 
 Her heart will no more sorrow. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 185 
 
 Her eyes will weep no more: 
 Yet it may be she will yearn 
 
 And look back from far before: 
 Lingering on the golden threshold 
 
 And leaning from the door. 
 
 Christina Rossetti 
 
 279 
 
 ... It was the rampart of God's house 
 
 That she was standing on; 
 By God built over the sheer depth 
 
 The which is Space begun; 
 So high, that looking downward thence 
 
 She scarce could see the sun. . . . 
 
 Around her, lovers, newly met 
 
 'Mid deathless love's acclaims, 
 Spoke evermore among themselves 
 
 Their heart-remembered names; 
 And the souls mounting up to God 
 
 Went by her like thin flames. ... 
 
 From the fixed place of Heaven she saw 
 
 Time like a pulse shake fierce 
 Through all the world. Her gaze still strove 
 
 Within the gulf to pierce 
 Its path; and now she spoke as when 
 
 The stars sang in their spheres. 
 
 " I wish that he were come to me, 
 
 For he will come," she said. 
 " Have I not prayed in Heaven? — on earth 
 
 Lord, Lord, has he not prayed? 
 Are not two prayers a perfect strength? 
 
 And shall I feel afraid? 
 
186 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 " When round his head the aureole clings, 
 
 And he is clothed in white, 
 I'll take his hand and go with him 
 
 To the deep wells of light; 
 As unto a stream we will step down, 
 
 And hathe there in God's sight. 
 
 "We two will stand beside that shrine. 
 
 Occult, withheld, untrod. 
 Whose lamps are stirred continually 
 
 With prayers sent up to God; 
 And see our old prayers, granted, melt 
 
 Each like a little cloud. 
 
 " We two will lie in the shadow of 
 
 That living mystic tree 
 Within whose secret growth the Dove 
 
 Is sometimes felt to be, 
 While every leaf that his plumes touch 
 
 Saith His Name audibly. 
 
 "And I myself will teach to him, 
 
 I myself, lying so, 
 The songs I sing here; which his voice 
 
 Shall pause in, hushed and slow. 
 And find some knowledge at each pause. 
 
 Or some new thing to know." . . . 
 
 She gazed and listened and then said. 
 Less sad of speech than mild, — 
 
 "All this is when he comes." She ceased. 
 The light thrilled through her, fill'd 
 
 With angels in strong level flight. 
 
 Her eyes prayed, and she smiled. . . . 
 
 Dante Gabriel Rossetti 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 187 
 
 280 
 
 I went to sleep ; and now I am refreshed, 
 
 A strange refreshment: for I feel in me 
 
 An inexpressible lightness, and a sense 
 
 Of freedom, as I were at length myself, 
 
 And ne'er had been before. How still it is! 
 
 I hear no more the busy beat of time. 
 
 No, nor my fluttering breath, nor struggling pulse; 
 
 Nor does one moment differ from the next. . . . 
 
 Another marvel: some one has me fast 
 
 Within his ample palm; 'tis not a grasp 
 
 Such as they use on earth, but all around 
 
 Over the surface of my subtle being. 
 
 As though I were a sphere and capable 
 
 To be accosted thus, a uniform 
 
 And gentle pressure tells me I am not 
 
 Self-moving, but borne forward on my way. 
 
 And hark! I hear a singing; yet in sooth 
 
 I cannot of that music rightly say 
 
 Whether I hear or touch or taste the tones. 
 
 Oh what a heart-subduing melody! . . . 
 
 Now know I surely that I am at length 
 
 Out of the body: had I part with earth, 
 
 I never could have drunk those accents in. 
 
 And not have worshipped as a God that voice 
 
 That was so musical; but now I am 
 
 So whole of heart, so calm, so self-possessed, 
 
 With such a full content, and with a sense 
 
 So apprehensive and discriminate. 
 
 As no temptation can intoxicate. 
 
 Nor have I even terror at the thought 
 
 That I am clasped by such a saintliness. 
 
 John Henry Newman 
 
188 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 281 
 
 . . . Bliss greater than any we can know here awaits 
 us in heaven. Does not the course of nature point to this? 
 What else is the meaning of the gradual increase of love 
 on earth? What else is the meaning of old age, when 
 the bodily powers die, while the love increases? What does 
 that point to, but to a restoration of the body when mortal- 
 ity is swallowed up of life? Is not that mortality of the 
 body sent us mercifully by God, to teach us that our love 
 is spiritual, and therefore will be able to express itself in 
 any state of existence? to wean our hearts that we may 
 learn to look for more perfect bliss in the perfect body? 
 Do not these thoughts take away from all earthly bliss 
 the poisoning thought, "all this must end"? Ay, end! 
 but only end so gradually that we shall not miss it, and 
 the less perfect union on earth shall be replaced in heaven 
 by perfect and spiritual bliss and union, inconceivable be- 
 cause perfect! 
 
 Do I undervalue earthly bliss? No! I enhance it 
 when I make it the sacrament of a higher union! Will 
 not these thoughts give more exquisite delight, will it not 
 tear off the thorn from every rose and sweeten every nectar 
 cup to perfect security of blessedness, in this life, to feel 
 that there is more in store for us — that all expressions 
 of love here are but dim shadows of a union which shall 
 be perfect, if we will but work here, so as to work out our 
 salvation. 
 
 Charles Kingsley 
 
 282 
 
 . . . After my arrival at Innsbruck I wandered alone by 
 the gush of that wild and roaring river. Everything was 
 still and solemn. Mighty shadows were moving silently 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 189 
 
 across the valley, like so many giant spectres, as the sun 
 went down behind the hills. The outlines of the mountains 
 gradually blended in a sky which became by degrees as 
 black as themselves, and I was left in the grandeur of 
 darkness. I felt, as I generally do on such occasions, 
 strongly the swift rush of time — on and on, bearing every- 
 thing along with it into the Infinite; and here are we, for 
 a moment, powerless nothings, but endued with powers of 
 agony and thought which none but immortals feel. Then 
 I went slowly back to Innsbruck, heard the hum of life 
 again, saw the windows glittering with light, heard the 
 drone of the church bells, and met the crowds coming 
 away from vespers. It all seemed a dream. 
 
 Frederick W. Robertson 
 
 283 
 
 Whatever is taught or told. 
 
 However men moan and sigh, 
 Love never shall grow cold, 
 
 And life shall never die. 
 
 Bayard Taylor 
 
 284 
 
 There is no Death! What seems so is transition; 
 
 This life of mortal breath 
 Is but a suburb of the life Elysian, 
 
 Whose portal we call Death. 
 
 She is not dead — the child of our affection — 
 
 But gone unto that school 
 Where she no longer needs our poor protection. 
 
 And Christ himself doth rule. 
 
190 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, 
 
 By guardian angels led, 
 Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, 
 
 She lives, whom we call dead. . . . 
 
 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 
 
 285 
 
 True is it that Death's face seems stern and cold, 
 When he is sent to summon those we love, 
 But all God's angels come to us disguised; 
 Sorrow and sickness, poverty and death. 
 One after other lift their frowning masks. 
 And we behold the seraph's face beneath, 
 All radiant with the glory and the calm 
 Of having looked upon the front of God. 
 With every anguish of our earthly part 
 The spirit's sight grows clearer; this was meant 
 When Jesus touched the blind man's lids with clay. 
 Life is the jailer. Death the angel sent 
 To draw the unwilling bolts and set us free. 
 He flings not ope the ivory gate of Rest — 
 Only the fallen spirit knocks at that — 
 But to benigner regions beckons us. 
 To destinies of more rewarded toil. 
 
 ... O, if Death 
 More near approaches, meditates, and clasps 
 Even now some dearer, more reluctant hand, 
 God, strengthen thou my faith, that I may see 
 That 'tis thine angel who, with loving haste. 
 Unto the service of the inner shrine 
 Doth waken thy beloved with a kiss. 
 
 James Russell Lowell 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 191 
 
 286 
 
 I pray you, for some little time to come, not to muse 
 too much upon your brother, even though such musings 
 should be untinged with gloom and should appear to make 
 you happier. In the eternity where he now dwells, it has 
 doubtless become of no importance to himself whether 
 he died yesterday or a thousand years ago. He is already 
 at home . . . more at home than ever he was in his 
 mother's house. Then let us leave him there for the 
 present; and if the shadows and images of this fleeting time 
 should interpose between us and him, let us not seek to 
 drive them away for they are sent of God. 
 
 Nathaniel Hawthorne 
 
 287 
 
 I long for household voices gone, 
 For vanished smiles I long. 
 
 But God hath led my dear ones on, 
 And He can do no wrong. 
 
 I know not what the future hath 
 
 Of marvel or surprise. 
 Assured alone that life and death 
 
 His mercy underlies. . . . 
 
 And so beside the Silent Sea 
 
 I wait the muffled oar; 
 No harm from Him can come to me 
 
 On ocean or on shore. 
 
 r know not where. His islands lift 
 Their fronded palms in air; 
 
192 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 I only know I cannot drift 
 
 Beyond His love and care. . . . 
 
 John Greenleaf Whittier 
 
 288 
 
 . . . Alas for him who never sees 
 The stars shine through his cypress trees! 
 Who, hopeless, lays his dead away, 
 Nor looks to see the breaking day 
 Across the mournful marbles play! 
 Who hath not learned, in hours of faith, 
 
 The truth to flesh and sense unknown. 
 That Life is ever lord of Death, 
 
 And Love can never lose its own! . . . 
 
 John Greenleaf Whittier 
 
 289 
 
 This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign, 
 
 Sails the unshadowed main, — 
 
 The venturous bark that flings 
 On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings 
 In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings. 
 
 And coral reefs lie bare. 
 Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair. 
 
 Its web of living gauze no more unfurl; 
 
 Wrecked is the ship of pearl! 
 
 And every chambered cell. 
 Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell, 
 As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell, 
 
 Before thee lies revealed, — 
 Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed! 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 193 
 
 Year after year beheld the silent toil 
 
 That spread his lustrous coil; 
 
 Still, as the spiral grew, 
 He left the past year's dwelling for the new, 
 Stole with soft step its shining archway through, 
 
 Built up its idle door. 
 Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more. 
 
 Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, 
 
 Child of the wandering sea, 
 
 Cast from her lap, forlorn! 
 From thy dead lips a clearer note is born 
 Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn! 
 
 While on mine ear it rings, 
 Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that 
 sings: — 
 
 Build thee more stately mansions, my soul, 
 
 As the swift seasons roll! 
 
 Leave thy low-vaulted past! 
 Let each new temple, nobler than the last. 
 Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, 
 
 Till thou at length art free, 
 Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea! 
 
 Oliver Wendell Holmes 
 
 290 
 
 This world is simply the threshold of our vast life; the 
 first stepping-stone from nonentity into the boundless ex- 
 panse of possibility. It is the infant-school of the soul. 
 The physical universe spread out before us, and the 
 spiritual trials and mysteries of our discipline, are simply 
 
194 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 our primer, our grammar, our spelling dictionary, to tell 
 us something of the language we are to use in our maturity. 
 
 Starr King 
 
 291 
 
 I have thought much lately of the possibility of my leav- 
 ing you all and going home. I am come to that stage 
 of my pilgrimage that is within sight of the River of 
 Death, and I feel that now I must have all in readiness 
 day and night for the messenger of the King. I have had 
 sometimes in my sleep strange perceptions of a vivid 
 spiritual life near to and with Christ, and multitudes of 
 holy ones, and the joy of it is like no other joy — it can- 
 not be told in the language of the world. What I have 
 then I know with absolute certainty, yet it is so unlike 
 and above anything we conceive of in this world that it is 
 difficult to put it into words. The inconceivable loveliness 
 of Christ! It seems that about Him there is a sphere 
 where the enthusiasm of love is the calm habit of the soul, 
 that without words, without the necessity of demonstrations 
 of affection, heart beats to heart, soul answers soul, we 
 respond to the Infinite Love, and we feel his answer in us, 
 and there is no need of words. All seemed to be busy 
 coming and going on ministries of good, and passing each 
 gave a thrill of joy to each as Jesus, the directing soul, the 
 centre of all, " over all, in all and through all," was working 
 his beautiful and merciful will to redeem and save. I 
 was saying as I awoke: — 
 
 " 'Tis joy enough, my all in all 
 
 At thy dear feet to lie. 
 Thou wilt not let me lower fall, 
 
 And none can higher fly." 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 195 
 
 This was but a glimpse; but it has left a strange sweet- 
 ness in my mind. 
 
 Harriet Beecher Stowe 
 
 292 
 
 We have the promises of God as thick as daisies in 
 summer meadows, that death, which men most fear, shall 
 be to us the most blessed of experiences, if we trust in 
 him. Death is unclasping; joy, breaking out in the desert; 
 the heart, come to its blossoming-time! Do we call it 
 dying when the bud bursts into flower? 
 
 As birds in the hour of transmigration feel the impulse 
 of southern lands, and gladly spread their wings for the 
 realm of light and bloom, so may we, in the death hour, 
 feel the sweet solicitations of the life beyond, and joyfully 
 soar from the chill and shadow of earth to fold our wings 
 and sing in the summer of an eternal heaven! 
 
 Henry Ward Beecher 
 
 293 
 
 ... I sincerely hope that my father may yet recover 
 his health, but at all events, tell him to remember to call 
 upon and confide in our great and good and merciful 
 Maker, who will not turn away from him in any extremity. 
 . . . Say to him that if we could meet now it is doubtful 
 whether it would not be more painful than pleasant; but 
 that if it be his lot to go now, he will soon have a joyous 
 meeting with the many loved ones gone before, and where 
 the rest of us, through the help of God, hope ere long to 
 join them. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln 
 
196 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 294 
 
 . . . She [Mrs. Garrison] is not dead, — she has gone 
 before; but she has not gone away. Nearer than ever, this 
 very hour she watches and ministers to those in whose lives 
 she was so wrapped; to whose happiness she was so de- 
 voted. Who thinks that loving heart could be happy if it 
 were not allowed to minister to those she loved? How 
 easy it is to fancy the welcome the old faces have given 
 her! The honoured faces, the familiar faces, the old tones, 
 that have carried her back to the pleasant years of health 
 and strength and willing labour! How gladly she broke 
 the bonds that hindered her activity ! There are more there 
 than here. Very slight the change seemed to her. She 
 has not left us, she has rejoined them. She has joined 
 the old band that worked life-long for the true and good. 
 The dear, familiar names, how freshly they come to our 
 lips! We can see them bend over and lift her up to them, 
 to a broader life! Faith is sight today. She works on a 
 higher level; ministers to old ideas; guards those she 
 went through life with so lovingly. Even in that higher 
 work they watch for our coming also. Let the years yet 
 spared us here be a warning to make ourselves fit for that 
 companionship ! 
 
 . . . Blessed be Thy name for the threescore overflowing 
 years; for the sunny sky she was permitted finally to see, 
 the hated name made immortal, the perilled life guarded 
 by a nation's gratitude, for the capstone put on with shout- 
 ing; that she was privileged to enter the promised land 
 and rest in the triumph, with the family circle unbroken, 
 all her loved about her! And blessed be Thy name. 
 Father, that in due time, with gracious and tender loving- 
 kindness. Thou didst break the bonds that hindered her 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 197 
 
 true life, and take her to higher service in Thine im- 
 mediate presence. 
 
 Wendell Phillips 
 
 295 
 
 While I must say with the great apostle, " It doth not 
 yet appear what we shall be," I hold as well to the faith 
 that ... I shall pass out of one room in the many 
 mansions into another, and what treasure in the heavens 
 was mine here, will be mine there, while that which is to 
 come will not seem so much another life as the ripeness 
 and perfecting of this life that now is. 
 
 Robert Collyer 
 
 296 
 
 . . . We are made to believe in [immortality]. There is 
 no better evidence than that [this] belief accords with 
 human nature. . . . When the reason is unable to prove 
 our immortality, the heart asserts it on the evidence of its 
 own imperishable love. 
 
 James Freeman Clarke 
 
 297 
 
 The immortality of the soul must rest upon something as 
 universal, as spiritual, as eternal as the soul itself. It 
 cannot be trusted to the testimony of external history, or 
 literary records, or bodily appearances; it must be founded 
 in the spiritual consciousness, in the laws of the soul, in 
 the essential merits of the hope, in its inextinguishable 
 charm for humanity, and in the testimony which its fruits 
 produce on those who live by its light. . . . 
 
 Jesus, the calmest, sanest, purest, best of souls, the con- 
 summate flower of humanity, affirmed our personal im- 
 
198 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 mortality with midoubting, unqualified certainty. I believe 
 him, not . . . because he rose from the dead, but because 
 he was all alive, immortal, living on principle and for ends 
 that were eternal, from the Sermon on the Mount to the 
 words from the cross. 
 
 Henry W, Bellows 
 
 298 
 
 We have faith in human immortality. . . . The great 
 essential to this belief is a sufficiently elevated estimate of 
 human nature: no man will ever deny its immortality who 
 has a deep impression of its capacity for so great a 
 destiny. . . . 
 
 In proportion as our nature rises in its nobleness, does 
 it realize its immortality. As it retires from animal gross- 
 ness, from selfish meanness, from pitable ignorance or 
 sordid neglect — as it opens forth into its true intellectual 
 and moral glory — do its doubts disperse, its affections 
 aspire: the veil is lifted from the future, the darkness 
 breaks away, and the spirit walks in dignity within the 
 paradise of God's eternity. What a testimony this is to 
 the great truth from which our hope and consolations 
 flow! What an incitement to seek its bright and steady 
 light by the culture of every holy faculty within us! The 
 more we do the will of our Father, the more do we feel 
 that this doctrine is indeed of him. Its affinities are with 
 the loftiest parts of our nature, and in our trust in it, we 
 ally ourselves with the choicest spirits of our race. 
 
 James Martineau 
 
 299 
 
 He who died at Azan sends 
 This to comfort all his friends: 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 199 
 
 Faithful friends! It lies, I know, 
 Pale and white and cold as snow; 
 And ye say, " Abdalla's dead! " 
 Weeping at his feet and head, 
 I can see your falling tears, 
 I can hear your sighs and prayers; 
 Yet I smile and whisper this — 
 " I am not the thing you kiss; 
 Cease your tears, and let it lie; 
 It was mine, it is not I." 
 
 Sweet friends! What the women lave 
 
 For its last bed of the grave. 
 
 Is but a hut which I am quitting. 
 
 Is a garment no more fitting, 
 
 Is a cage from which, at last. 
 
 Like a hawk my soul hath passed. 
 
 Love the inmate, not the room — 
 
 The wearer, not the garb — the plume 
 
 Of the falcon, not the bars 
 
 Which kept him from those splendid stars. 
 
 Loving friends! Be wise and dry 
 Straightway every weeping eye — 
 What ye lift upon the bier 
 Is not worth a wistful tear. 
 'Tis an empty sea-shell — one 
 Out of which the pearl is gone; 
 The shell is broken, it lies there; 
 The pearl, the soul, the all, is here. 
 'Tis an earthern jar, whose lid 
 Allah sealed, the while it hid 
 That treasure of his treasury, 
 A mind that loved him; let it lie! 
 
200 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Let the shard be earth's once more. 
 Since the gold shines in his store. 
 
 Allah glorious! Allah good! 
 Now thy world is understood; 
 Now the long, long wonder ends; 
 Yet ye weep, my erring friends, 
 While the man whom ye call dead, 
 In unspoken bliss, instead. 
 Lives and loves you; lost, 'tis true, 
 By such light as shines on you; 
 But in the light ye cannot see 
 Of imfulfilled felicity — 
 In enlarging paradise. 
 Lives a life that never dies. 
 
 Farewell, friends! Yet not farewell; 
 Where I am, ye, too, shall dwell. 
 I am gone before your face, 
 A moment's time, a little space. 
 When ye come where I have stepped 
 Ye will wonder why ye wept; 
 Ye will know, by wise love taught. 
 That here is all, and there is naught. 
 Weep awhile, if ye are fain — 
 Sunshine still must follow rain; 
 Only not at death — for death. 
 Now I know, is that first breath 
 Which our souls draw when we enter 
 Life, which is of all life centre. 
 
 Be ye certain all seems love, 
 Viewed from Allah's throne above; 
 Be ye stout of heart, and come 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 201 
 
 Bravely onward to your home! 
 
 La Allah ilia Allah! yea! 
 
 Thou love divine! Thou love alway! 
 
 He that died at Azan gave 
 
 This to those who made his grave. 
 
 Sir Edwin Arnold 
 
 300 
 
 And this is death: I understand it all. 
 
 New being waits me; new perceptions must 
 
 Be born in me before I plunge therein; 
 
 Which last is Death's affair; and while I speak, 
 
 Minute by minute he is filling me 
 
 With power ; and while my foot is on the threshold 
 
 Of boundless life — the doors unopened yet, 
 
 All preparations not complete within — 
 
 I turn new knowledge upon old events. . . . 
 
 Robert Browning 
 
 301 
 
 Be comforted; . . . 
 The face of Death is toward the Sun of Life, 
 His shadow darkens earth: his truer name 
 Is " Onward," no discordance in the roll 
 And march of that Eternal Harmony 
 Whereto the worlds beat time, tho' faintly heard 
 Until the great Hereafter. Mourn in hope. 
 
 Alfred Tennyson 
 
 302 
 
 . . . My end of breath 
 Shall bear away my soul in being true! . . . 
 No work begun shall ever pause for death! 
 
202 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Love will be helpful to me more and more 
 r the coming course, the new path I must tread. . . . 
 
 Robert Browning 
 
 303 
 
 . . . the energy of life may be 
 Kept on after the grave, but not begim; 
 And he who flagg'd not in the earthly strife. 
 From strength to strength advancing — only he. 
 His Soul well-knit, and all his battles won, 
 Mounts, and that hardly, to eternal life. 
 
 Matthew Arnold 
 
 304 
 
 What we, when face to face we see i^ 
 
 The Father of our souls, shall be, '$ 
 
 John tells us, doth not yet appear; * 
 Ah! did he tell what we are here! 
 
 A mind for thoughts to pass into, 
 A heart for loves to travel through. 
 Five senses to detect things near, 
 Is this the whole that we are here? 
 
 Rules baffle instincts — instincts rules. 
 Wise men are bad — and good are fools. 
 Facts evil — wishes vain appear. 
 We cannot go, why are we here? 
 
 O may we for assurance' sake, 
 Some arbitrary judgment take. 
 And wilfully pronounce it clear, 
 For this or that 'tis we are here? 
 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 203 
 
 Or is it right, and will it do, 
 To face the sad confusion through, 
 And say — It doth not yet appear, 
 What we shall be, what we are here. 
 
 Ah yet, when all is thought and said. 
 The heart still overrules the head; 
 Still what we hope we must believe, 
 And what is given us receive; 
 
 Must still believe, for still we hope 
 That in a world of larger scope. 
 What here is faithfully begun 
 Will be completed, not undone. 
 
 My child, we still must think, when we 
 That ampler life together see. 
 Some true result will yet appear 
 Of what we are, together, here. 
 
 Arthur Hugh C lough 
 
 305 
 
 ... A wanderer is man from his birth. 
 
 He was born in a ship 
 
 On the breast of the river of Time; . . . 
 
 Vainly does each, as he glides, 
 
 Fable and dream 
 
 Of the lands which the river of Time 
 
 Had left ere he woke on its breast. 
 
 Or shall reach when his eyes have been closed. . . . 
 
 [For] what was before us we know not. 
 
 And we know not what shall succeed . . . 
 
 [But] the width of the waters, the hush 
 
 
204 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Of the grey expanse where he floats, 
 
 Freshening its current and spotted with foam 
 
 As it draws to the Ocean, may strike 
 
 Peace to thfe soul of the man on its breast — 
 
 As the pale waste widens around him, 
 
 As the banks fade dimmer away, 
 
 As the stars come out, and the night-wind 
 
 Brings up the stream 
 
 Murmurs and scents of the infinite sea. 
 
 Matthew Arnold 
 
 306 
 
 Sunset and evening star. 
 
 And one clear call for me! 
 And may there be no moaning at the bar, 
 
 When I put out to sea. 
 
 But such a tide as moving seems asleep. 
 
 Too full for sound and foam, 
 When that which drew from out the boundless deep 
 
 Turns again home. 
 
 Twilight and evening bell. 
 
 And after that the dark! 
 And may there be no sadness of farewell. 
 
 When I embark; 
 
 For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place 
 
 The flood may bear me far, 
 I hope to see my pilot face to face 
 
 When I have crost the bar. 
 
 Alfred Tennyson 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 205 
 
 307 
 
 Methinks we do as fretful children do, 
 Leaning their faces on the window pane 
 To sigh the glass dim with their own breath's stain, 
 And shut the sky and landscape from their view; 
 And thus, alas! since God the maker drew 
 A mystic separation 'twixt those twain — 
 The life beyond us and our souls in pain — 
 We miss the prospect which we are called unto 
 By grief we are fools to use. Be still and strong, 
 O man, my brother! hold thy sobbing breath. 
 And keep thy soul's large window pure from wrong, 
 That so, as life's appointment issueth. 
 Thy vision may be clear to watch along 
 The sunset consummation-lights of death. 
 
 Elizabeth Barrett Browning 
 
 308 
 
 . . . Death is the entrance into the great light. 
 
 Victor Hugo 
 309 
 
 ... If so, death would be like the arrival of a traveller 
 at the top of a great mountain, whence he sees spread out 
 before him the whole configuration of the country, of which 
 till then he had had but passing glimpses. To be able to 
 overlook one's own history, to divine its meaning in the 
 general concert and in the divine plan, would be the 
 beginning of eternal felicity. Till then we had sacrificed 
 ourselves to the universal order, but then we should under- 
 stand and appreciate the beauty of that order. We had 
 toiled and laboured under the conductor of the orchestra; 
 and we should find ourselves become surprised and de- 
 
206 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 lighted hearers. We had seen nothing but our own little 
 path in the mist; and suddenly a marvellous panorama and 
 boundless distances would open before our dazzled eyes. 
 Why not? 
 
 Henri Frederick Amiel 
 
 Eudoxe: 
 
 Your immortality is only apparent; it does not extend 
 beyond the eternity of action; it does not imply the eternity 
 of the person. Jesus does more good today than when he 
 was an obscure Galilean; but he is no longer living. 
 
 Theogtiste: 
 
 He is still alive. His person exists; it has even en- 
 larged. Man lives where he acts. This life is dearer 
 to us than bodily life, since we willingly sacrifice the 
 latter for the former. Mind, I am not speaking only of 
 the life as conceived in opinion, in reputation, or in re- 
 membrance. This life, in fact, is insufficient, it is apt 
 to be too unjust. The more fortunate are those who may 
 have escaped this opinion. Tamerlane is more celebrated 
 than some unknown righteous man. Marcus Aurelius en- 
 joys the reputation he has merited not because he was 
 emperor, but because he has written his Meditations. True 
 influence is hidden; not that definite historic opinion is 
 on the whole very wrong, but it sins entirely too often. 
 Some unnamed individual may have been greater than 
 Alexander; some woman's heart, who had never uttered 
 a word about her life, may have felt more profoundly than 
 the most eloquent poet. I am speaking of life through in- 
 fluence, or, as the mystics would say, of life in God. 
 Human life, not its moral opposite, draws a tiny trail like 
 the point of a compass in the bosom of the infinite. This 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 207 
 
 arc of a circle drawn in God has no more an end than God 
 has. It is in the memory of God that men dwell immortal. 
 
 The opinion which absolute conscience has of him, the 
 remembrance of him which it preserves, — this is the true 
 life of the righteous, this is the eternal life. Conscience 
 assures a limitation, an opposition of the ego and the non- 
 ego, which is the very negation of the Infinite. What is 
 eternal is the idea. 
 
 After all, is our hope presumptuous? Is our demand 
 self-seeking? No, certainly not. We do exact no recom- 
 pense; we simply require to live, to know more, to learn 
 the secret of the universe which we have so eagerly sought, 
 the destiny of humanity which has stirred us so passion- 
 ately. 
 
 Ernest Renan 
 
 311 
 
 It is not too much to say that in this point of view 
 intelligence proves itself to belong essentially to an order 
 of things which is superior to change and death, and which 
 in its immortal stillness is unaffected and unperturbed by 
 the fluctuations and evanescence that condition all finite 
 things. 
 
 A future of illimitable knowledge and goodness is pos- 
 sible to it [the nature of man], because by its very structure 
 it has power to realize itself in all that seems to limit it. 
 
 John Caird 
 
 312 
 
 . . . We doubt whether any one of these views which 
 regard human beings as altogether dependent and transi- 
 tory has ever become a really pervading sentiment of the 
 whole nature, in spontaneous thought and action, as well 
 as in reflection. When an ancient poet, having scouted 
 
208 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 all idea of deities and retribution after death as useless 
 terrors by which the smooth and peaceful course of our 
 natural pleasure in life is disturbed, turns upon us and 
 inveighs against the fear of death, and asks. Do we, in- 
 satiable, desire to go on feasting for ever, and never to 
 retire with dignity, as satisfied guests, from the banquet 
 of life? the effect produced is no doubt striking. But 
 in asking this does he not forget that monitions to modera- 
 tion and dignity must fall very flat on the ear of him who 
 knows that in an hour he will cease to be? Or, in using 
 this simile, which is quite out of keeping with his general 
 tenor, is he not perchance secretly influenced by the truer 
 thought that this life is indeed a banquet, from which 
 as guests who have had enough, we must depart; but 
 that we, not so transitory, depart from it only to enter 
 another state of existence in which there will remain to 
 us the memory of what we have before enjoyed? And, on 
 the other side, what poetic and glowing expression has of- 
 ten been given to pantheistic views! But whilst they 
 extol with devotional rapture the absorption of the indi- 
 vidual in the universal, is not that which they are glorifying 
 just the abiding and enduring joy, which the mortal ex- 
 periences in its reunion with the eternal? And do they 
 not hereby assert the immortality of that mortal, which, 
 though destined to extinction, is only destined to such an 
 extinction as signifies its eternal preservation in some 
 form or other? This thought, which pantheistic poetry 
 cannot escape, is one which cannot be got rid of either by 
 the most prosaic reasoning or the most commonplace views. 
 People may seem to be as thoroughly convinced as you will 
 of their own impending annihilation, and may speak of the 
 disappearance of personal existence in the lap of universal 
 Nature, and one may indeed imagine that that which used to 
 happen may cease to happen, but one can never imagine that 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 209 
 
 anything which has once existed can cease to be. And how- 
 ever much people may attempt to persuade themselves that 
 the self-conscious Ego is in fact only an event, a vanish- 
 ing passage between atoms variously moved, still the imme- 
 diate consciousness of our own personal reality will always 
 remain invincible to these attempts, and we can never think 
 of ourselves as melting away in the great receptacle of 
 universal Nature without thinking too that we shall still 
 be preserved and go on existing in it in our dissolved con- 
 dition. 
 
 . . . Although in theory, men would have often denied 
 the existence of this inextinguishable feeling of being 
 bound up with an imperishable world, yet its activity has 
 been shown again and again. Sometimes in the provident 
 care for the wellbeing of a distant posterity — a care 
 which seems to spring up spontaneously in men's hearts; 
 sometimes in the intense interest taken in the general 
 improvement of mankind; and how often in outbursts of 
 ambition which have disturbed the world! 
 
 The individual soul that considers itself to be a mere 
 passing production of Nature is seldom altogether in- 
 different to future fame, and yet in what would the attrac- 
 tion of such fame consist if it were merely attached to a 
 name which no longer had an owner! In all these mani- 
 festations there is revealed the suppressed belief in a world 
 of spiritual interests, a world to which its individual 
 members are indissolubly united, far as we may yet be 
 from any clear idea of the way in which what seems so 
 transient becomes endowed with eternal existence. 
 
 Herman Lotze 
 
 313 
 
 Death [is] a transitory stage in a life that does not 
 find completion in this world. Our ultimate reason for 
 
210 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 believing anything that goes beyond our immediate sen- 
 sible experience, is that we cannot give a rational account 
 of the facts, cannot conceive them as part of an intelligible 
 order, if it be not true. And on this ground I think there 
 is strong evidence for man's future existence. The whole 
 system of things, of which man is the highest part, can 
 be made coherent with itself only on the view that his 
 earthly life is a part of a greater whole. This is the only 
 view that is consistent with the conviction that the universe 
 is a rational, and therefore a moral, system; or, what is 
 the same thing, with the existence of a God who governs 
 the world. Now this means that we should believe in a 
 future life because we have good ground to believe in God 
 and in goodness as the ultimate principle of all things. 
 
 Edward Caird 
 
 314 
 
 The same wide consent of mankind which sustains belief 
 in a God, and invests Him with a certain character, has 
 everywhere perceptibly, though variably and sometimes 
 with a great vagueness of outline, carried the sphere of the 
 moral government which it assigns to Him beyond the limits 
 of the visible world. In that larger region, though it lie 
 beyond the scope of our present narrow view, the belief of 
 theistical mankind has been, that the laws of this moral 
 government would be more clearly developed, and the 
 normal relation between good and evil, and between their 
 respective consequences, fully established. 
 
 Along, therefore, with a belief in God, we have to register 
 the acknowledgement of another truth, the doctrine of tlie 
 future state of man, which has had a not less ample ac- 
 ceptance in all the quarters from which the elements of 
 authority can be drawn; and has, indeed, in the darkest 
 periods and places of religion, been found difficult to eradi- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 211 
 
 cate, even when the Divine Idea had been so broken up 
 and degraded, as to seem divested of all its most splendid 
 attributes. 
 
 William E. Gladstone 
 
 315 
 
 ... To any one who feels it conducive either to his 
 satisfaction or to his usefulness to hope for a future state, 
 . . . there is no hindrance to his indulging that hope. 
 Appearances point to the existence of a Being who has 
 great power over us . . . and of whose goodness we have 
 evidence . . . and as we do not know the limits either of 
 his power or of his goodness, there is room to hope that 
 both the one and the other may extend to granting us this 
 gift. . . . The same ground which permits the hope, war- 
 rants us in expecting that if there be a future life, it will 
 be at least as good as the present, and will not be wanting 
 in the best feature of the present life, improvability by our 
 own efforts. . . . 
 
 John Stuart Mill 
 
 316 
 
 With respect to immortality, nothing shows me (so 
 clearly) how strong and almost instinctive a belief it is, 
 as the consideration of the view now held by most physicists, 
 namely that the sun with all the planets will in time grow 
 too cold for life. . . . Believing as I do that man in the 
 distant future will be a far more perfect creature than 
 he now is, it is an intolerable thought that he and all other 
 sentient beings are doomed to complete annihilation after 
 such long-continued slow process. . . . 
 
 Charles Darwin 
 
212 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 317 
 
 All nature tells us the same strange, mysterious story, of 
 the exuberance of life, of endless variety, of unimaginable 
 quantity. All this life upon our earth has led up to and 
 culminated in that of man. It has been, I believe, a com- 
 mon and not unpopular idea that during the whole process 
 of the rise and growth and extinction of past forms, the 
 earth has been preparing for the ultimate — Man. Much of 
 the wealth and luxuriance of living things, the infinite variety 
 of form and structure, the exquisite grace and beauty in bird 
 and insect, in foliage and flower, may have been mere by- 
 products of the grand mechanism we call nature — the one 
 and only method of developing humanity. 
 
 And is it not in perfect harmony with this grandeur 
 of design (if it be design), this vastness of scale, this 
 marvellous process of development through all the ages, 
 that the material universe needed to produce this cradle 
 of organic life, and of a being destined to a higher and 
 a permanent existence, should be on a corresponding scale 
 of vastness, of complexity, of beauty? Even if there were 
 no such evidence as I have here adduced for the unique 
 position and the exceptional characteristics which distin- 
 guish the earth, the old idea that all the planets were in- 
 habited, and that all the stars existed for the sake of other 
 planets, which planets existed to develop life, would, in the 
 light of our present knowledge, seem utterly improbable 
 and incredible. It would introduce monotony into a uni- 
 verse whose grand character and teaching is endless diver- 
 sity. It would imply that to produce the living soul in the 
 marvellous and glorious body of man — man with his 
 faculties, his aspirations, his powers for good and evil — 
 that this was an easy matter which could be brought about 
 anywhere, in any world. It would imply that man is an 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 213 
 
 animal and nothing more, is of no importance in the uni- 
 verse, needed no great preparations for his advent, only, 
 perhaps, a second-rate demon, and a third or fourth-rate 
 earth. Looking at the long and slow and complex growth 
 of nature that preceded his appearance, the immensity 
 of the stellar universe with its thousand million suns, and 
 the vast aeons of time during which it has been develop- 
 ing — all these seem only the appropriate and harmonious 
 surroundings, the necessary supply of material, the sufl&- 
 ciently spacious workshop for the production of that planet 
 which was to produce, first, the organic world, and then, 
 Man. . . . 
 
 Man is a duality, consisting of an organized spiritual 
 form, evolved coincidently with and permeating the physical 
 body, and having corresponding organs and development. 
 Death is the separation of this duality, and effects no 
 change in the spirit, morally or intellectually. Progres- 
 sive evolution of the intellectual and moral nature is the 
 destiny of individuals; the knowledge, attainments, and 
 experience of earth-life forming the basis of spirit-life. 
 
 Alfred Russel Wallace 
 
 318 
 
 . . . From the first dawning of life, we see all things 
 working together toward one mighty goal, the evolution 
 of the most exalted spiritual qualities which characterize 
 Humanity. The body is cast aside and returns to the dust 
 of which it was made. The earth, so marvellously wrought 
 to man's uses, will also be cast aside. The day is to come, 
 no doubt, when the heavens shall vanish as a scroll, and 
 the elements be melted with fervent heat. So small is the 
 value which Nature sets upon the perishable forms of 
 matter! The question, then, is reduced to this: are Man's 
 
214 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 highest spiritual qualities, into the production of which 
 all this creative energy has gone, to disappear with the 
 rest? Has all this work been done for nothing? Is it all 
 ephemeral, all a bubble that bursts, a vision that fades? 
 Are we to regard the Creator's work as like that of a child, 
 who builds houses out of blocks, just for the pleasure of 
 knocking them down? For aught that science can tell us, 
 it may be so, but I can see no good reason for believing 
 any such thing. . . . The more thoroughly we comprehend 
 that process of evolution by which things have come to be 
 what they are, the more we are likely to feel that to deny 
 the everlasting persistence of the spiritual element in Man 
 is to rob the whole process of its meaning. It goes far 
 toward putting us to permanent intellectual confusion, and 
 I do not see that any one has as yet alleged, or is ever 
 likely to allege, a sufficient reason for our accepting so 
 dire an alternative. 
 
 For my own part, therefore, I believe in the immortality 
 of the soul, not in the sense in which I accept the demon- 
 strable truths of science, but as a supreme act of faith 
 in the reasonableness of God's work. . . . Such a crown of 
 wonder seems to me no more than the fit climax to a crea- 
 tive work that has been ineffably beautiful and marvellous 
 in all its myriad stages. . . . 
 
 John Fiske 
 
 319 
 
 Nature, through the whole geological history of the earth, 
 was gestative mother of spirit, which, after its long 
 embryonic development, came to birth and independent 
 life and immortality in man. ... As the material evolu- 
 tion of Nature found its goal, its completion, and its signifi- 
 cance in man, so must man enter immediately upon a higher 
 spiritual evolution to find its goal and completion and signi- 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 215 
 
 ficance in the ideal man — the Divine man. As spirit, un- 
 conscious in the womb of Nature, continues to develop by 
 necessary law until it comes to birth and independent life 
 in man, so the new-born spirit of man . . . must ever strive 
 by freer law to attain, through a newer birth, unto a higher 
 life. ... Is there any conceivable meaning in Nature with- 
 out this consummation? All evolution has its beginning, 
 its course, its end. Without immortality this beautiful 
 cosmos, which has been developing into increasing beauty 
 for so many millions of years, when its evolution has run 
 its course and all is over, would be precisely as if it had 
 never been — an idle dream, an idiot tale signifying noth- 
 ing. I repeat, without immortality, the cosmos has no 
 meaning. 
 
 Joseph Le Conte 
 
 320 
 
 The great significance of the individual man fairly raises 
 the presumption that his place in Nature has a meaning 
 that is not to be measured by the length of his life in the 
 body. Looking as we must do for a purpose that justifies 
 to our understanding all this doing of Nature, is it not 
 reasonable to suppose that one at least of the designed re- 
 sults is attained in the creation of these historic personal- 
 ities? May we not fairly regard these persons as contain- 
 ing and preserving the permanent gain which comes from 
 the work of the visible universe: as the indestructible profit 
 of a work which otherwise would offend us by its apparent 
 resultlessness? . . . 
 
 Nathaniel Shaler 
 
 321 
 
 Out of the dusk a shadow, 
 Then, a spark; 
 
216 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Out of. the cloud a silence, 
 
 Then, a lark; 
 Out of the heart a rapture, 
 
 Then, a pain; 
 Out of the dead, cold ashes. 
 
 Life again. 
 
 John B. Tabb 
 
 322 
 
 . . . Out of death comes the view of the life beyond the 
 grave. . . . Though death be repugnant to the flesh, yet 
 where the Spirit is given, to die is gain. What a wonderful 
 transition it is! 
 
 Michael Faraday 
 
 323 
 
 ... Death, . . . 
 
 Opener and usher to the heavenly mansion. . . . 
 
 Walt Whitman 
 
 324 
 
 The word of summons comes and the soul leaps to answer 
 it. The eternal life in us answers to the eternal life beyond 
 the grave, recognizes it, flees to its own. There is no 
 violence of transfer. It is a continuation of the one same 
 life. The grave is only the moat around the inner castle 
 of the King, across which they who have long been His 
 loving and loyal retainers on the farther side enter in, sure 
 of a welcome to the heart of His hospitality. Far above 
 any morbid or affected, unnatural, unhuman pretence of a 
 wish for death there towers this calm Christian confidence, 
 ready to die, yet glad to stay here until the time comes; 
 knowing that death will be release, and yet finding life 
 happy and rich with the power of the resurrection already 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 217 
 
 present in it; counting both worlds God's worlds, and so 
 neither despising this nor dreading the other. . . . 
 
 Phillips Brooks 
 
 325 
 
 ... What then is the meaning of life? ... To me it 
 seems intelligible only as the avenue and vestibule to an- 
 other life. Its facts seem explainable only upon a theory 
 which cannot be expressed but in myth and symbol, and 
 which, everywhere and at all times, the myths and symbols 
 in which men have tried to portray their deepest perceptions, 
 do in some form express. . . . Shall we say that what 
 passes from our sight passes into oblivion? No; not into 
 oblivion. Far, far beyond our ken the eternal laws must 
 hold their sway. The hope that rises is the heart of all re- 
 ligions! The poets have sung it, the seers have told it, 
 and in its deepest pulses the heart of man throbs responsive 
 to its truth. 
 
 Henry George 
 
 326 
 
 Much on earth is hidden from us, but there is given us 
 in recompense the secret conviction of our living bond with 
 another world, a celestial and loftier world: and the very 
 roots of our thoughts and sensations are not here but there 
 in other worlds. 
 
 Dostoevsky 
 
 327 
 
 I believe in the life eternal; and I believe that man 
 is rewarded according to his acts, here and everywhere, 
 now and forever. I believe that so firmly that, at my 
 age, seeing myself upon the edge of the grave, I must 
 
218 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 often make an eflfort not to pray for the death of my body; 
 that is to say, for my birth into a new life. . . . 
 
 Leo Tolstoi 
 
 328 
 
 On the question before us [immortality] wide and far 
 your hearts will range from those early days when matins 
 and evensong, evensong and matins sang the larger hope 
 of humanity into your souls. . . . You will wander through 
 all phases, to come at last, I trust, to the opinion of Cicero, 
 who had rather be mistaken with Plato than be in the right 
 with those who deny altogether the life after death; and 
 this is my own confessio fidei. 
 
 Sir William Osier 
 
 329 
 
 I'm always speculating about why I always take Life 
 after Death for granted, while so many people start with 
 extinction, and throw the onus prohandi of a hereafter on 
 the Immortalist. I always catch myself seeking for a proof 
 of extinction, and finding Aone. I used to think once that 
 it was only resentment against the attitude of those who 
 see a proof of cessation of existence in the disappearance 
 of the means by which they have detected it in others. . . . 
 For I have never seen, and never shall see, that the cessation 
 of the evidence of existence is necessarily evidence of the 
 cessation of existence. . . . 
 
 . . . the death of a man might be better described as the 
 birth of a soul, and, inferentially, a parallel between the 
 foresight into its life to come of the unborn child on the 
 one hand and the unborn soul on the other. Who shall 
 say that the unborn child in its degree does not learn as 
 much of this world as we succeed in learning of the 
 next? . . . 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 219 
 
 The end of Life is beyond its powers of knowledge. 
 Death is a change that occurs at its beginning. The high- 
 est good is the growth of the Soul, and the greatest man 
 is he who rejoices most in great fulfilments of the will of 
 God. 
 
 William De Morgan 
 
 330 
 
 This is not the place to enter into detail or to discuss 
 facts scorned by orthodox science, but I cannot help re- 
 membering that an utterance from this chair is no ephemeral 
 production, for it remains to be criticized by generations 
 yet imborn, whose knowledge must inevitably be fuller and 
 wider than our own. Your President therefore should not 
 be completely bound by the shackles of present-day ortho- 
 doxy, nor limited to beliefs fashionable at the time. In 
 justice to myself and my co-workers I must risk annoy- 
 ing my present hearers, not only by leaving on record my 
 conviction that occurrences now regarded as occult can be 
 examined and reduced to order by the methods of science 
 carefully and persistently applied, but by going further 
 and saying, with the utmost brevity, that already the facts 
 so examined have convinced me that memory and affection 
 are not limited to that association with matter by which 
 alone they can manifest themselves here and now, and 
 that personality persists beyond bodily death. 
 
 Sir Oliver Lodge 
 
 331 
 
 V mystery of Life, 
 
 That after all our strife, 
 Defeats, mistakes, 
 
220 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Just as, at last, we see 
 The road to victory. 
 The tired heart breaks. 
 
 ^ Just as the long years give 
 Knov/ledge of how to live, 
 
 Life's end draws near; 
 As if, that gift being ours, 
 God needed our new powers 
 
 In worlds elsewhere. 
 
 There, if the Soul whose wings 
 Were won in suffering, springs 
 
 To life anew. 
 Justice would have some room 
 For hope beyond the tomb, 
 
 And mercy, too. 
 
 J And since, without this dream 
 No light, no faintest gleam 
 
 Answers our " why " ; 
 But earth and all its race 
 Must pass and leave no trace 
 
 On that blind sky; 
 
 Shall reason close that door 
 On all we struggled for. 
 
 Seal the Soul's doom; 
 Make all this universe 
 One wild answering curse. 
 
 One lampless tomb? 
 
 4 Mine be the dream, the creed 
 That leaves for God, indeed. 
 For God, and man. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 221 
 
 One open door whereby 
 To prove His world no lie 
 And crown his plan. 
 
 Alfred Noyes 
 
 332 
 
 Thou Power, that beyond the wind 
 
 Rulest, to thee I am resigned. 
 
 My child from me is snatched away; 
 
 She vanished at the peer of day. 
 
 Yet I discern with clearer brow 
 
 A high indulgence in the blow, 
 
 Light in the storm that o'er me broke, 
 
 A special kindness in the stroke, 
 
 A gentleness behind the Law, 
 
 A sweetness following on the awe. 
 
 Shall I forget that noon-day hour. 
 
 When as upon some favourite flower 
 
 A deep and tingling bliss was shed, 
 
 A thrilling peace from overhead? 
 
 I had not known it since my birth, 
 
 I shall not know it more on earth. 
 
 But now I may not sin, nor err. 
 
 For fear of ever losing her. 
 
 Though reeling from Thy thunder blow. 
 
 Though blinded with Thy lightning low, 
 
 I stagger back to dismal life, 
 
 And mix myself with mortal strife. 
 
 Thy judgment still to me is sweet; 
 
 I feel, I feel, that we shall meet. 
 
 Stephen Phillips 
 
222 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 333 
 
 We know not where they tarry who have died; 
 The gate wherein they entered is made fast, 
 No living mortal hath seen one who past 
 Hither, from out the darknes deep and wide. 
 
 We lean on Faith ; and some less wise have cried : 
 "Behold the butterfly, the seed that's cast! " 
 Vain hopes that fall like flowers before the blast! 
 What man can look on Death un terrified? — 
 
 Who love can never die! They are part 
 Of all that lives beneath the summer sky; 
 With the world's living soul their souls are one; 
 
 Nor shall they in vast nature be undone 
 
 And lost in the general life. Each separate heart 
 Shall live, and find its own, and never die. 
 
 Richard Watson Gilder 
 
 334 
 
 We know not how it is to be, or where. But somehow, 
 somewhere, whether we wish for it or not, we know, by the 
 dumb craving of the ordered world, as well as by the ut- 
 tered hope of holiest souls, that God will yet fulfill us 
 into something better than the fragments that we are. And 
 so we wait, and work, and watch, and do the best we m^ay, 
 or bow our heads in sorrow that our doing is so much below 
 the best — and as his laws ordain we let life go, or fall 
 asleep, but always for some further greater life beyond the 
 shadows and the sleeping. 
 
 Brooke Herford 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 223 
 
 335 
 
 The belief in a future life is a natural and an universal 
 one. It may claim the credit of being native and essential, 
 unless it can be disproved. It cannot be disproved. The 
 most that doubt can do is to say that it does not know. 
 It may stand, then; and no one may justly charge it with 
 unreason. Beyond this there are many indications that 
 point toward this belief as their most rational solution. 
 This hypothesis of a future is the one which most naturally 
 accounts for all known facts. Such being the case, we may 
 as logically claim it as the astronomer claims a new planet, 
 as yet unseen, as the needed explanation of the perturba- 
 tions and movements that ask for some such cause. 
 
 Minot J. Savage 
 
 336 
 
 . . . We rejoice that in the hours of our purer vision, 
 when the pulse-throb of eternity is strong within us, we 
 know that no pang of mortality can reach our unconquer- 
 able soul, and that . . . death is but the gateway to life 
 eternal. . . . 
 
 Walter Rauschenbusch 
 
 337 
 
 It must never be forgotten that humanity is involved in 
 this faith, that humanity is its witness. ... It persists 
 in believing that the universe is reasonable, and that human 
 life in its best achievement, in its best capacity, and in its en- 
 during moral need, is of permanent concern to the Most 
 High. . . . Through the higher instincts not of one man, 
 but of all men; through the kinship to the Infinite, not of 
 single lives, but of all lives; through the ideals that dawn, 
 
224 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 not upon a few favoured individuals, but upon mankind; 
 finally, through the great note of permanence in the soul, 
 the universe would seem to be delivering its decree concern- 
 ing the dignity and destiny of the race. ... It is this 
 voice that the prophet of today waits to hear, the voice 
 like the sound of many waters and mighty thunderings, 
 rolling through all the deeper and greater humanities, the 
 voice of the Infinite speaking through the race, at length 
 become harmonious with his righteous purpose in history, 
 and registering his decree in favour of the immortality of 
 man. 
 
 George A. Gordon 
 
 338 
 
 Immortality is one of the great spiritual needs of man. 
 ... I have to confess that my own personal feeling . . . 
 has never been of the keenest order, and that, among the 
 problems that give my mind solicitude, this one does not 
 take the very foremost place. Yet there are individuals 
 with a real passion for the matter, men and women for 
 whom a life hereafter is a pungent craving . . . and in 
 whom keenness of interest has bred an insight into the 
 relations of the subject that no one less penetrated with the 
 mystery of it can attain. Some of these persons are known 
 to me . . . they do not speak as the scribes, but as having 
 direct authority. . . . 
 
 In strict logic . . . the fangs of cerebralistic materialism 
 are drawn. My words ought to exert a releasing function 
 on your hopes. You may believe henceforward, whether 
 you care to profit by the permission or not. . . . 
 
 The reader would be in accord with everything that the 
 text of my lecture intended to say, were he to assert that 
 every memory and afifection of his present life is to be 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 225 
 
 preserved, and that he shall never in saecula saeculorum 
 cease to be able to say to himself: " I am the same per- 
 sonal being who in old times upon the earth had those ex- 
 periences." 
 
 William James 
 
 339 
 
 I have never seen what to me seemed an atom of proof 
 that there is a future life. And yet^I am strongly in- 
 clined to expect one. 
 
 Mark Twain 
 
 340 
 
 . . . That there is a great will at work behind it all, I 
 cannot for a moment doubt; nor can I doubt that I do 
 it, with many foolish fears and delays, and shall do it to 
 the end. Why it is that, voyaging thus to the haven be- 
 neath the hill, I meet such adverse breezes, such head- 
 strong currents, such a wTack of wind and thwarting wave, 
 I know not; nor what that other land will be like, if in- 
 deed I sail beyond the sunset; but that a home awaits me 
 and all mankind I believe, of which this quiet house, so 
 pleasantly ordered, among its old trees and dewy pastures, 
 is but a faint sweet symbol. . . . There is a Truth behind 
 all confusions and errors; a good beyond all pilgrimages. 
 I shall find it, I shall reach it, in some day of sudden glory, 
 of hope fulfilled and sorrow ended; and no step of the 
 way thither will be wasted, whether trodden in despair and 
 weariness or in elation and delight, till we have learned not 
 to fear, not to judge, not to mistrust, not to despise; till 
 in a moment our eyes will be opened, and we shall know 
 that we have found peace. 
 
 Arthur Christopher Benson 
 
226 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 341 
 
 . . . Among all the possibilities which the universe still 
 hides from us, one of the easiest to realize, one of the most 
 probable ... is certainly the possibility of enjoying an 
 existence much more spacious, lofty, perfect, durable and 
 secure than that which is offered to us by our actual con- 
 sciousness. Admitting this possibility — and there are few 
 as probable — the problem of immortality is, in principle, 
 solved. It now becomes a question of grasping or fore- 
 seeing its ways and, amid the circumstances that interest 
 us the most, of knowing what part of our intellectual and 
 moral acquirements will pass into our eternal and uni- 
 versal life. . . . 
 
 Maurice Maeterlinck 
 
 342 
 
 Our own will dies and God's will lives in us, and in so 
 far as this is the case we attain the object of oiir earthly 
 existence, that is, the realization of a higher and wider con- 
 sciousness, the discovery of our true personality, which is 
 immortal. This cannot persist until it has been attained, 
 and its attainment is the Way of Life. In other words, 
 when we are conscious of the Divine life and love dwelling 
 within us, our human life becomes a conscious partaker of 
 the endless life of God. 
 
 Sir William F. Barrett 
 
 343 
 
 As to the soul, verily it is sent forth by the Word of 
 God, and it is that which, when kindled by the Fire of the 
 Love of God, will not be quenched, neither by the waters 
 of the rain, nor by the seas of the world. It is indeed that 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 227 
 
 kindled fire which is burning in the human Lote-tree, 
 uttering " Verily there is no God but HE," and he who 
 hears His voice is one of those who are successful. On 
 leaving the body, God will send it forth after the best 
 form, and cause it to enter into a high heaven: verily 
 thy Lord is powerful over all things. 
 
 Baha O'Llah 
 
 344 
 
 . . . The Infinite Power of Love that has grounded a 
 new spontaneous nature in man over against a dark and 
 hostile world, will conserve such a new nature and its 
 spiritual nucleus, and shelter it against all perils and as- 
 saults, so that life as the bearer of Life Eternal can never 
 be wholly lost in the stream of time. Thus we obtain 
 . . . belief in immortality — conviction of the indestructi- 
 bility of that spiritual unity of life in man, which is the 
 work of God. And it is from such a conception that the 
 conviction of the eternity of the Divine Life proceeds — 
 a conviction which gives man a trust in the preservation 
 in some kind of way of the spiritual nucleus of his na- 
 ture. . . . 
 
 Rudolph Eucken 
 
 345 
 
 I build my belief in immortality on the conviction that 
 the fundamental reality of the universe is consciousness, and 
 that no consciousness can ever be extinguished, for it be- 
 longs to the whole and must be fulfilled in the whole. The 
 one unthinkable supposition from this point of view is 
 that any kind of being which has ever become aware of it- 
 self, that is, has ever contained a ray of the eternal con- 
 sciousness, can perish. 
 
 Reginald G. Campbell 
 
228 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 346 
 
 In the will, as in consciousness, we have a new element 
 in the evolution of the life, the development of a force 
 which can dominate brain processes. It is an autonomy, 
 controlling the nervous system, and regulating the func- 
 tions of the mind. It is a psychic force which from its 
 place of authority can direct the stores of nerve force, now 
 into this channel and now into that, by a power of choice 
 which has no physiological law, and, indeed, no psycho- 
 logical law can explain or predict. 
 
 The body thus appears to have produced what it can no 
 longer control, nor even understand; and evolution has 
 brought forth the flower and glory of its age-long develop- 
 ment. 
 
 Beyond this stage of mental evolution it is not neces- 
 sary to go because we have now crossed the great gulf 
 between the physiological and the psychical, and have set 
 our feet firmly on that shore where the higher faculties of 
 the mind, reason and abstract thought, are subsequently 
 developed. These higher powers serve only to point us 
 still further along the road that delivers us from bondage 
 to the flesh, and leads us to anticipate the complete emanci- 
 pation of the mind from the body. The mind may hence- 
 forth become indifferent to the disasters which in the 
 course of nature are bound to overtake the body, and may 
 hope to survive its destruction and decay — and perhaps 
 thereafter to find or create for itself a " spiritual body " 
 adapted to a different sphere of existence and to other modes 
 of life. . . . 
 
 . . . For the present, so far as science is concerned, life 
 after the grave is not a proved fact, but the evidence is 
 sufl&cient to justify faith in it. Such " faith " is often looked 
 upon as a specifically religious function, and suggests to 
 
 I 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 229 
 
 the casual observer a process of " swallowing " what is in- 
 credible. Far from that being the case, faith is a func- 
 tion which the scientist employs constantly and without 
 which he could not conduct his investigations. " Faith " 
 is merely the religious counterpart of the " hypothesis " 
 of the scientist. He is bound to assume as a hypothesis 
 the law of gravity, and other mighty assumptions which 
 he has not proved ; but, having assumed any such hypothesis, 
 he finds that the facts of the universe as he knows them 
 fit so perfectly into it that he is confirmed in his belief 
 in the legitimacy of his hypothesis. Precisely the same 
 process is employed by the religious man who assumes the 
 truth of belief in God and in immortal life. Having ac- 
 cepted these hypotheses, he finds that they explain so mfiny 
 of the deep problems of the world that his faith in them is 
 confirmed. Since, therefore, the facts of science, which 
 we have been studying, seem rather to confirm than to con- 
 tradict the hypothesis of a life beyond death, the religious 
 man is acting only reasonably when he accepts the belief 
 as an article of faith. ... 
 
 James Arthur Had field 
 
 347 
 
 The notion of a material identity between the present 
 and future bodies is one which ought to be far more em- 
 phatically repudiated by the Church than has hitherto been 
 done; but that does not mean that there is no connection 
 or continuity between them. That connection, however, 
 clearly cannot consist in identity of material particles; 
 for even in this life, so we are told, the material particles 
 which constitute our bodies are completely replaced about 
 once in every seven years. The principle of continuity 
 and connection between my body of today and my body 
 
230 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 of twenty years ago is to be found, not in its material 
 particles, but in the form-giving body-building principle 
 of life within, i. e., in the soul. The soul is not, as the 
 Gnostics thought, a mere prisoner in a body of alien na- 
 ture. Body affects soul and soul affects body, and neither 
 is complete without the other; but (as argued above), the 
 soul is the " predominant partner." But if the principle 
 of bodily continuity even in this world is found not in 
 any identity of material particles, but in the soul, it 
 is obvious that the principle of continuity between the 
 terrestrial and the celestial body also must be looked for 
 in the same direction. And if we ask how the connection 
 we seek can be adequately supplied by the soul, the reply 
 would be that it is in virtue of that power inherent in the 
 life principle of determining form and of building up by 
 assimilation from its environment a new body suited to that 
 environment — whether that environment be in this world or 
 in the world beyond our sight. 
 
 Burnett Hillman Streeter 
 
 348 i 
 
 The life eternal is the life we are living now and here. 
 [But] the individual as we know him on this earth can- 
 not reappear in another world. . . . What the father, 
 mother, friend we have touched " here below " is, he or 
 she is by the co-operating force of both mind and body. 
 But, if the mind be the creator of the body, it can pass on 
 in another stage of existence to create for itself a better 
 body to realize the aspirations felt but unattainable here. 
 Soul may know soul hereafter through all their new clothes. 
 
 Henry D, Lloyd 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 231 
 
 349 
 
 [We] belong not to this world of our merely human 
 sense and thought. . . . Therein lies the very proof that 
 [we] even now belong to a higher and to a richer realm. 
 Therein lies the very sign of [our] true immortality. 
 
 Despite God's absolute unity, we, as individuals, pre- 
 serve and attain our unique lives and meanings, and are 
 not lost in the very life that sustains us, and that needs us 
 as its own expression. This life is real through us all; 
 and we are real through our union with that life. Close is 
 our touch with the eternal. Boundless is the meaning of 
 our nature. Its mysteries baffle our present science, and 
 escape our present experience; but they need not blind our 
 eyes to the central unity of Being, nor make us feel lost 
 in a realm where all the wanderings of time mean the 
 process whereby is discovered the homeland of Eternity. 
 
 Josiah Royce 
 
 350 
 
 Personality, being the highest product and final crown 
 of life and of the universe, must be permanent, or all 
 value vanishes with it. Its permanence is seen in its per- 
 sistence through all earthly vicissitudes. While it de- 
 velops from germinal consciousness to fullblown power, 
 yet after emerging into selfhood it retains its central core 
 of consciousness, which does not change with the years but 
 remains as the identical self. Its outward circumstances 
 are in a state of ceaseless flux and at times pass through 
 tremendous shocks and upheavals; its very body flows 
 away from it in a steady stream and is constantly replaced 
 with new tissues; its subjective experience is in a state of 
 incessant change and development, and at intervals en- 
 counters catastrophic crises and is swept by terrible storms; 
 
232 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 and yet none of these things rolls it from its base, but its 
 central self persists as the same personality. If it can sur- 
 vive such constant and deep changes and even repeatedly 
 put off the entire body and clothe itself in a new garment 
 of the flesh, will it not survive the still greater shock of 
 death and weave around itself a new body adapted to its 
 new condition? ... 
 
 The end of each stage of evolution marks a critical point 
 where the product is cut off from the process and raised 
 to a higher level. The direction in which this principle 
 points is plain: it points to a higher life for man. His 
 soul ripens on the stem of the body and then is detached 
 and the body perishes. But the whole analogy of evolution 
 requires that this most precious product should not be lost, 
 but should pass on to a higher stage and be devoted to a 
 more exalted use, or be transmuted into finer, richer life. 
 The long, slow, unwearied climb, purchased at every step 
 by a great deal of sacrifice, from the ether to the atom, 
 from the atom to the crystal, from the crystal to the cell, and 
 from the cell to man, has been struggling towards personal- 
 ity as its goal. Shall the atom and the crystal and the cell 
 be on their way to a higher destiny at the lower end of the 
 scale of evolution, and yet personality in the human soul at 
 the top fail of this principle and hope and fall into nothing- 
 ness? . . . That personalities, the highest and costliest em- 
 bodiments of worth, should be produced through the travail 
 of divine birth only to be flung as rubbish to the void, puts 
 to confusion all our ideas of reason and right. Evolution 
 itself has written all over it the promise and potency of 
 some better thing, and its long, blood-stained process is ade- 
 quately completed and crowned only when the human soul, 
 its topmost blossom and finest fruit, passes into a higher 
 world and an immortal life. 
 
 James H. Snowden 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 233 
 
 351 
 
 The law of evolution is that Good shall on the whole 
 increase in the universe with the process of the suns: that 
 immortality itself is a special case of a more general 
 Law, namely, that in the whole universe nothing really 
 finally perishes that is worth keeping, that a thing once 
 attained is not thrown away. 
 
 The general mutability and mortality in the world need 
 not disturb us. The things we see perishing and dying are 
 not of the same kind as those which we hope will endure. 
 Death and decay, as we know them, are interesting physical 
 processes, which may be studied and understood; they have 
 seized the imagination of man, and govern his emotions, 
 perhaps unduly, but there is nothing in them to suggest 
 ultimate destruction, or the final triumph of ill; they are 
 necessary correlatives to conception and birth into a ma- 
 terial world; they do not really contradict an optimistic 
 view of existence. 
 
 So far as we can tell, there need be no real waste, no 
 real loss, no annihilation; but everything sufl&ciently valu- 
 able, be it beauty, artistic achievement, knowledge, un- 
 selfish affection, may be thought of as enduring henceforth 
 and forever if not with an individual and personal exist- 
 ence, yet as part of the eternal Being of God. 
 
 And this carries with it the persistence of personality 
 in all creatures who have risen to the attainment of God- 
 like faculties, such as self-determination and other attri- 
 butes which suggest kinship with Deity and make their pos- 
 sessor a member of the Divine family. For whether or 
 not this incipient theory of the conservation of value stand 
 the test of criticism, it is undeniable that . . . seers do not 
 hesitate to attribute permanence and timeless existence to 
 the essential element in man himself. They realize that 
 
234 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 he is one with the universe, that he may come to be in 
 tmie with the infinite, and that his spasmodic efforts towards 
 a state wherein the average will rise to a level now attained 
 by only a few, are part of the evolutionary travailing of 
 the whole creation. . . . What we are claiming is no less 
 than this — that, whereas it is certain that the present 
 body cannot long exist without the soul, it is quite possible 
 and indeed necessary for the soul to exist without the present 
 body. We base this claim on the soul's manifest transcend- 
 ence, on its genuine reality, and on the general law of the 
 persistence of all real existence. 
 
 Sir Oliver Lodge 
 
 352 
 
 Philosophy introduces us thus into the spiritual life. 
 And it shows us at the same time the relation of the life 
 of the spirit to that of the body. The great error of the 
 doctrines on the spirit has been the idea that by isolating 
 the spiritual life from all the rest, by suspending it in 
 space as high as possible above the earth, they were placing 
 it beyond attack, as if they were not thereby simply ex- 
 posing it to be taken as an effect of mirage. . . . They 
 are right to believe in the absolute reality of the per- 
 son and in his independence toward matter; but science 
 is there, which shows the interdependence of conscious life 
 and cerebral activity. They are right to attribute to man 
 a privileged place in nature, to hold that the distance is 
 infinite between the animal and man; but the history of 
 life is there, which makes us witness the genesis of species by 
 gradual transformation, and seems thus to reintegrate man 
 in animality. When a strong instinct assures the prob- 
 ability of personal survival, they are right not to close their 
 ears to its voice; but if there exist " souls " capable of an 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 235 
 
 independent life, whence do they come? . . . All these 
 questions will remain mianswered ... if we do not re- 
 solve to see the life of the body just where it really is, on 
 the road that leads to the life of the spirit. . . . 
 
 [Souls] are nothing else than the little rills into which 
 the great river of life, flowing through the body of hu- 
 manity, divides itself. The movement of the stream is 
 distinct from the river bed, although it must adopt its 
 winding course. Consciousness is distinct from the organism 
 it animates, although it must undergo its vicissitudes . . . 
 the destiny of consciousness is not bound up . . . with 
 the destiny of cerebral matter. Consciousness is essen- 
 tially free; it is freedom itself. . . . 
 
 As the smallest grain of dust is bound up with our en- 
 tire solar system, ... so all organized beings, from the 
 humblest to the highest, from the first origins of life to the 
 time in which we are, and in all places as in all times, do 
 but evidence a single impulsion. . . . All the living hold 
 together, and all yield to the same tremendous push. The 
 animal takes his stand on the plant, man bestrides ani- 
 mality; and the whole of humanity, in space and in time, 
 is one immense army galloping beside and before and be- 
 hind each of us in an overwhelming charge able to beat 
 down every resistance and clear the most formidable ob- 
 stacles, perhaps even death. 
 
 Henri Bergson 
 
 353 
 
 . . . What are the things which most bear the impress 
 of the Eternal, — which seem most truly to mirror the 
 power of God? Wisdom, love, duty, joyous and free ser- 
 vice. 
 
 But what do these words mean? They express personal 
 
236 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 qualities, they are attributes of a living being. They are 
 doubtless potentialities of the universe, bound up in its 
 necessary causation, but to us they have been revealed in 
 human consciousness. 
 
 For unnumbered ages atoms have been moved about by 
 forces as indestructible as themselves. They have floated 
 in mists of fire, they have been gathered into molten billows, 
 they have been whirled into worlds and systems of worlds, 
 they have risen into clouds, they have fallen in rain, they 
 have risen again in grass-blades and flowers and trees. 
 They have been organized into creatures that breathe and 
 creep and fly, and they return again into dust. 
 
 . . . But the time comes when there is something more. 
 Out of the dust there emerges a creature whose existence in 
 the material world is nothing short of a miracle. Connect 
 him as closely as you may with all that went before, and yet 
 the amazing fact remains that his being carries him into 
 another sphere which transcends the familiar round of physi- 
 cal causation. His language is strange in this world of 
 law. Is it only a chance concourse of atoms, organized 
 into a brain, as yesterday they may have been organized 
 into the needs of the roadside, from which comes the con- 
 fident voice: I love, I hope, I worship eternal beauty, I 
 off'er myself in obedience to a perfect law of righteous- 
 ness, I gladly suffer tliat others may be saved, I resist 
 the threatening evil that I see, I choose not the easy way, 
 but the difl&cult way, my will shall not yield to circum- 
 stance, but only to a higher will. 
 
 Molecules, however organized, do not naturally thus 
 utter themselves. Chemical reactions are not thus ex- 
 pressed. There are no equivalents for this new power in 
 the mechanical forces. ... A universe out of which there 
 emerges a living will cannot be purposeless. In the light 
 of the living will the history of the Fast must be written, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 237 
 
 and this newly revealed force throws a penetrating light 
 into the future. Here is something that has an eternal 
 meaning. Here is the first glimpse of infinitude that really 
 satisfies. The infinitudes of Time and Space and Physical 
 Force awe us at first, and then tire us. It is because they 
 are infinite in extent, but not infinite in value. We very 
 quickly exhaust their meaning, and then there is the sense 
 of monotonous repetition. . . . 
 
 . . . But the glimpse of spiritual infinitude is like the 
 glimpse of mountains towering above us, range upon range, 
 peak upon peak. Looking up we see no end, we are in- 
 spired by the immensities. There is in us the unstilled de- 
 sire for that which lies beyond. Did ever lover tire of the 
 thought of love eternal, the vaster passion gathering all 
 unto itself, guarding all and keeping all? The truth-lover 
 tires of accumulation of unrelated facts, but he does 
 not tire of Truth, Truth vitalized and harmonized. Di- 
 vine ideas ever find us young and ever keep us so. . . . 
 
 . . . This is that of which — when the clouds are off 
 our souls — we dare assert immortality. . . . 
 
 . . . The wondering joy in life inspires a deeper con- 
 fidence than many a laboured argument. It is a faith that 
 is born anew in unselfish friendship. Many a man, who 
 would not claim immortality for himself, yet reverently 
 recognizes in another greater than himself "the power of 
 an endless life." 
 
 Samuel McChord Crothers 
 
 354 
 
 The man of moral seriousness, who looks on life as a 
 sacred privilege and trust, who has visions of heights to 
 which his spiritual nature may climb, who has touched 
 depths of refining spiritual experience — depths that are 
 
238 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 prophetic of others deeper still; the man who is capable 
 of high and ennobling friendships, whose horizon embraces 
 aims that are exalting and exalted, that man will look on 
 immortality as a priceless boon, not because of any op- 
 portunity that it offers for delights and rewards, but be- 
 cause of the opportunity that it offers for continuing the 
 task of spiritual sculpture, for rounding out his character, 
 for completing the dimensions of his being, for maturing 
 the great life-purpose, that here on earth had time only to 
 blossom, or, perchance, only to bud. For such a man, 
 with such moral experience, conscious of ever deeper and 
 intenser moral living, no alternative is open but belief in 
 survival of his essential spiritual selfhood, to be somehow 
 fitted, equipped for further progress toward " the goal 
 set up " for him, albeit he can form no visual image of 
 this equipment and knows moral progress here only in 
 connection with brain and other bodily equipment. . . . 
 
 The only rational view of our earthly pilgrimage is 
 that of a process of growth, upward and onward endlessly, 
 a progressus ad Parnassum. If, then, when that pilgrimage 
 ends, our goal be still like a star shining in the distant 
 heaven and we look up from the low plane of our present 
 attainment to that star, what escape is there from the fright- 
 ful unreason of such a situation? It is, so far as I can 
 see, that death does not terminate the pilgrimage but that 
 somehow, somewhere, opportunity is afforded for the per- 
 petuation of what is essentially spiritual in us, to the end 
 that it may continue its consecrated devotion to the su- 
 preme purpose of its being. 
 
 To my reason immortality is the only possible solution 
 to the mystery of life. 
 
 Alfred W. Martin 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 239 
 
 355 
 
 ... No man in those hours when he is intellectually and 
 spiritually at his best can consent, without violence to his 
 profoundest instincts, to believe in a world that loses all 
 its gains, a world in which nothing that we have willed 
 or hoped or dreamed of good shall exist. Without some 
 form of personal permanence that issue to the cosmic pro- 
 cess seems inevitable. 
 
 . . . The man who lives as though he were immortal 
 lives in a universe where the highest spiritual values are 
 permanent, outlasting the growth and dissolution of the 
 stars; where personality, whether in himself or others, is 
 infinitely precious and has everlasting issues; where char- 
 acter is the supreme concern of life, in behalf of which all 
 else may reasonably be sacrificed; where no social service 
 ever can be vain, if it registers itself in even one man 
 made better, and where, in all public-minded devotion to 
 moral causes on the earth, we are not digging artificial 
 lakes to be filled by our own buckets, in hopeless contest 
 with an alien universe, but rather building channels down 
 which the eternal spiritual purpose of the living God shall 
 flow to its " far off divine event." 
 
 . . . Death is a great adventure, but none need go un- 
 convinced that there is an issue to it. The man of faith 
 may face it as Columbus faced his first voyage from the 
 shores of Spain. What lies across the sea he cannot tell; 
 his special expectations all may be mistaken; but his insight 
 into the clear meanings of present facts may persuade him 
 beyond doubt that the sea has another shore. Such con- 
 fident faith, so founded upon reasonable grounds, shall 
 be turned to sight, when, for all the dismay of the un- 
 believing, the hope of the seers is rewarded by the vision of 
 a new continent, Harry Emerson Fosdick 
 
240 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 356 
 
 ... By translation from this world to another new pos- 
 sibilities are opened up. Here, however faithful may be 
 the soul and however fully it may express itself in the out- 
 ward life, this expression is at best incomplete, and only 
 prophetic of that which is yet to be. But in the case of 
 less perfect characters the need of such translation is still 
 more imperative, and there comes a time when it becomes 
 apparent that further progress in this world is barred, 
 whether owing to self-wrought or inherited incapacities or 
 outward causes of arrested development springing it may 
 be from the hand of God Himself. And yet, in the case 
 of such characters, how often are the good and evil qualities 
 intermingled in such a way that it is clear that finally only 
 the good will survive — that the strong sense of right and 
 truth will in due time master the traditional proneness 
 to wrong and deception, the inner gentleness and largeness 
 of spirit rise superior to the temporary declensions into 
 suspicious resentful tempers, and the high purposes ulti- 
 mately extinguish every unworthy habit and bring every 
 unruly passion into obedience to the spirit of Christ. Not 
 what the man now is, but what he aspires to be, is the real 
 man, and when death removes him from this life's fitful 
 fever and troubled environment, this is the picture he leaves 
 behind him in the hearts of those who knew and loved 
 him, and this is the ideal he is already on the way to 
 achieve, armed wifth fresh powers and enriched with fresh 
 opportunities. 
 
 R. H. Charles D. Litt 
 
 357 
 
 It is becoming increasingly hard to find where death 
 achieves its victory. Man has perfected a hundred devices 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 241 
 
 to perpetuate his mortal acts. His voice is caught on 
 rolling disks, and held imperishable for the ears of his 
 grandchildren. Gestures of his hands, the pantomime of his 
 face, are recorded on films that can be laid away for a 
 century and then unspun and projected on screens. If the 
 breath of his body and his chance actions are so worthy of 
 long continuing, then his spirit, that is finer than they, 
 may be even more persisting, and impress itself on what is 
 more durable than wax. If death cannot carry away into 
 oblivion tones of his voice ntor the spectacle of his ways, 
 it does not become us to doubt that death does not scatter 
 spirit beyond recall, nor altogether end what was so ar- 
 dent. 
 
 Arthur Gleason 
 
 358 
 
 There is a plant of the Syrian deserts — the Rose of 
 Jericho — about the size of our common daisy plant, and 
 bearing a similiar flower, which in dry seasons, when the 
 earth about its roots is turned into mere sand, has the pres- 
 ence of mind to detach itself from its hold altogether and 
 roll itself into a mere ball — flower, root, and all. It is 
 then blown along the plains by the wind, and travels away 
 until it reaches some moist and sheltered spot, when it ex- 
 pands again and takes hold on the ground, uplifts its head, 
 and merrily blooms once more. Like the little rose of 
 Jericho, the human soul has at times to draw in its roots 
 (which we may compare to the animal part) and separate 
 them from their earthly entanglement; even the sun in 
 heaven, which it knows distantly for the source of its 
 life, may be obscured; but compacting itself for the nonce 
 into a sturdy ball, it starts gaily on its far adventure. 
 
 Edward Carpenter 
 
242 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 359 
 IN THE HUT 
 
 . . . The hut was empty. I chopped some wood and 
 made a fire, fetched water from the spring and cooked my 
 evening meaL For an hour or more I have lain in the 
 straw and tried to sleep; in vain! That door swings ajar; 
 symbols besiege me and press for interpretation. The 
 stars bum brighter and brighter; the torrents roar; and the 
 glacier gleams cold and white, coiled in the jaws of the 
 abyss. It is the type of death as the valley was of life. 
 And it is to wrestle with death that I am here alone. 
 
 But I dare not face him yet ; I recognize that I am afraid. 
 Let me turn back then to life, and record, for my assur- 
 ance, the truth my thought has long divined and vision 
 today confirmed. Nothing exists but individuals in the 
 making. All things live, yes, even those we call inani- 
 mate. A soul, or a myriad souls, inform the rocks and 
 streams and winds. Innumerable centres of life leap 
 in joy down the torrent; or it may be some diffused and 
 elemental spirit singly sustains that ever-flowing form. The 
 sea is a passion, the air and the light a will and a desire. 
 All things together, each in his kind, each in his rank, 
 press upwards, moved by love, to a goal that is good. 
 What that goal is, I do not closely inquire, neither do I ask 
 after the origin or meaning of the Whole. I cling to the 
 fact I know, to movement and its cause ; the fact I know from 
 the soul of Man and infer in Nature. What He is, She is; 
 and what He is, I know. He is discord straining to har- 
 mony, ignorance to knowledge, fear to courage, hate and 
 indifference to love. He is a system out of equilibrium, 
 and therefore moving towards it; he is the fall of the stone, 
 the flow of the stream, the orbit of the star, rendered in the 
 truth of passion and desire. To apprehend Reality is 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 243 
 
 the goal of his eternal quest. . . . The horizons of death 
 and birth shut us in. And even of the interspace we are 
 not free, for we are pent in our own faculties. Something 
 these reveal, but most they hide. We have five senses, but 
 we have no more; we have a brain, but its beats are timed. 
 Born into a shell, we grow till we reach its limits; the rest 
 is retrocession or frustration. To shatter the shell is the 
 destiny of life; but it can only be shattered by death. There 
 is the paradox of our being. If death be death, life is 
 not life; if life be life, death is not death. For either life 
 is nothing or it is the overcoming of death. That I know 
 and to that pass I am come. All I can do in this prison 
 of the flesh I have done; I have learnt what I can learn, 
 and I have felt what I can feel. At every point my grow- 
 ing soul presses against her walls. And now at last they 
 begin to crack. Beams of strange light shoot here and 
 there across the darkness; liquid notes break upon the 
 silence. I am ripe for my metamorphosis; and yet, oh 
 shame! I know that I fear it. And before me lies the 
 symbol of my fear, the space, the cold, the solitude, the 
 uncommunicating Powers. Above me shine the eternal 
 stars, whither I am bound. But my way is over the moun- 
 tain. Have I the courage to climb? 
 
 ON THE SUMMIT 
 
 Of all the dawns that I have watched in the mountains, 
 never was one like that I saw today. I forgot the glacier, 
 and was aware only of the stars. Through the chinks 
 in my prison wall they blazed brighter and brighter, till 
 where they shone it fell away, and I looked out on the 
 Past. I knew myself to be more than myself, an epitome 
 of the generations; and I travelled again, from the source, 
 my life which is the life of Man. I was a shepherd pas- 
 
244 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 turing flocks on star-lit plains of Asia; I was an Egyptian 
 priest on his tower conning the oracles of the sky; I was 
 a Greek sailor with Bootes and Orion for my guides; I was 
 Endymion entranced on mountains of Arcady. I saw the 
 star of Bethlehem and heard the angels sing; I spoke with 
 Ptolemy, and watched the night with Galileo. A thousand 
 times I had died, a thousand times been born. By these 
 births and deaths my course was marked through the night 
 of Time. But now I had come to sunrise. The stars began 
 to fade; and solemn and slow the flower of dawn un- 
 folded crystal petals, budded a violet, and blossomed a 
 rose. The mountains lit their altars of amaranthine fire; 
 and into his palace thus prepared rolled the chariot of 
 the god, to the sound of the marching music to which crea- 
 tion moves. 
 
 I could not see the god, but I heard the music; and 
 hearing it, I overcame fear. I was on the ice-slope, hung 
 between the abyss and the sky. The chips of ice rattled 
 and clinked to measureless depths below, and my nerves 
 and senses shivered to hear them as they fell. But the 
 very stress of anguish set my spirits free. As with a knife, 
 that passage cut her loose from the flesh. Earth to earth, 
 dust to dust, let the body drop back to the pit. But the 
 soul has wings; and on the summit mine spread hers. For 
 there at last I fronted the sun and the new world. The 
 other world has vanished away, I know not how or whither. 
 Before me stretches an ocean, untravelled and unplumbed; 
 and sheer from its waters rise afar cliff's of rosy snow. 
 The wall between me and the future is down; the sun 
 streams through; and in my ears, more loud and more 
 clear, sounds the marching music, to which I move, and with 
 me all creation. . . . 
 
 G. Lowes Dickinson 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 245 
 
 360 
 
 Slowly has passed the daily miracle. It is night. 
 . . . Everything is sleeping, save only a single star and the 
 pansies. This serenity of night! What could seem less 
 likely ever more to move and change again today? And 
 yet it is not so; the nightly miracle has passed; for the 
 starling has begun its job, and the sun is fretting those dark 
 busy wings with gold. Full day has come again! But 
 the face of it is a little strange; it is not like yesterday. 
 Queer — to think no day is like a day that is past, and 
 no night like a night that is coming. 
 
 Why then fear death, which is but night? Why care 
 if next day have different face and spirit. . . . 
 
 John Galsworthy 
 
 361 
 
 I was not aware of the moment when I first crossed the 
 threshold of this life. 
 
 What was the power that made me open out into this 
 vast mystery like a bud in the forest at midnight! 
 
 When in the morning I looked upon the light I felt 
 in a moment that I was no stranger in this world, that the 
 inscrutable without name and form had taken me in its arms 
 in the form of my own mother. 
 
 Even so, in death the same unknown will appear as even 
 known to me. And because I love this life, I know I shall 
 love death as well. 
 
 The child cries out when from the right breast the 
 mother takes it away, in the very next moment to find in 
 the left one its consolation. 
 
 Rabindranath Tagore 
 
246 
 
 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 362 
 
 It is not arguments that convince one of the necessity 
 of a future life. . . . Life and death — they are what 
 convince a man. The sort of thing that convinces a 
 man is when he sees a being dear to him, with whose life 
 he has been intimately bound up, . . , and suddenly this 
 being suffers, is tortured, and ceases to be. Why? It can- 
 not be that there is no answer. I believe that there is 
 one. . . . One must believe that we live not merely now 
 on this patch of earth, but that we have lived and shall live 
 eternally there in the universe. . . . 
 
 Leo Tolstoi 
 
 363 
 
 Though I have watched so many mourners weep 
 O'er the real dead, in dull earth laid asleep — 
 Those dead seemed but the shadows of my days 
 That passed and left me in the sun's bright rays. 
 Now though you go on smiling in the sun 
 Our love is slain, and love and you were one. 
 You are the first, you I have known so long, 
 "Whose death was deadly, a tremendous wrong. 
 Therefore I seek the faith that sets it right 
 Amid the lilies and the candle-light. 
 I think on Heaven, for in that air so clear 
 We two may meet, confused and parted here. 
 Ah, when man's dearest dies, 'tis then he goes 
 To that old balm that heals the centuries' woes. 
 Then Christ's wild cry in all the streets is rife: — 
 " I am the Resurrection and the Life." 
 
 Vachel Lindsay 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 247 
 
 364 
 
 Lord of all Light and Darkness, 
 
 Lord of all Life and Death, 
 Behold, we lay in earth today 
 
 The flesh that perisheth. 
 Take to thyself whatever may 
 
 Be not as dust and breath — 
 Lord of all Light and Darkness, 
 
 Lord of all Life and Death. 
 
 William Watson 
 
 365 
 
 What, then, is Life — what Death? 
 
 Thus the answer saith ; 
 
 faithless mortal, bend thy head and listen: 
 
 Down o'er the vibrant strings. 
 
 That thrill, and moan, and mourn, and glisten, 
 
 The Master draws his bow. 
 
 A voiceless pause; then upward, see, it springs 
 
 Free as a bird with disimprisoned wings! 
 
 In twain the chord was cloven, 
 
 While, shaken with woe, 
 
 With breaks of instant joy all interwoven. 
 
 Piercing the heart with lyric knife. 
 
 On, on the ceaseless music sings, 
 
 Restless, intense, serene; — 
 
 Life is the downward stroke; the upward, Life; 
 
 Death but the pause between. . . . 
 
 Richard Watson Gilder 
 
248 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 366 
 
 . . . There is no death. The thing that we call death 
 Is but another, sadder name for life, 
 Which is itself an insufficient name, 
 Faint recognition of that unknown life, — 
 That power whose shadow is the universe. 
 
 Richard Henry Stoddard 
 
 367 
 
 Over the grave bends Love sobbing, and by her side 
 stands Hope, and whispers — "We shall meet again. Be- 
 fore all life is death, and after all death is life. The fall- 
 ing leaf, touched with the hectic flush that testifies of 
 autumn's death, is in a subtler sense, a prophecy of spring.'* 
 
 Robert G. Ingersoll . 
 
 368 
 
 Under the wide and starry sky, 
 Dig the grave and let me lie. 
 Glad did I live and gladly die. 
 And I laid me down with a will. 
 
 This be the verse you grave for me: 
 Here he lies where he longed to be; 
 Home is the sailor, home from sea. 
 And the hunter home from the hill, 
 
 Robert Louis Stevenson 
 
 369 
 
 Bear me not with mourning to my grave, for shall not my 
 spirit have leapt to God? 
 
 Elizabeth Gibson 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 249 
 
 370 
 
 Our journey had advanced; 
 Our feet were almost come 
 To that odd fork in Being's road, 
 Eternity by term. 
 
 Our pace took sudden awe, 
 Our feet reluctant led. 
 Before were cities, but between. 
 The forest of the dead. 
 
 Retreat was out of hope, — 
 Behind, a sealed route. 
 Eternity's white flag before, 
 And God at every gate. 
 
 Emily Dickinson 
 
 371 
 
 Man comes a pilgrim of the universe. 
 
 Out of the mysteries that were before 
 
 The world, out of the wonder of old stars. 
 
 Far roads have felt his feet, forgotten wells 
 
 Have glassed his beauty bending down to drink. 
 
 At altar-fires anterior to Earth 
 
 His soul was lighted, and it will burn on 
 
 After the suns have wasted in the void. 
 
 His feet have felt the pressure of old worlds, 
 
 And are to tread on others yet unnamed — 
 
 Worlds sleeping yet in some new dream of God. 
 
 Edwin Markham 
 
250 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 372 
 
 Passage — immediate passage ! the blood bums in my veins I 
 
 Away, soul! hoist instantly the anchor! 
 
 Cut the hawsers — haul out — shake out every sail ! . . . 
 
 Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only! 
 
 Reckless, soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with nae; 
 
 For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go. 
 
 And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all. 
 
 my brave soul! 
 
 farther, farther sail! 
 
 O daring joy, but safe! Are they not all the seas of God? 
 
 farther, farther, farther sail! 
 
 Walt Whitman 
 
 373 
 
 Joy, shipmate, joy! 
 (Pleas'd to my soul at death, I cry) 
 Our life is closed, our life begins, 
 The long, long anchorage we leave, 
 The ship is clear at last, she leaps! 
 She swiftly courses from the shore, 
 Joy, shipmate, joy! 
 
 Walt Whitman 
 
 374 
 
 Not pleasure alone is good, but pain also; not joy alone 
 
 but sorrow; 
 Freed must the psyche be from the pupa, and pain is there to 
 
 free it. 
 Throes and struggles and clenchings of teeth — but pain is 
 
 there to free it. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 251 
 
 Lo ! the prison walls must fall — even though the prisoner 
 tremble. 
 
 Long the strain, sometimes seeming past endurance — then 
 the dead shell gives way, and a new landscape dis- 
 closes 
 
 Curtain behind curtain, wall behind wall, life behind life. 
 
 Dying here, to be borne there, passing and passing and pass- 
 ing, 
 
 At last a new creature behold, transfigured to more than 
 mortal ! 
 
 For brief after all is pain, but joy ah! joy is eternal! 
 And then the veil that divides, the subtle film of illusion — 
 The prison-wall so slight, at a touch it parts and crumbles, 
 And opens at length on the sunlit world and the winds of 
 heaven. 
 
 Edward Carpenter 
 
 375 
 
 All night we hear the rattling flaw, 
 
 The casements shiver with each breath ; 
 And still more near the foemen draw, 
 
 The pioneers of Death. 
 
 Their grisly chieftain comes: 
 He steals upon us in the night. 
 Call up the guards! light every light! 
 
 Beat the alarum drums. 
 
 His tramp is at the outer door; 
 
 He bears against the shuddering walls; 
 Lo! what a dismal frost and hoar 
 
 Upon the window falls! 
 Feed, feed the watch-fires everywhere — 
 Even yet their cheery warmth will scare 
 
 This thing of night away. 
 
252 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Ye cannot ! something chokes the grate 
 
 And clogs the air within its flues, 
 And runners from the entrance gate 
 
 Come chill with evil news; 
 
 The bars are broken ope! 
 Ha! he has scaled the inner wall! 
 But fight him still, from hall to hall; 
 
 While life remains, there's hope. 
 
 Too late! the very frame is dust, 
 
 The locks and trammels fall apart; 
 He reaches scornful of their trust. 
 
 The portals of the heart. 
 
 Ay, take the citadel! 
 But where, grim Conqueror, is thy prey? 
 In vain thou'lt search each secret way, 
 
 Its flight is hidden well. 
 
 We yield thee, for thy paltry spoils, 
 
 This shell, this ruin thou hast made; 
 Its tenant has escaped thy toils. 
 Though they were darkly laid. 
 Even now, immortal, pure, 
 It gains a house not made with hands, 
 A refuge in serener lands, 
 A heritage secure. 
 
 E, C, Stedman 
 
 376 
 
 'Twas in another's pangs I hither came; 
 
 'Tis in mine own that I anon depart. 
 Birth, thou doorway hung with swords of flame, 
 
 How like to Death thou art! 
 
 William Watson 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 253 
 
 377 
 
 Death is only a second birth into a freer existence in 
 which the spirit breaks through its slender covering and 
 abandons inaction and sloth, as the child does in its first 
 birth. . . . 
 
 The spirit will no longer wander over mountain and 
 field, or be surrounded by the delights of spring only to 
 mourn that it all seems exterior to him; but, transcending 
 earthly limitations, he will feel new strength and joy in 
 growing. He will no longer struggle by persuasive words 
 to produce a thought in others, but in the immediate in- 
 fluence of souls upon each other, no longer separated by the 
 body, but united spiritually, he will experience the joy of 
 creative thought; he will not outwardly appear to the loved 
 ones left behind, but will dwell in their inmost souls and 
 think and act in and through them. 
 
 For those souls which have grown together as one through 
 their movements of sympathy, gain force each from the other 
 . . . and at the same time confirmation as individuals 
 through the union of their diversities. Those souls which 
 have seized together upon a form or an idea of truth, 
 beauty or goodness in their eternal purity, remain thereby 
 united to all eternity and in like manner possess these ideals 
 as a part of themselves in everlasting unity. . . . 
 
 How much will man have to learn after death! For he 
 must not think that at the first entrance, he will possess 
 the whole divine perception for which the future life will 
 offer the means. Even here the child first learns to see 
 and hear ; for what he sees and hears in the beginning is un- 
 comprehended appearance, is mere sound without meaning 
 — at first only bewilderment, astonishment and confusion: 
 and nothing different does the new life offer to the new child 
 at first. Only what man brings with him from this life, the 
 
254 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 composite echo of memories of all he has done and thought 
 and been here, does he see, in the transition, all at once 
 clearly lighted up within itself, yet still he remains primarily 
 only what he was. 
 
 Gustav Fechner 
 
 378 
 
 " If men could guess what is in store for them when they 
 die, they would not have the patience to live — they 
 wouldn't wait. . . . 
 
 "Nothing is lost — nothing! From the ineffable, high, 
 fleeting thought a Shakespeare can't find words to express, 
 to the slightest sensation of an earthworm — nothing ! Not 
 a leaf's feeling of the light, not a loadstone's sense of the 
 pole, not a single volcanic or electric thrill of the mother 
 earth. . . . 
 
 " ' As we sow we reap '; that is a true saying, and all the 
 sowing is done here on earth, and the reaping beyond. 
 Man is a grub; his dead clay, as he lies cofl&ned in his 
 grave, is the left-ofif cocoon he has spun for himself during 
 his earthly life, to burst open and soar from, with all his 
 memories about him, even the lost ones. . . . We are all, 
 tous tant que nous sommes, little bags of remembrance that 
 never dies; that's what we're for. But we can only bring 
 with us to the common stock what we've got. . . . 
 
 " There are battles to be fought and races to be won, 
 but no longer against ' each other.' And strength and swift- 
 ness to win them; but no longer any strong and swift. 
 There is weakness and cowardice, but no longer any cowards 
 or weaklings. . . . 
 
 " And the goal ? The cause, the whither and the why of 
 it all? . . . As far as I can make it out, everything every- 
 where seems to be an ever-deepen|n|, ^y§r-broadening 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 255 
 
 stream that makes with inconceivable velocity for its own 
 proper level, where perfection is! . . . and ever gets 
 nearer, and never finds it, and fortunately never will! 
 
 " Only that, unlike an earthly stream, and more like 
 a fresh flowing tide up an endless, boundless, shoreless 
 creek (if you can imagine that), the level it seeks is im- 
 measurably higher than its source. And everywhere in it 
 is Life, Life, Life! ever renewing and doubling itself, and 
 ever swelling that mighty river which has no banks! 
 
 "And everywhere in it, like begets like, plus a little 
 better or a little worse; and the little worse finds its way 
 back into some backwater and sticks there, and finally goes 
 to the bottom, and nobody cares. And the little better 
 goes on bettering and bettering — not all man's folly 
 or perversions can hinder that, nor make that headlong tor- 
 rent stay, or ebb, or roll backward for a moment.". . . 
 
 " [And] who shall say where Shakespeare and you and 
 I come in — tiny links in an endless chain, so tiny that 
 even Shakespeare is no bigger than we! And just a little 
 way behind us, those little wiggling transparent things, all 
 stomach, that we descend from; and far ahead of our- 
 selves, but in the direct line of a long descent from us, an 
 ever-growing conscious Power, so strong, so glad, so simple, 
 so wise, so mild, and so beneficent, that what can we do, 
 even now, but fall on our knees with our foreheads in the 
 dust, and our hearts brimful of wonder, hope and love, and 
 tender shivering awe; and worship as a yet unborn, barely 
 conceived, and scare begotten Child — that which we have 
 always been taught to worship as a Father — That which 
 is not now, but is to be — That which we shall all share in 
 and be part and parcel of in the dim future — That which 
 is slowly, surely, painfully weaving Itself out of us and 
 the likes of us all through the limitless Universe, and Whose 
 coming we can but faintly foretell by the casting of its 
 
256 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 shadow on our own slowly, surely, painfully awakening 
 souls! " 
 
 George Du Maurier 
 
 379 
 
 If the universe, ... is really a home to us, we shall 
 find it more of a home when we are rid of the litter and 
 phantoms of this life, which are here our property and 
 not ourselves. And we shall come into this home, not as 
 strangers needing to learn the customs and the language, 
 but as exiles returning with memories awakened at every 
 step. Everywhere we shall recognize those people and 
 things that are according to our idea and memory of home, 
 as we now recognize a great tune when we hear it for the 
 first time. It is as if we were helping to make it our- 
 selves. It is we ourselves that speak in it and say what 
 we have always wanted to say. So this future life will 
 seem to be ours and always to have been ours; only we 
 have never managed to live in it before. It will be the 
 expression of what we always knew about reality but could 
 not even dare to whisper to ourselves. Nor will it seem 
 to be a reward to us but rather something that we have been 
 fools not to make for ourselves before. Music is not a 
 prize for being good; it is not something that the musician 
 imposes upon us, but a revelation that suddenly we share 
 with him. And we share it only because in our values we 
 are his equals and of like mind with him, though we 
 could not have expressed our minds without his help. That 
 is an image of our equality with God. He makes the music 
 and we recognize it; and He does not make the music for 
 Himself, but for us; His joy is in our recognition of it; 
 and to be one with us in that recognition. 
 
 Reality, to me, here, is in what I love, not in what I 
 hate; and I do not love from mere habit and just what 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 257 
 
 happens to be around me. I love from recognition of what 
 is everlastingly lovable; and this will last into a future 
 state. It is the spirit that gives form, and the beauty of 
 things made by man is the form given to them by the spirit 
 of man. So, as the spirit will persist, the beauty will per- 
 sist also and will be of the same nature, whether it come 
 from man or from God, and whatever its material may be. 
 The beauty we shall recognize even if its material be strange 
 to us. We shall not have to learn it all afresh; and we 
 shall recognize it the more easily because all our present 
 ugly phantoms of beauty will be gone. So will the false 
 phantoms we mistake for truth, and the evil phantoms we 
 miscall goodness. 
 
 In this life progress means that we become freer of the 
 tyranny of the past. I am aware of progress in myself 
 when I am able suddenly to live in the present and no 
 longer to see it only through the phantoms of my own past. 
 Only then do I become myself, and not something else 
 subject to what I have been. The difficulty, for us, is to 
 go on being freshly ourselves in an eternally fresh rela- 
 tion with what is. We are always falling behind our actual 
 experience, judging it as if it were a something that had 
 happened before, as if it were actually in the past for us; 
 and so we judge other men as if they were tied by their 
 past. That is how we find it so difficult to forget and for- 
 give. They are to us what they have done; and we become 
 to ourselves what we have done; and so come to think 
 of all things as bound by a chain of cause and effect. 
 But progress in another life will be a greater freedom from 
 the tyranny of the past. We shall begin afresh, but it will 
 be we ourselves that begin. All status will be swept away 
 like cobwebs. We shall love Shakespeare for himself and 
 not for his reputation, and we shall come nearer to loving 
 God also for Himself and not for His reputation. . . . 
 
258 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 If in that other life God is more instant to us, more 
 plainly revealed in a more piercing righteousness, truth, 
 and beauty, it may be we shall suffer a sharper pain than 
 here for our failure to rise to our opportimity. Beauty 
 often makes us sad here, because we are ourselves in- 
 adequate to it. There our inadequacy may make the far 
 greater beauty almost intolerable to us. We shall have lost 
 all our comfortable unrealities, our sense of status, our 
 vulgarities, our formulae, and our hostile generalizations; 
 we shall have no one to encourage us in our nonsense; 
 and we shall be face to face, all naked and bare as we 
 are, with that which here we call the beatific vision. We 
 shall know that it is the beatific vision; and yet it will hurt 
 us with our own inadequacy to experience it. . . . This sub- 
 limity of the beatific vision is not a cold sublimity, as we 
 often suppose; it is not a sublimity emptied of all content 
 or absorbed in the enjoyment of itself. There is desire in 
 it calling to our desire, the love of God calling to the love 
 of man; and it is the urgency of the call that will pain 
 us. — To fail in the answer to this ineffable appeal, to baffle 
 the desire of God with the faintness of our own desire, 
 that will be the pain of Heaven. Nor shall we know, nor 
 shall God know, whether we shall ever be able to satisfy 
 His desire with our own. But at least the pain of ours 
 will be real, as his desire is real. It will be real like the 
 sorrow of a great piece of music, not unreal like the 
 routine of this life to which we subdue ourselves even 
 while we rebel against it. It will be real like the Cruci- 
 fixion, which continues for ever and must continue, until 
 man has risen to an equality with God; for that time is 
 hidden in the darkness of the future, for it rests with man 
 himself whether he shall so rise. But all the glory and 
 the beauty of the universe is in the desire of God for man 
 to be equal with Himself, and in the answering desire of 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 259 
 
 man. And that also is the beauty and glory of heaven, 
 more intense than on earth because there man is closer 
 to God. 
 
 A, Clutton-Brock 
 
 380 
 
 Not with vain tears when we're beyond the sun, 
 We'll beat on the substantial doors, nor tread 
 Those dusty high-roads of the aimless dead 
 Plaintive for Earth; but rather turn and run 
 Down some close-covered by-way of the air, 
 Some low sweet alley between wind and wind. 
 Stoop under faint gleams, tread the shadows, find 
 Some whispering ghost-forgotten nook, and there 
 Spend in sweet converse our eternal day; 
 Think each in each, immediately wise; 
 Learn all we lacked before; hear, know and say 
 What this tumultuous body now denies; 
 And feel, who have laid our groping hands away; 
 And see, no longer blinded by our eyes. 
 
 Rupert Brooke 
 
 381 
 
 When Earth's last picture is painted and the tubes are 
 
 twisted and dried, 
 When the oldest colours have faded, and the youngest critic 
 
 has died, 
 We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it — lie down for 
 
 an aeon or two, 
 Till the Master of All Good Workmen shall put us to work 
 
 anew. 
 
 And those that were good shall be happy: they shall sit in 
 a golden chair; 
 
 
260 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 They shall splash at a ten-league canvas with brushes of 
 
 comets' hair; 
 They shall find real saints to draw from — Magdalene, 
 
 Peter, and Paul, 
 They shall work for an age at a sitting, and never be tired 
 
 at all. 
 
 And only the Master shall praise us, and only the Master 
 
 shall blame; 
 And no one shall work for money, and no one shall work 
 
 for fame. 
 But each for the joy of the working, and each, in his 
 
 separate star. 
 Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the God of Things 
 as They are! 
 
 Rudyard Kipling 
 
 382 
 
 Marlowe is dead, and Greene is in his grave, 
 And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone! 
 
 Our Ocean-shepherd sleeps beneath the wave; 
 
 Robin is dead, and Marlowe in his grave. 
 
 Why should I stay to chant another stave. 
 And in my Mermaid Tavern drink alone? 
 
 For Kit is dead and Greene is in his grave, 
 And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone. 
 
 Where is the singer of the Faerie Queen? 
 
 Where are the lyric lips of Astrophel? 
 Long, long ago, their quiet graves were green; 
 Ay, and the grave, too, of their Faerie Queen! 
 And yet their faces, hovering here unseen. 
 
 Gall me to taste their new-found oenomel; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 261 
 
 To sup with him who sang the Faerie Queen; 
 
 To drink with him whose name was Astrophel. 
 
 I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave! 
 
 If there be none, the gods have done us wrong. 
 Ere long I hope to chant a better stave, 
 In some great Mermaid Inn beyond the grave; 
 And quaff the best of earth that heaven can save, 
 
 Red wine like blood, deep love of friends and song. 
 I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave; 
 
 And hope to greet my golden lads ere long. 
 
 Alfred Noyes 
 
 383 
 
 ^To range, deep-wrapt, along a heavenly height, 
 
 0*erseeing all that man but imdersees; 
 To loiter down lone valleys of delight, 
 
 And hear the beating of the hearts of trees. 
 And think the thoughts that lilies speak in white 
 
 By greenwood pools.and pleasant passages; 
 
 With healthy dreams a-dream in flesh and soul, 
 
 To pace, in mighty meditations drawn, 
 From out the forest to the open knoll 
 
 Where much thyme is, whence blissful leagues of lawn 
 Betwixt the fringing woods to southward roll 
 
 By tender inclination ; mad with dawn. 
 
 Ablaze with fires that flame in silver dew 
 
 When each small globe doth glass the morning-star, 
 
 Long ere the sun, sweet-smitten through and through 
 With dappled revelations read afar, 
 
 1 Bayard Taylor. 
 
 I 
 
262 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Suffused with saintly ecstasies of blue 
 As all the holy eastern heavens are — 
 
 To fare thus fervid to what daily toil 
 Employs thy spirit in that larger Land 
 
 Where thou art gone; to strive, but not to moil 
 In nothings that do mar the artist's hand, 
 
 Not drudge unriched, as grain rots back to soil — 
 No profit out of death . . . 
 
 ... my Friend, 
 Freely to range, to muse, to toil, is thine: 
 
 Thine, now, to watch with Homer sails that bend 
 Unstained by Helen's beauty o'er the brine 
 
 Towards some clean Troy no Hector need defend 
 Nor flame devour; or, in some mild moon's shine, 
 
 Where amiabler winds the whistle heed. 
 To sail with Shelley o'er a bluer sea. 
 
 And mark Prometheus, from his fetter freed, 
 Pass with Deucalion over Italy, 
 
 While bursts the flame from out his eager reed 
 Wild-stretching towards the West of destiny; 
 
 Or, prone with Plato, Shakespeare and a throng 
 Of bards beneath some plane-tree's cool eclipse 
 
 To gaze on glowing meads where, lingering long, 
 Psyche's large butterfly her honey sips; 
 
 Or, mingling free in choirs of German song. 
 To learn of Goethe's life from Goethe's lips; 
 
 These, these are thine, and we, who still are dead. 
 Do yearn — nay, not to kill thee back again 
 
 Into this chamel life, this lowlihead. 
 
 Not to the dark of sense, the blinking brain, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 263 
 
 The hugged delusions drear, the hunger fed 
 On husks of guess, the monarchy of pain . . . 
 
 Not unto thee, bright spirit, do we yearn 
 
 To bring thee back, but oh, to be, to be 
 Unbound of all these gyves, to stretch, to spurn 
 
 The dark from off our dolorous lids, to see 
 Our spark, conjecture, blaze and sunwise burn, 
 
 And suddenly to stand again by thee! 
 
 Ah, not for us, not yet, by thee to stand: 
 
 For us, the fret, the dark, the thorn, the chill; 
 
 For us, to call across unto thy Land, 
 
 *' Friend, get thee to the minstrel's holy hill, 
 
 And kiss those brethren for us mouth and hand, 
 And make our duty to our Master Will." 
 
 Sidney Lanier 
 
 384 
 
 Call me not dead when I, indeed, have gone 
 Unto the company of the everliving 
 High and most glorious poets! Let thanksgiving 
 Rather be made. Say : " He at last hath won 
 
 Rest and release, converse supreme and wise, 
 Music and song and light of immortal faces; 
 Today, perhaps, wandering in starry places. 
 He hath met Keats, and known him by his eyes. 
 
 Tomorrow (who can say?) Shakespeare may pass, 
 And our lost friend just catch one syllable 
 Of that three-centuried wit that kept so well; 
 
 Or Milton; or Dante, looking on the grass 
 Thinking of Beatrice, and listening still 
 To chanted hymns that sound from the heavenly hill." 
 
 Richard Watson Gilder 
 
264 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 385 
 
 It is hard to speak of the dead when one loves to 
 think them still alive, when they are still near to us, when 
 they are still enwrapt in the fierce blinding light of the 
 battlefield. I can only think of her as still keeping her 
 vigil over the advancing hosts of the proletariat, in whose 
 war she enlisted as a healer of wounds and a comforter of 
 sorrows. ... I cannot but think of her as sitting peace- 
 fully in the great shadows, holding hands with Rosa Luxem- 
 burg, her sister, and listening to her story, and telling her 
 of you and of America, and of the wonderful things that are 
 to be. And I know that both smile and are happy that 
 you and I have grown strong and wise enough to refrain, 
 for the love of them, from too many words and too easy 
 
 tears ^ 
 
 Arturo Giovannitti 
 
 386 
 
 The roof of man is fragile, the fire on his hearth dies 
 out; the nest is torn by winds and weather, its inmates 
 scattered to the four corners of earth. Amid the wreck 
 of the home in which we were reared, and the ruins life goes 
 on heaping up around us, we are seized with the home- 
 sickness for an eternal dwelling-place. Our hope is in an 
 abiding city where there shall be no more mourning or 
 separation, where no one shall be an orphan, or astray, 
 
 1 That would be a glorious life for me there where I might meet 
 Palamedes, and Ajax, the son of Telamon, and others perhaps who 
 long ago perished by an unrighteous judgment, and how glad I 
 should be to compare my wrongs with theirs. But the greatest joy 
 would be in questioning the inhabitants there as I do here, and ex- 
 amining them to discover who is really wise and who only in his own 
 conceit. What would not a man give to examine the leader of the 
 great Trojan armament, or Odysseus, or Sisyphus, or any of a thou- 
 sand other men and women whom it would be our infinite joy to meet 
 and question and call our friends. — Socrates. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 265 
 
 or solitary; where the pilgrim arrived at his journey's 
 end shall shake off the dust from his feet and lay down 
 his staff; where the whole great family, at length complete 
 and reconciled, shall take its rest in the peace of the 
 heavenly home. 
 
 We love thee the more, humble roof of earth, because 
 thy bonds and thy affections are the human prophecy of 
 a divine accomplishment; because thou art the symbol of 
 that shelter not made with hands, the Father's house in 
 which are many mansions. 
 
 Charles Wagner 
 
 387 
 
 Softly Christophe closed his eyes. . . . 
 
 . . . "Mothers, lovers, friends. . . . Where are you? 
 Where are you, my souls? I know that you are there, and 
 I cannot take you." 
 
 "We are with thee. Peace, beloved! " 
 
 " I will not lose you ever more. I have sought you 
 so long! " 
 
 " Be not anxious. We shall never leave thee more." 
 
 "Alas! The stream is bearing me on." 
 
 "The river that bears thee on, bears us with thee." 
 
 " Whither are you going? " 
 
 "To the place where we shall be united once more." 
 
 "Will it be soon?" 
 
 "Look." 
 
 And Christophe, making supreme effort to raise his head 
 . . . saw the river overflowing its banks, covering the 
 fields, moving on, august, slow, almost still. And, like 
 a flash of steel, on the edge of the horizon there seemed 
 to be speeding toward him a line of silver streams, quiver- 
 ing in the sunlight. The roar of the ocean. . . . And his 
 heart sank, and he asked: 
 
266 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 " Is it He? " 
 
 And the voices of his loved ones replied: 
 
 "It is He!" 
 
 And his dying brain said to itself: 
 
 "The gates are opened. . . . That is the chord I was 
 seeking! . . . But it is not the end! There are new spaces! 
 . . . We will go on, tomorrow." 
 
 Romain Rolland 
 
 388 
 
 To an open house in the evening 
 
 Home shall men come, 
 
 To an older place than Eden, 
 
 To a taller town than Rome. 
 
 To the end of the way of the wandering star, 
 
 To the things that cannot be and that are. 
 
 To the place where God was homeless. 
 
 And all men are at home. 
 
 G. K. Chesterton 
 
 389 
 
 If I should die, think only this of me: 
 That there's some corner of a foreign field 
 That is for ever England. There shall be 
 In that rich earth a richer dust conceal'd; 
 A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, 
 Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam; 
 A body of England's, breathing English air. 
 Washed by the rivers, blest by sun of home. 
 
 And think, this heart, all evil shed away, 
 A pulse in the eternal mind, no less 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 267 
 
 Gives somewhere back the thoughts of England given; 
 Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; 
 And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness 
 In hearts at peace, under an English heaven. 
 
 Rupert Brooke 
 
 390 
 
 ^To have lived and loved — yea, even for a little. 
 
 To have known the sun and fulness of the earth; 
 
 To have tested joy nor stayed to prove it brittle, 
 
 And travelled grief to find it end in mirth; 
 
 To have loved the good in life, and followed, groping, 
 
 Beauty that lives among the common things. 
 
 Awaiting, eager-eyed and strongly hoping. 
 
 The fain far beating of an angel's wings. 
 
 All of these were his. And with his soul's releasing, 
 Dearest of all, immortal youth has crowned him, 
 And that bright spirit is young eternally; 
 Dreaming, he hears the great winds blow unceasing, 
 And over him, above him and around him. 
 The music and the thunder of the sea. 
 
 Crommelin Brown 
 
 391 
 
 ^ Once in my garret — you being far away 
 Tramping the hills and breathing upland air. 
 Or so I fancied — brooding in my chair, 
 I watched the London sunshine feeble and grey 
 Dapple my desk, too tired to labour more. 
 When, looking up, I saw you standing there 
 
 1 Rupert Brooke. 
 
268 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Although I'd caught no footstep on the stair, 
 Like sudden April at my open door. 
 
 Though now heyond earth's farthest hills you fare, 
 
 Song-crowned, immortal, sometimes it seems to me 
 
 That, if I listen very quietly. 
 
 Perhaps I'll hear a light foot on the stair 
 
 And see you, standing with your angel air, 
 
 Fresh from the uplands of eternity. 
 
 Wilfred Wilson Gibson 
 
 392 
 
 You called to me from o'er the restless tide: 
 
 Within the deepening shades of Death's confines, 
 
 — Like winds grown free among the forest pines 
 
 Did set my spirit free: and like a bride — 
 
 Like a lost mistress to a lover sad — 
 
 Led my young spirit unto Love: relit 
 
 The flame, the dream where two friends long ago would sit 
 
 Together happy, disunited mad. 
 
 So near to death, friend, have I grown to thee — 
 Grown to thy soul like ivy to the wall. 
 Beheld a dream of Love's eternity . . . 
 Near to the grave, beneath a soldier's pall. 
 If time ne'er grants our friendship future span 
 Know, friend, we meet in spirit Man to Man! 
 
 Sergt. J. N. Streets 
 
 393 
 
 Because of you we will be glad and gay, 
 Remembering you we will be brave and strong; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 269 
 
 And hail the advent of each dangerous day, 
 And meet the great adventure with a song. 
 And as you proudly gave your jewelled gift, 
 We'll give our lesser offering with a smile. 
 Nor falter on that path where, all too swift. 
 You led the way and leapt the golden stile. 
 
 Whether new paths, new heights to climb you find 
 Or gallop through the unfooted asphodel, 
 We know you know we shall not lag behind. 
 Nor halt to waste a moment on a tear; 
 And you will speed us onward with a cheer. 
 And wave beyond the stars that all is well. 
 
 M.B. 
 
 394 
 
 All ye who fought since England was a name. 
 
 Because her soil was holy in your eyes; 
 Who heard the summons and confessed Her claim, 
 
 Who flung against a world's time-hallow'd lies 
 The truth of English freedom — fain to give 
 
 Those last lone moments, careless of your pain, 
 Knowing that only so must England live 
 
 And win by sacrifice, the right to reign — 
 Be glad, that still the spur of your bequest 
 
 Urges your heirs their threefold way along — 
 The way of Toil that craveth not for rest. 
 
 Clear Honour, and stark Will to punish wrong! 
 The seed ye sow'd God quicken'd with His breath; 
 
 The crop has ripen'd — lo, there is no death! 
 
 Anonymous 
 
270 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 395 
 
 ... By Yser banks where yellow flags do flaunt 
 Their beauty, like the Shropshire calm canal 
 That charmed my childhood, where white lilies haunt 
 The troubled deep, blooming for burial; 
 
 There lies youth ended on the very edge 
 Of war, where freshly comes a charmed rose 
 From ruined garden; there by foreign hedge, 
 Hallow'd in God's free earth you have repose. 
 
 There while the blasts of battle rend and scar 
 Nature's calm loveliness, was briefly said, 
 Half heard in the loud obloquy of war. 
 The dear and simple ritual of the dead. 
 
 And here from lavish lap of young July 
 
 In English gardens climb and riot still 
 
 Roses untorn; and fledgling finches try 
 
 Here in God's peace their homely joyous trill. . , . 
 
 Ah even there divinely to your ken 
 The vision comes, more clear for one farewell, 
 Your village home, the church that fronts the fen, 
 Our Flanders; yea for them, for us you fell. 
 
 Too young! ay me too young for love to lose. 
 Love human blind; but old enough for eyes. 
 Pure prescient eyes of death, that deeply choose, 
 Yea, old enough for death, divinely wise. 
 
 Some human tears will fall; some tender note 
 Will haunt our wandering by canal and road; 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 271 
 
 The stricken poplars lie, the lilies float; 
 
 They fade; home, home; you live and grow in God. . . . 
 
 Rest, home and rest; for you fulfillment, calm: 
 To your free spirit still from opening road 
 Call and appeal; afar the happy palm 
 Haunts the clear height, and holds the gleam of God. 
 
 R. Fanshawe 
 
 396 
 
 "When I behold dear youth sent down to death; 
 And homely cities barbarously sacked; 
 Christ's followers here denying what he saith, 
 Christian in babbled word, heathen in act; 
 Nations all bloody from fraternal strife; 
 And beauty powerless as a broken wing; 
 Then I despair of faith and art and life — 
 Until I hear this inward clarion ring: 
 "Rate not too richly peace and happiness. 
 Sorrow and war have each their lively sap, 
 Eternal truth unfoiled by temporal stress. 
 Immortal being unharmed by mortal hap." 
 Then do I know that nothing can work wrong 
 To men or man, nor vex them over long. 
 
 Wallace Bertram Nichols 
 
 397 
 
 They have not gone from us. no ! they are 
 The inmost essence of each thing that is 
 Perfect for us; they flame in every star; 
 The trees are emerald with their presences. 
 They are not gone from us; they do not roam 
 
272 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 The flaw and turmoil of the lower deep, 
 
 But have now made the whole wide world their home, 
 
 And in its loveliness themselves they steep. 
 
 They fail not ever; theirs is the dium 
 Splendour of sunny hill and forest grave; 
 In every rainbow's glittering drop they burn; 
 They dazzle in the massed clouds' architrave; 
 They chant in every wind, and they return 
 In the long roll of any deep blue wave. 
 
 Robert Nichols 
 
 398 
 
 "Killed!" did you say? 
 He is not killed, but overwhelmed with life. 
 Outweighed with glory, overcome with pride, 
 Outstripping others in the world-wide strife. 
 And marching side by side with Christ his guide. 
 
 "Killed!" did you say? 
 
 He is not killed, but superfused with sight 
 
 Of Christ his Saviour bidding him ascend. 
 
 Where Saints and Martyrs crown the Warrior-knight, 
 
 Who gives his life for brother, sister, friend. 
 
 "Killed!" did you say? 
 He is not killed, for you are on the way 
 Where Christ your Priest will offer you a place 
 Amongst the sainted souls in white array 
 Who, through the sacrifice, have saved the race. 
 
 W. Evans De Beauvoir 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 273 
 
 399 
 
 Not on an Altar shall mine eyes behold Thee 
 Tho' Thou art sacrifice, Thou too art Priest; 
 
 Bend, that the feeble arms of Love enfold Thee, 
 So Faith shall bloom, increased. 
 
 Not on a Cross, with passion buds around Thee, 
 Thou — crowned and lonely, in Thy suffering; 
 
 Nay, but as watching Mary met and found Thee, 
 Dawn-robed, the Risen King. 
 
 Not in the past, but in the present glorious. 
 Not in the future, that I cannot span. 
 
 Living and breathing, over death victorious. 
 My God. ... My Brother-Man. 
 
 Ivan Adair 
 
 400 
 
 1. 
 
 Saints have adored the lofty soul of you.^ 
 
 Poets have whitened at your high renown. 
 
 We stand among the many millions who 
 
 Do hourly wait to pass your pathway down. 
 
 You, so familiar, once were strange: we tried 
 
 To live as of your presence unaware. 
 
 But now in every road on every side 
 
 We see your straight and steadfast signpost there. 
 
 I think it like that signpost in my land. 
 Hoary and tall, which pointed me to go 
 Upward, into the hills, on the right hand, 
 1 Death. 
 
274 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 Where the mists swim and the winds shriek and blow, 
 A homeless land and friendless, but a land 
 I did not know and that I wished to know. 
 
 Such, such is death: no triumph: no defeat. 
 Only an empty pail, a slate rubbed clean, 
 A merciful putting away of what has been. 
 And this we know: Death is not Life effete. 
 Life crushed, the broken pail. We who have seen 
 So marvellous things know well the end's not yet. 
 
 Victor and vanquished are a-one in death: 
 Coward and brave: friend, foe. Ghosts do not say, 
 " Come, what was your record when you drew breath? " 
 But a big blot has hid each yesterday 
 So poor, so manifestly incomplete, 
 And your bright promise, withered long and sped, 
 Is touched, stirs, rises, opens and grows sweet 
 And blossoms and is you, when you are dead. 
 
 Charles Hamilton Sorley 
 
 401 
 
 This night of Spring, beneath an alien sky, 
 
 Is lit with flaming homesteads; a fierce glare 
 
 Of distant fire, dashed as with blood, looms up 
 
 Mantling the landskip ; while at intervals 
 
 The sullen guns roar challenge to the heavens, 
 
 And earth lies stricken — all her harmonies 
 
 Turned to a hideous discord, mile on mile 
 
 The trenched fields labour with their mortal freight — 
 
 The sons of warring empires, over all 
 
 Death's self, for ever present yet unseen, 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 275 
 
 Broods like eclipse. But lo! amid the hush 
 That falls upon the smoke-clad battle-zone, 
 There rises, lull and sweet, from some dim copse 
 Flanking the host, the same unfaltering note 
 That haunts our English dingles far away — 
 The cadence of a nightingale, whose song 
 Goes floating through the gloom — one wild refrain 
 Of deathless love and life's immortal hope. 
 
 Edward Henry Blakeney 
 
 402 
 
 Ye barren peaks, so mightily outlined 
 
 In naked rock against the viewless sky, 
 
 Your rugged grandeur mocks my human pride, 
 And rouses it to passionate reply. 
 
 Ye scorn the foot that treads your pathless ways, 
 The voice that breaks your primal solitudes. 
 
 Yea, e'en the eye that views your serried heights, 
 The ear that hears your canyon interludes. 
 
 Yet know that when your music-making brooks 
 Have buried you beneath the conquering sea, 
 
 And mingled heart of stone with oozy mud. 
 The topmost summit with the level lea. 
 
 This ear shall hear the deathless song of Life, 
 This eye shall see beyond the outmost skies. 
 
 This voice shall sing soul-music, and this foot 
 Shall tread the love-lit paths of Paradise. 
 
 Should I, then, bom immortal, bow to you. 
 Who are but transient mounds of earthly clod? 
 
276 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 glorious heights! — I kneel in humble awe 
 To worship at the altars of my God. 
 
 Bernard Freeman Trotter 
 
 403 
 
 ^ Now have I left the world and all its tears, 
 
 And high above the sunny cloud-banks fly, 
 
 Alone in all this vast and lonely sky — 
 
 This limpid space in which the myriad spheres 
 
 Go thundering on, whose song God only hears 
 
 High in his heavens. Ah! how small seem I, 
 
 And yet I know he hears my little cry 
 
 Down there among Mankind's cruel jests and sneers. 
 
 And I forget the grief which I have known, 
 
 And I forgive the mockers and their jest. 
 
 And in this mighty solitude alone, 
 
 I taste the joys of everlasting rest. 
 
 Which I shall know when I have passed away 
 
 To live in Heaven's never-fading day. 
 
 Paul R. Bewsher 
 
 404 
 
 I may not wait to hear 
 What says the wind that sweeps across the lea. 
 And yet I know it speaks, and in its voice 
 There is some word to make my heart rejoice, 
 Some message speeding on eternally 
 
 That God has not made clear. 
 
 I may not wait to find 
 The secret of the seething sea that flows 
 
 1 Written while flying in the air. 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 277 
 
 Nor ever rests; yet must there be some plan 
 Above the most exalted thought of man, 
 Some destiny that none but Heaven knows, 
 And Heaven keeps me blind! 
 
 I may not wait to know 
 The secret of the towering mountain height 
 That makes my little self so small and frail 
 And bids me rest awhile behind the veil, 
 Because so far beyond it shines the light 
 
 And God would have it so! 
 
 I may not wait; I see 
 The hosts of Righteousness go forth to slay 
 The armies of a people that would turn 
 From all that makes man's nobler soul to burn, 
 And yet I feel as now I take my way 
 
 My Immortality! 
 
 Reginald F, Clements 
 
 405 
 
 I that had life ere I was born 
 Into this world of dark and light, 
 Waking as one who wakes at mom 
 From dreams of night, 
 
 I am as old as Heaven and Earth — 
 But sleep is death without decay, 
 And since each morn renews my birth, 
 I am no older than the day. 
 
 Old though my outward form appears. 
 Though it at last outworn shall lie. 
 
278 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 This, that is servile to the years, 
 This is not I — 
 
 I, who outwear the form 1 take, 
 When I put off this garb of flesh, 
 Still in immortal youth shall wake 
 And somewhere clothe my life afresh. 
 
 A. St. John Adcoch 
 
 406 
 
 And the leaves fall — 
 
 The silver and golden fall together, 
 
 A-mingled irresistibly like tears. 
 
 The low-branched elms stand idly 
 
 In all the full-leaved glory of their life: 
 
 Yet here and there a yellow flake slips slowly. 
 
 And the branch, where once it hung, lies bare. 
 
 Below they lie — the yellow fruits of day. 
 
 And a soft spirit of the night 
 
 Weaves the white spell of sleep about their feet. 
 
 And the leaves fall — 
 
 The great sleep of the trees is nigh: 
 
 The flowers are dead. 
 
 Yet through the fine-spun web of mist 
 
 Gleams faintly Michael's pale blue star — 
 
 A time of sad soul-hunger, unspeakable desire, 
 
 That clutches at the heart and drags the soul! 
 
 And the leaves fall — 
 
 Is there a far faint life 
 
 Whispers with blood-choked voice thy name 
 
THE GRAIL OF LIFE 279 
 
 Whispers but once — no more? 
 Then weep ye now, Mothers! 
 And, Maidens, weep! 
 
 England, rend the raiment of thy wealth! 
 Tear the soft vesture of thy pride! 
 Let the tears fall and be not comforted! 
 In all their youth they went for thee; 
 In all their strength they died for thee; 
 And so they fell. 
 As the leaves fall — 
 
 Yet they say you are dead? 
 
 Ask of the trees. Perchance they hear 
 
 A distant murmuring of pulsing sap. 
 
 Perchance in their dim minds they see 
 
 Pale curled leaves that strive to greet the sun, 
 
 Perchance they know if yellow daffodils 
 
 Will dance again. 
 
 Yet the leaves fall — 
 
 And yonder through the mist is Michael's star — 
 
 Saint Michael with his angel -host! 
 
 Ay! see them as they sweep along 
 
 Borne on an unseen wind to the far throne of God. 
 
 And, Mothers, see; Maidens, look 
 
 How the world's Christ stoops down and kisses each. 
 
 And listen now and hear their cry, 
 
 As lances raised, they greet their King — 
 
 " There is no death — There is no death — 
 
 No death — " and comfort you 
 
 When the leaves fall. 
 
 Joseph Courtney 
 
280 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 
 
 407 
 
 Life! I know not what thou art, 
 But I know that thou and I must part; 
 And when, or how, or where we met 
 I own to me's a secret yet. 
 
 Life! we've been long together 
 Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; 
 'Tis hard to part when friends are dear — 
 Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear; 
 Then steal away, give little warning, 
 Choose thine own time; 
 Say not Good Night, — but in some brighter clime 
 Bid me Good Morning. 
 
 A, L, Barbauld 
 
APPENDIX 
 A — SOURCES 
 
 Sources from which quotations are taken, are listed herewith. In- 
 asmuch as our purpose was to give inspiration rather than knowledge, 
 we have eliminated all details, offering a minimum rather than a 
 maximum of information. 
 
 Some few quotations have been taken from trustworthy second- 
 hand sources, which we have not thought it necessary to verify. 
 Such cases are indicated by the word, Quoted. 
 
 PART I 
 
 1. — From Poem, Character of the Happy Warnor. 
 
 2. — From Nichomachean Ethics. 
 
 3. — Quoted, Bridges's The Spirit of Man. 
 
 4. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 
 
 5. — From The Trojan Women. 
 
 6. — From The Seven Against Thebes. 
 
 7. — The Courage of Enlightened Minos (480 B. c.) 
 
 8. — Quoted, John Masefield's Gallipoli. 
 
 9.— From History, II, 37, 
 10. — From The Battle of the Baltic. 
 11. — Ode, How Sleep the Brave. 
 12.— From Childe Harold, III, 29. 
 13. — Poem, Incident of the French Camp. 
 14. — From An Ode Written in Time of Hesitation. (Referring to 
 
 Robert Gould Shaw.) 
 15. — From Memoriae Positum. (Referring to Shaw, as above.) 
 16. — From Ode recited at the Harvard Commemoration, 1865. 
 17. — Inscription (see footnote). 
 18. — From Voluntaries. 
 19. — From Above the Battle. 
 20. — From Gallipoli. 
 21. — Sonnet, Youth's Consecration, in Soldier Poets: Songs of the 
 
 Fighting Men. 
 22. — Sonnet, The Dead. 
 23.— Sonnet, from 1914. 
 24. — Poem, The Last Morning. 
 
 25. — Same as No. 3. Published in the London Times (1914). 
 26. — Sonnet, Death in France. 
 
 281 
 
282 APPENDIX 
 
 27. — Letter published in the New York TimeSy August, 1918. 
 
 28. — From The American Spirit, a letter in France to his mother. 
 
 29. — Poem, / Have a Rendezvous with Death. (Author killed in 
 
 battle at Belloz-on-Sauterre, July, 1916.) 
 30. — Poem, To a Hero. 
 31. — Sonnet, To a Dead Poet. 
 
 32. — Poem, Dirge for Dead Warriors, from Dies Heroica. 
 33. — .Sonnet, To Our Dead. See Lest We Forget, A War Anthology. 
 34. — Poem, Vimy Ridge. 
 35. — Sonnet, Heroes. 
 36. — Poem, The Morning Paper, from The Retinue and Other 
 
 Poems. 
 37. — Poem, Requiescant, from In the Battle Silences (written in a 
 
 field near Ypres, April, 1915). 
 38. — Poem, Adieu. 
 39.— From The Wrack of the Storm. 
 40. — From The Individual. 
 
 41. — Quoted, John Morley's Recollections, voL ii 
 42.—" Fragment." 
 43. — From Essays: Of Death. 
 44. — From A fax. 
 45.— Sonnet XII. 
 46. — Same as No. 41. 
 47. — From Religio Medici. 
 48. — Familiar quotation (unverified). 
 49. — From Essay, Falsehood of Universal Peace. 
 50. — Sonnet, Quern Metui Moritura. 
 51. — Poem, Prospice. 
 52. — From De Senectute. 
 53. — From Julius Ccesar. 
 54. — From The Map of Life. 
 55. — From De Vita Beata, Chapter 22. 
 56. — From Meditations. 
 57.— From Ethics IV, 67. 
 58. — From Discourses. 
 59. — From The Economy of Human Life, translated from an Indian 
 
 manuscript. 
 60. — From Saemund's Edda. 
 
 61. — Quoted, Moncure D. Conway's Sacred Anthology. 
 62. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 
 63. — Same as No. 61. 
 64. — From The Imitation of Christ. 
 65. — From Life of Channing, by his nephew William Henry Chan- 
 
 ning, p. 612. 
 66. — From Satires X, 357. 
 
APPENDIX 283 
 
 67.— Poem, Shorter PoemSy Book III, No. 19. 
 
 68. — From Aex Triplex. 
 
 69. — From On William Shakespeare. 
 
 70. — From Measure for Measure. 
 
 71. — From contemporary newspaper account of the sinking of the 
 Lusitania. 
 
 72. — Poem, The Heroic Dead (on the loss of the Titanic) . 
 
 73. — Poem, Sir Humphrey Gilbert. 
 
 74. — Inscription written for the monument of Sir John Franklin in 
 Westminster Abbey. 
 
 75. — From Diary of Captain Scott, in Scott's Last Expedition, vol. i. 
 
 76. — From Account of E. L. Atkinson, in Scott^s Last Expedition, 
 vol. ii. 
 
 77. — Last Statement of Captain Scott, in Scott's Last Expedition, 
 vol. i. 
 
 78. — Letter to Tacitus on the eruption of Vesuvius. 
 
 79. — From Concerning the Statues. 
 
 80. — From Samson Agonistes. 
 
 81. — From On Belief in the Resurrection. 
 
 82. — From A Tale of Two Cities. 
 
 83. — From Androcles and the Lion. 
 
 84.— Poem, The Last Word. 
 
 85.— From The Private Life of the Buffs, 
 
 86.— From Hellas, 211. 
 
 87.— From The Task. 
 
 88.— Poem, The Martyrs. 
 
 89. — From Triumph. 
 
 90. — From Apology of Socrates. 
 
 91.— From Phaedo. 
 
 92. — From the Apocrypha. 
 
 93. — From the New Testament, a combination of Matthew and 
 Luke. 
 
 94. — From the New Testament. 
 
 95. — From Revealed Religion, in The Grammar of Assent. 
 
 96. — Same as No. 3 — Beatus Vincentuis. 
 
 97. — From Foxe's Book of Martyrs. 
 
 98. — Last words to judges at his trial for heresy. 
 
 99. — Sonnet, Life Well Lost, in Warner's Library of World's Best 
 
 Literature. 
 100. — From Life of Savonarola. 
 101. — Same as above. 
 102.— Same as No. 97. 
 
 103. — Letter to Friends (written in prison while awaiting execution) . 
 104. — From Three Great Lives. 
 105. — Same as No. 41. Quoted by Gladstone to Morley. 
 
284 APPENDIX 
 
 106.— From Life of Sir Walter Raleigh (1736). 
 
 107. — See footnote. 
 
 108. — Letter to his wife after his condemnation (written in the Tower 
 of London) . 
 
 109. — Poem, My Pilgrimage. 
 
 110. — From Article in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th edition. 
 
 111. — The Martyrs' Monument (1706) Greyfriars Churchyard, Edin- 
 burgh. 
 
 112. — From Parkham's The Jesuits in North America. Written in 
 anticipation of massacre by Huron Indians. 
 
 113. — Letter from Ahmad Sohrab to the Friday night meeting at 
 the studio of Miss Juliet Thompson, New York City, dated 
 Port Said, Egypt, June, 1913 (hitherto unpublished). 
 
 114. — From John Brown. 
 
 115. — See quotation. 
 
 116. — From Oswald Garrison Villard's Life of John Brown. 
 
 117. — Speech before Judge Gary at trial of Chicago anarchists 
 (1886). From contemporary newspaper account. 
 
 118. — From Gilbert Murray's The War of Democracy. (Statement 
 by Mr. Gahan.) 
 
 119. — Editorial Karl Liebknecht. — From The Conservator^ March, 
 1919. 
 
 120.— From Paradise Lost, VI, 29. 
 
 121.— From The City of God. 
 
 122. — From Song of Myself. 
 
 123. — From Chants Communal. 
 
 124.— From Paine's Life of Mark Twain, HI. 1578. 
 
 125.— Poem, Inscribed to " R. G. C. B.— 1878." 
 
 126. — From Gitanjali, 91. 
 
 127. — Same as above, 93. 
 
 128. — From Poem, Habeas Corpus. 
 
 129. — From Poem, Rcsurgam. 
 
 130.— Poem, Let Me Live Out My Years. 
 
 131. — Poem, Mors Benefica. 
 
 132. — Poem, The Stirrup-Cup. 
 
 133. — From The Cenci, Act V. 
 
 134. — From Convito, quoted in Morley's Life of Gladstone. 
 
 135. — From Life of Agricola, 45 and 46. 
 
 136. — From Funeral Oration for Louis Bourbon, Prince of Conde. 
 
 137. — From Thanatopsis. 
 
 138.— Poem, A Wish. 
 
 139. — From Memories of President Lincoln. — ""When Lilacs Last in 
 the Door-yard Bloomed." 
 
 140. — From Prayers of the Social Awakening. 
 
n 
 
 APPENDIX 285 
 
 PART II 
 
 141.— Prayer to Sonia (Ry. IX, 113, 7). 
 
 142. — Quoted, M. J. Savage's Minister's Handbook (China). 
 
 143. — Same as above — (India) . 
 
 144.— Same as No. 142— (200 B.C.). 
 
 145. — Same as above — (1500 B. c.) . 
 
 146.— Same as No. 142 — (2000 b. c.) . 
 
 147.— Same as above— (2000 B.C.). 
 
 14fi.— Same as No. 61. 
 
 149.— Same as No. 142 — (589 b. c.) . 
 
 150. — Same as No. 61. 
 
 151. — From Electro. 
 
 152.— From Iliad, XXIII — Pope's translation. 
 
 153. — From Helen. 
 
 154.— From The Republic. 
 
 155. — From Metaphysics. 
 
 156.— Same as No. 142— (500 B.C.). 
 
 157. — Same as above — (580 B.C.). 
 
 158.— From Phaedo. 
 
 159. — From The Frogs. 
 
 160. — From Myers' Pindar. 
 
 161. — Same as No. 142, quoted by Cicero. 
 
 162.— Same as No. 52. 
 
 163. — Same as above. 
 
 164. — Same as No. 55. 
 
 165.— Same as No. 142. 
 
 166. — Letter to his wife on the death of his little daughter. 
 
 167. — Found in an ancient Greek Tomb. 
 
 168. — Hon. Lionel A. Tollemache's translation. 
 
 169. — From the Apocrypha. 
 
 170. — From the New Testament, Gospel of John. 
 
 171. — From the New Testament, I Corinthians. 
 
 172. — From On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain, 
 
 173. — The Hymn to Apollo. 
 
 174. — From On Belief in the Resurrection. 
 
 175. — From On the Decease of Satyrus. 
 
 176. — Consolatory letter to Heliodorus on the death of his nephew, 
 
 Nepotian. 
 177. — Same as No. 3. — Iste Cognovit. 
 178. — From The Acts of the Apostles. 
 179. — From Nisibene Hymns. 
 180.— Same as No. 142. 
 181. — From The Great Catechism. 
 
286 APPENDIX 
 
 182. — From The Divine Institutes. 
 
 183. — From Against the Gentiles. 
 
 184. — From Monologium LXIX. 
 
 185. — Same as No. 3 — Gaudent in caelis, 
 
 186. — Same as above — Sanctum est. 
 
 187. — From Select Demonstrations. 
 
 188.— Same as No. 121. 
 
 189.— From The Vesper Hymn. 
 
 190. — From Meditations. -"■' 
 
 191.— Same as No. 64. 
 
 192. — Compilation from (1) The Forty Questions of the Soul, (2) 
 The Way of Christ, and (3) Aurora. 
 
 193. — From Works drawn from obscurity in middle of last century 
 by Franz Pfeiffer (1857). — Rich collection, eighteen trea- 
 tises, translated by Sister Odilia Funke. 
 
 194. — From Opuscules. 
 
 195. — Letter to his sister on the death of their father. 
 
 196. — From Immortality of the Soul (Conversation with M. de 
 Ramsai) . 
 
 197. — From Spiritual Torrents. 
 
 198.— Letter to " Child of God soon to die." 
 
 199.— Canzone VIII. 
 
 200. — Sonnet, To Laura. 
 
 201. — Same as above. 
 
 202. — From The Divine Comedy (Paradiso). 
 
 203. — Sonnet, Love and Death. 
 
 204. — Sonnet, Lovers Furnace. 
 
 205.— From Morals. 
 
 206. — From Philosophical Maxims. 
 
 207, — From Christian Theology. 
 
 208. — From The Resurrection. 
 
 209.— Poem, Astro phel (Sir Philip Sidney). 
 
 210. — From A Confession of Faith. 
 
 211.— From Journal (the 6th of the 11th month, 1687). 
 
 212. — From Pilgrim's Progress. 
 
 213. — From Lycidas. 
 
 214. — From Paradise Lost. 
 
 215. — From Sonnet. 
 
 216. — From The Analogy of Religion. 
 
 217.— From Holy Living and Holy Dying. 
 
 218.— Same as No. 47. 
 
 219. — From Of the Truth of the Christian Religion, 
 
 220. — From The Spectator. 
 
 221.— From Principia, Bk. III. 
 
 222.— From Ethics. 
 
APPENDIX 287 
 
 223. — From The Reasonableness of Christianity. 
 
 224. — From Critique of Locke on " Human Understanding" 
 
 225. — From Pensees Diverses. 
 
 226. — From The True Christian Religion. 
 
 227. — From Heaven and Hell. 
 
 228. — From On the Understanding. 
 
 229.— From Cato, Act V, Scene I. 
 
 230. — Poem, Our Life Is Hid with Christ in God, in The Temple. 
 
 231.— Poem, The Dying Christian to His Soul. 
 
 232. — Poem, Friends in Paradise. 
 
 233.— From Poem, On Receipt of My Mother's Picture. 
 
 234. — Hymn, from The Seasons. 
 
 235.— Same as No. 142. 
 
 236.— From Night Thoughts, Bk. I. 
 
 237.— From The Task. 
 
 238. — From The Critique of Practical Reason. 
 
 239.— Compilation from (1) The Ignorant Philosopher, and (2) 
 Essay on Soul. 
 
 240. — From Emile (the "Savoyard Vicar"). 
 
 241. — From Journal, in Lockhart's Life of Scott, vol. vii. 
 
 242.— From Pleasures of Hope, Bk. II. 
 
 243. — From Maxims. 
 
 244.— Quoted, J. F. Clarke's Go Up Higher (Sermon, "Many Man- 
 sions"). 
 
 245. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 
 
 246.— Same as No. 243. 
 
 247.— Same as No. 142. 
 
 248. — From Age of Reason. 
 
 249. — Epitaph written by himself. 
 
 250. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 
 
 251. — From Directions of a Blessed Life. 
 
 252. — Letter to John Adams, on the death of Mrs. Adams. 
 
 253. — From Lectures on the True, the Beautiful and the Good, XVI. 
 
 254. — From Philosophy of Life and Philosophy of Language, Lec- 
 ture IV. 
 
 255. — From Queen Mah. 
 
 256.— Poem, The Death Bed. 
 
 257. — From Prometheus Unbound, Act III, Scene 3. 
 
 258. — Poem, Adonais. 
 
 259.— Same as No. 243. 
 
 260. — From Religious Musings. 
 
 261. — From To a Friend. 
 
 262. — Poem, When Coldness Wraps this Suffering Clay. 
 
 263. — Ode, Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early 
 Childhood. 
 
288 APPENDIX 
 
 264. — From The Excursion. 
 
 265. — Poem, The Journey of Life. 
 
 266.— Sonnet, Night. 
 
 267. — From Immortality (a sermon). 
 
 268. — From The Philosophy of Religion. 
 
 269. — From essay on Immortality. 
 
 270. — From an essay (miverified). 
 
 271. — From A Sermon on Immortal Life. 
 
 272. — From Meditations on the Immortality of the Soul. 
 
 273.— From Threnody. 
 
 274. — From Sartor Resartus. 
 
 275. — Poem, No Coward Soul is Mine. 
 
 276.— From Festus. 
 
 277.— From Three Nuns. 
 
 278.— From To the End. 
 
 279.— From The Blessed Damozel. 
 
 280. — From The Dream of Gerontius. 
 
 281. — From a sermon (miverified). 
 
 282. — From Letters. 
 
 283. — From Poem, Peach-Blossom. 
 
 284. — From Resignation. 
 
 285. — From On the Death of a Friend's Child. 
 
 286. — Letter to his wife on the death of her brother, in Life by 
 Julian Hawthorne. 
 
 287. — From The Eternal Goodness. 
 
 288. — From Snowbound. 
 
 289. — Poem, The Chambered Nautilus. 
 
 290.— Same as No. 142. 
 
 291. — Letter written in anticipation of death. 
 
 292.— From Best Thoughts. 
 
 293. — Letter to step-brother, John Johnson, referring to his dying 
 father, quoted in "William Eleroy Curtis's The True Abra- 
 ham Lincoln. 
 
 294i. — Remarks at the funeral service of Mrs. William Lloyd Garri- 
 son, Jan. 27, 1876. 
 
 295. — From Where the Light Dwelleth, sermon "Looking Toward 
 Sunset." 
 
 296. — From Essentials and Non-Essentials in Religion. 
 
 297. — From Sermons. 
 
 298. — From Endeavors After the Christian Life (sermon " Great 
 Hopes"). 
 
 299.— Poem, After Death in Arabia. 
 
 300. — From Paracelsus. 
 
 301. — From Death of the Duke of Clarence. 
 
 302.— From The Ring and the Book (" Pompilia"). 
 
APPENDIX 289 
 
 303. — From Sonnet, Immortality. 
 
 304. — Poem, Through a Glass Darkly. 
 
 305.— From The Future. 
 
 306. — Poem, Crossing the Bar. 
 
 307. — Sonnet, The Prospect. 
 
 308.— From Les Miserables (" Fantine ") . 
 
 309. — From Journal. 
 
 310. — From Philosophic Dialogues and Fragments. 
 
 311. — From The Fundamental Ideas of Christianity (" The Future 
 Life"). 
 
 312. — From Microcosmos: An Essay Concerning Man and His Rela- 
 tion to the World. 
 
 313. — From Address. 
 
 314. — From Gleanings of Past Years, Vol. III. 
 
 315. — From Three Essays on Religion: Theism. 
 
 316. — From Life by his Son, Vol. I. 
 
 317. — From Miracles and Modern Spiritualism. 
 
 318. — From The Destiny of Man. 
 
 319. — From Evolution and Its Relation to Religious Thought. 
 
 320.— Same as No. 40. 
 
 321. — Poem, Evolution. 
 
 322. — From Letters (to his niece, Mrs. Deacon) . 
 
 323. — From Poem, Gods. 
 
 324. — From a sermon (unverified). 
 
 325. — From Progress and Poverty. 
 
 326. — From The Brothers Karamazof. 
 
 327.— From B.eply to the Holy Synod (1901). 
 
 328. — From Science and Immortality. 
 
 329. — From Joseph Vance. 
 
 330. — From Continuity, an address as President of the British Asso- 
 ciation, 1913. 
 
 331. — Poem, The Open Door, in The New Morning. 
 
 332. — Poem, Faith, in Poems. 
 
 333. — Poem, Love and Death. 
 
 334. — From The Small End of Great Problems. 
 
 335. — From Life Beyond Death. 
 
 336.— Same as No. 140. 
 
 337. — From Immortality and the New Theodicy. 
 
 338. — From Human Immortality. 
 
 339.— From Paine's Life of Mark Twain, Vol. Ill, 1431. 
 
 340.— From The Silent Isle. 
 
 341. — From The Measure of the Hours. 
 
 342. — From On the Threshold of the Unseen. 
 
 343.— Tablet to Ra'is. 
 
 344. — From The Truth of Religion. 
 
290 APPENDIX 
 
 345. — From The New Theology. 
 
 346. — From An Essay in Discovery ("The Mind and the Brain"). 
 
 347. — Same as above ("The Resurrection of the Dead"). 
 
 348. — From Notebook (unpublished). 
 
 349. — From The World and the Individual, Vol. II. 
 
 350. — From Can We Believe in Immortality? 
 
 351. — From The Immortality of the Soul. 
 
 352. — From Creative Evolution, III. 
 
 353. — From The Endless Life. 
 
 354. — From Faith in a Future Life. 
 
 355. — From The Assurance of Immortality. 
 
 356. — From The Drew Lecture, delivered at Oxford, Oct. 11, 1912. 
 
 357. — From Love, Home and the Inner Life. 
 
 358. — From The Drama of Love and Death. 
 
 359. — From Religion and Immortality, Chap. 4. 
 
 360. — Compilation from (1) The Patrician, (2) A Sheaf, (3) Free- 
 lands, (4) The Inn of Tranquillity, and (4) A Bit o' Love, 
 made originally for Readings from Great Authors. 
 
 361. — From Gitanjali, 95. 
 
 362.— From War and Peace, Vol. II. 
 
 363. — Poem, The Hope of the Resurrection, in The Congo. 
 
 364. — Poem, At a Burial, in New Poems. 
 
 365. — Poem, Non Sine Dolore. 
 
 366. — From Hymn to the Sea. 
 
 367. — From Liberty and Literature. 
 
 368. — Poem, Requiem. 
 
 369.— From The Well by the Way. 
 
 370. — Poem, The Journey. 
 
 371. — Poem, The Pilgrim, in The Shoes of Happiness. 
 
 372. — From Passage to India. 
 
 373. — Poem, Joy, Shipmate, Joy! 
 
 374. — From Towards Democracy. 
 
 375. — Poem, The Assault by Night. 
 
 376. — Poem, Birth and Death. 
 
 377.— From Life After Death. 
 
 378. — From Peter Ibbetson. 
 
 379.— Same as No. 346 (" A Dream of Heaven "). 
 
 380. — Sonnet, Suggested by Some Proceedings of the Society for 
 Psychical Research. 
 
 381. — Poem, When Earth's Last Picture, in Collected Verse. 
 
 382. — Song, from Tales of the Mermaid Tavern. 
 
 383. — Poem, To Bayard Taylor. 
 
 384 — Sonnet, Call me not dead — 
 
 385. — Letter in the Liberator, in memory of Miss Jessie Ashley. 
 
 386. — From By the Fireside. 
 
APPENDIX 291 
 
 387. — From Jean Christophe, Vol. IX. 
 
 388. — Poem, Home At Last. 
 
 389.— Sonnet, from 1914. 
 
 390. — Sonnet, Rupert Brooke. 
 
 391. — Sonnet, Rupert Brooke, in Battle and Other Poems. 
 
 392.— Sonnet, To W. H. W. 
 
 393.— Sonnet, To Julian Grenfell. 
 
 394. — Sonnet, To the Men Who Have Died for England. Printed in 
 
 Punch. 
 395. — Poem, By Yser Banks (An elegy on a young officer). 
 396. — Sonnet, The Inward Clarion, from The Poetry Review. 
 397. — Sonnet, Our Dead, in Ardours and Endurances. 
 398. — Poem, Killed in Action. 
 399. — Poem, Real Presence, in The Poetry Review. 
 4m.— Two Sonnets, "To Death!" See Clarke's Treasury of War 
 
 Poetry. 
 401. — Poem, In View of the Battlefield, in Collected War Poems. 
 402. — Poem, Altars, in A Canadian Twilight and Other Poems of 
 
 War and of Peace. (Author killed in action, 1917.) 
 403. — Sonnet, The Fringe of Heaven, in The Dawn Patrol and Other 
 
 Poems of an Aviator. 
 404. — Poem, Immortality. 
 
 405.^ Poem, Immortality, in Songs of the World War. 
 406. — Poem, As the Leaves Fall, in Soldier Poets: Songs of the 
 
 Fighting Men. 
 407. — Poem, Life! I know not what thou art. 
 
APPENDIX 
 B — ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
 
 Copyrighted material has been included in this Anthology by per- 
 mission of, and by special arrangement with, publishers and authors. 
 Thanks are herewith extended to the following who have thus co- 
 operated with us in the making of this book: 
 
 Allen and Unwin, Ltd., London: 
 
 Edward Carpenter, Towards Democracy, 
 
 Cartwright Frith, " Heroes." 
 Appleton & Co., New York: 
 
 Alfred W. Martin, Faith in a Future Life, 
 
 Nathaniel Shaler, The Individual. 
 Atlantic Monthly Press, Boston: 
 
 Briggs Adams, The American Spirit. 
 Ball Publishing Company, Boston: 
 
 Sir Oliver Lodge, The Immortality of the Soul, 
 Blackwell, D. H., Oxford: 
 
 R. Fanshawe, " By Yser Bank." 
 Blakeney, E. H., Kings School, Ely, "In View of the Battlefield," 
 
 from Collected War Poems. 
 Brentano's : 
 
 G. Bernard Shaw, " Androcles and the Lion." 
 Cecil Palmer and Hayward, London : 
 
 A. St. John Adcock, " Immortality." 
 Chatto and Windus, London: 
 
 Robert Nichols, Ardours and Endurances. 
 Child, Oscar C. A., " To a Hero." 
 Constable and Co., London: 
 
 F. G. Scott, In the Battle Silences. 
 De Beauvoir, Dr. W. E., " Killed in Action." 
 Dodd, Mead & Company, New York: 
 
 Maurice Maeterlinck, The Measure of the HourSy The Wrack of 
 the Storm. 
 
 Robert F. Scott, Scott's Last Expedition. 
 Doran and Company, New York: 
 
 John Oxenham, *' Vimy Ridge." 
 292 
 
APPENDIX 293 
 
 Doubleday, Page & Company, New York: 
 
 Rudyard Kipling, Collected Verse. 
 
 Edwin Markham, The Shoes of Happiness. 
 
 Charles Wagner, By the Fireside. 
 Dryden Publishing Company, New York: 
 
 (A Soldier Son), "Adieu." 
 Dutton and Company, New York: 
 
 Katherine Lee Bates, The Retinue and Other Poems (1918). 
 
 Sir William F. Barrett, On the Threshold of the Unseen 
 (1918). 
 Erskine Macdonald, Ltd., London: 
 
 Paul R. Bewsher, The Dawn Patrol. 
 
 J. N. Streets, The Undying Splendor, 
 Fifield (A. C), London: 
 
 Elizabeth Gibson, The Well by the Way, 
 Fortnightly Review, England: 
 
 W. L. Courtney, " To Our Dead." 
 Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York: 
 
 Arthur Gleason, Love, Home and the Inner Life. 
 
 Alfred Noyes, Tales of the Mermaid Tavern, " The Heroic Dead," 
 "The Open Door." 
 George W. Jacobs and Company, Philadelphia: 
 
 W. E. B. DuBois, John Brown. 
 Harper Brothers, New York: 
 
 George Du Maurier, Peter Ihbetson. 
 
 A. B. Paine, Life of Mark Twain. 
 
 R. H. Stoddard, " Hymn to the Sea," 
 Henry Holt and Company, New York: 
 
 Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution. 
 
 William De Morgan, Joseph Vance. 
 
 Romain Rolland, Jean Christophe. 
 Houghton, MiflBin and Company, Boston: 
 
 G. H. Clarke (ed.), Treasury of War Poetry, 
 
 S. M. Crothers, The Endless Life. 
 
 John Fiske, The Destiny of Man. 
 
 R. W. Gilder, "Love and Death," "Non Sine Dolore," " CaU Me 
 Not Dead." 
 
 G. A. Gordon, Immortality and the New Theodicy, 
 
 William James, Human Immortality. 
 
 J. R. Lowell, " Commemoration Ode," " Memoriae Positum," 
 " On the Death of a Friend's Child." 
 
 W. V. Moody, " Ode in Time of Hesitation." 
 
 William Osier, " Science and Immortality." 
 
 E. C. Stedman, " Assault by Night," " Mors Benefica." 
 
 O. G. ViUard, Life of John Brown, 
 
294 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 John Lane Company, New York: 
 
 Rupert Brooke, Sonnets " 1914," " Suggested by Proceedings of 
 the Society for Psychical Research." 
 
 WiUiam Watson, " At a Burial," " Birth." 
 Little, Brown and Company, Boston: 
 
 Emily Dickinson, Poems (Second Series). 
 
 Francis Parkman, The Jesuits in North America. 
 McClelland, Goodchild and Stewart, Toronto: 
 
 B. F. Trotter, A Canadian Twilight. 
 McClurg and Company, Chicago: 
 
 William Clark, Life of Savonarola. 
 Maclechose and Company, England: 
 
 Edward Caird, Address. 
 MacmiUan Company, New York: 
 
 Matthew Arnold, "The Future," "A Wish," "Immortality," 
 " The Last Word." 
 
 R. G. Campbell, The New Theology. 
 
 A. H. Clough, " Through a Glass Darkly." 
 
 Harry E. Fosdick, The Assurance of Immortality, 
 
 W. W, Gibson, Battle and Other Poems. 
 
 Vachel Lindsay, The Congo. 
 
 John Masefield, Philip the King, Gallipoli. 
 
 J. G. Neihardt, " Let Me Live Out My Years." 
 
 Stephen Phillips, " Faith." 
 
 Josiah Royce, The World and the Individual. 
 
 Rabindranath Tagore, Gitanjali. 
 
 An Essay in Discovery (Symposium). 
 Mitchell Kennerley, New York: 
 
 Edward Carpenter, The Drama of Love and Death. 
 North American Review, New York: 
 
 Alan Seegar, " I Have a Rendezvous with Death." 
 Open Court Company, Chicago: 
 
 Remain RoUand, Above the Battle. 
 Oxford University Press, England: 
 
 Robert Bridges, " Youth Whose Hope Is High." 
 Pilgrim Press, Boston: 
 
 Walter Rauschenbusch, Prayers of the Social Awakening. 
 Poetry Review, Chicago: 
 
 Ivan Adair, " Real Presence." 
 
 N. B. Nichols, " The Inward Clarion." 
 Punch, London: 
 
 Anonymous, "To the Men Who Have Died for England." 
 Putnam and Sons, New York: 
 
 A. C. Benson, The Silent Isle. 
 
 Sir Oliver Lodge, Continuity. 
 
APPENDIX 295 
 
 Rudolph Eucken, The Truth of Religion, 
 
 M. J. Savage, Life Beyond Death. 
 Scribner's Sons, New York: 
 
 John Galsworthy, The Patricians, Inn of Tranquillity, A Sheaf, 
 A Bit o' Love. 
 
 William Henley, " The Ways of Death." 
 
 Sidney Lanier, " The Stirrup Cup," " To Bayard Taylor." 
 
 R. L. Stevenson, " Aex Triplex." 
 Small, Maynard and Company, Boston: 
 
 Father Tabb, " Evolution." 
 
INDEX 
 
 [The figures in this Index refer to selection numbers] 
 
 Abdul Baha, 113 
 
 Abelard, 189 
 
 Acts of the Apostles, 94 
 
 Adair, Ivan, 399 
 
 Adams, Briggs, 28 
 
 Adcock, A. St. John, 405 
 
 Addison, Joseph, 220, 229 
 
 Aeschylus, 6 
 
 Agricola, 135 
 
 Alcott, J. Bronson, 270 
 
 Ambrose, St., 81, 174, 175 
 
 Amiel, Henri Frederick, 309 
 
 Angelo, Michael, 62, 203, 204 
 
 Anonymous, 25, 27, 38, 394 
 
 Anselm, St., 184 
 
 Aphrahat, 187 
 
 Apocrypha, The, 92, 169 
 
 Aristophanes, 159 
 
 Aristotle, 2, 155 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, 84, 138, 303, 
 
 305 
 Arnold, Sir Edwin, 299 
 Athanasius, St., 183 
 Atkinson, E. L., 76 
 Augustine, St., 121, 188 
 Aurelius, Marcus, 56 
 
 Bernard, St., 190 
 Bewsher, Paul R., 403 
 Bhagavadgita, 63, 144 
 Bible, The, 93, 94, 170, 171 
 Blakeney, Edward Henry, 401 
 Boehme, Jakob, 192 
 Bossuet, James Benique, 136 
 Brebeuf, Jean de, 112 
 Bridges, Robert, 67 
 Bronte, Emily, 275 
 Brooke, Rupert, 22, 23, 380, 389 
 Brooks, Phillips, 324 
 Brown, Crommelin, 32, 390 
 Brown, John, 114, 115, 116 
 Brown, Sir Thomas, 47, 218 
 Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 307 
 Browning, Robert, 13, 51, 300, 
 
 302 
 Brunitiere, M., 49 
 Bruno, Giordano, 98, 99 
 Bryant, WiUiam CuUen, 137, 265 
 Buddha, 148 
 
 Buddhist Scriptures, 142, 143 
 Bunyan, John, 212 
 Butler, Bishop, 216 
 Byron, Lord, 12, 262 
 
 Bacon, Sir Francis, 43, 210 
 Baha O'Llah, 343 
 Bailey, Philip James, 276 
 Barbauld, Mrs. A. L., 407 
 Barrett, Sir William F., 342 
 Bates, Katherine Lee, 36 
 Beecher, Henry Ward, 292 
 Bellows, Henry W., 297 
 Benson, Arthur Christopher, 
 Bergson, Henri, 352 
 
 340 
 
 Caird, Edward, 313 
 Caird, John, 311 
 Calvin, John, 207 
 Campbell, Thomas, 10, 242 
 Campbell, Reginald J., 345 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 274 
 Carpenter, Edward, 358, 374 
 Carstairs, CarroU, 26 
 Cato, 161 
 Cavell, Edith, 118 
 
 297 
 
298 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Channing, William Ellery, 65, 
 
 267 
 Chesterton, Gilbert K., 388 
 Child, Oscar C. A., 30 
 CLrysostom, St. John, 79, 178 
 Church Service, The, 96, 177, 
 
 185, 186 
 Cicero, 52, 162, 163 
 Clark, William, 100 
 Clarke, James Freeman, 296 
 Clements, Reginald F., 404 
 Clough, Arthur Hugh, 304 
 Clutton-Brock, A., 379 
 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 260 
 Collier, Jeremy, 105 
 Collins, William, 11 
 Collyer, Robert, 295 
 Cooke, Francis E., 104 
 Corinthians (I), 171 
 Courtney, Joseph, 406 
 Courtney, W. L., 33 
 Cousin, M. Victor, 253 
 Cowper, William, 87, 233, 237 
 Cranmer, Archbishop, 105 
 Crothers, Samuel McChord, 353 
 
 Dante, 134, 202 
 Darwin, Charles, 316 
 Da Vmci, Leonardo, 205, 206 
 De Beauvoir, W. Evans, 398 
 De Morgan, William, 329 
 Dickens, Charles, 82 
 Dickinson, Emily, 88, 89, 370 
 Dickinson, G. Lowes, 359 
 Donne, John, 215 
 Dostoevsky, 326 
 Doyle, Sir F. H., 85 
 Du Bois, W. E. B., 114 
 Du Maurier, George, 378 
 
 Ephraim Syrus, 179 
 Epictetus, 58 
 
 Epitaph (Egyptian Tomb), 147 
 Epitaph (Greek Tomb), 167 
 Epitaph (Greyfriars Churchyard, 
 
 Edinburgh), 111 
 Eucken, Rudolph, 344 
 Euripides, 5, 153 
 
 Fanshawe, R., 395 
 
 Faraday, Michael, 322 
 
 Fechner, Gustav, 377 
 
 Fenelon, 196 
 
 Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 251 
 
 Fiske, John, 318 
 
 Fosdick, Harry Emerson, 355 
 
 Fox, George, 211 
 
 Foxe (Book of Martyrs), 97, 102 
 
 Franklin, Benjamin, 249, 250 
 
 Frith, J. Cartwright, 35 
 
 Frohman, Charles, 71 
 
 Galsworthy, John, 360 
 
 George, Henry, 325 
 
 Gibson, Elizabeth, 369 
 
 Gibson, W. W., 391 
 
 Gilder, Richard Watson, 333, 
 
 365, 384 
 Giovannitti, Arturo, 385 
 Gladstone, William E., 314 
 Gleason, Arthur, 357 
 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang, 244 
 Gordon, George A., 337 
 Gospels, The, 93, 170 
 Greek Anthology, 168 
 Gregory of Nyssa, 180, 181 
 Grotius, Hugo, 219 
 Guizot, F. P. G., 272 
 Guyon, Madame, 197, 198 
 
 Eckhart, Meister, 193 
 Egyptian Book of the Dead, 146 
 Elizabeth, Queen, 46 
 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 17, 18, 
 269, 273 
 
 Hadfield, James Arthur, 346 
 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 286 
 Hegel, George Wilhelm Fried- 
 rich, 268 
 Henley, William K, 125 
 
INDEX 
 
 299 
 
 Heraclitus, 156 
 
 Herbert, George, 230 
 
 Herder, Johann Gottfried von, 
 
 235 
 Herford, Brooke, 334 
 Hindus, 141 
 
 Holmes, Oliver WendeU, 289 
 Homer, 152 
 Hood, Thomas, 256 
 Hugo, Victor, 69, 308 
 Hume, David, 228 
 Huss, John, 103 
 
 Indian MS., 59 
 IngersoU, Robert G., 367 
 
 Jackson, Helen Hunt, 128, 129 
 James, William, 338 
 JeflFerson, Thomas, 252 
 Jerome, St., 176 
 Jesus, 93, 170 
 Juvenal, 66 
 
 Kant, Immanuel, 48, 238 
 Kempis, Thomas a, 64, 191 
 Kheyam, Omar, 61 
 King, Starr, 290 
 Kingsley, Charles, 281 
 Kipling, Rudyard, 381 
 Knox, John, 208 
 
 Lactantius, 182 
 
 Lanier, Sidney, 132, 383 
 
 Latimer, Hugh, 110 
 
 Lecky, W. E. H„ 54 
 
 Le Conte, Joseph, 319 
 
 Leibnitz, Gottfried Wilhelm 
 
 von, 224 
 Liebknecht, Karl, 119 
 Lincoln, Abraham, 293 
 Lindsay, Vachel, 363 
 Litt, R. H. C. D., 356 
 Lloyd, Henry Demarest, 348 
 Locke, John, 223 
 Lodge, Sir Oliver, 330, 351 
 
 V Longfellow, Henry W., 73, 284 
 Lotze, Herman, 312 
 Lowell, James RusseU, 15, 16 
 285 
 
 Maccabees (I), 92 
 ./Maeterlinck, Maurice, 39, 341 
 Markham, Edwin, 371 
 Martin, Alfred, 354 
 Martineau, James, 298 
 Masefield, John, 20 
 M. B., 393 
 
 Mill, John Stuart, 315 
 Milton, John, 80, 120, 213, 214 
 Mohammed, 4, 150 
 Montesquieu, 225 
 Moody, William Vaughn, 14 
 More, Sir Thomas, 104 
 
 Neihardt, John G., 130 
 Newman, John Henry, 95, 280 
 Newton, Isaac, 221 
 Nichols, Robert, 24, 397 
 Nichols, Wallace Bertram, 396 
 Noyes, Alfred, 72, 331, 382 
 
 Oldys, William, 106 
 Osier, William, 328 
 Oxenham, John, 34 
 
 Paine, Thomas, 247, 248 
 Parker, Theodore, 271 
 Pascal, 194, 195 
 Paul, 171 
 
 Petrarch, 199, 200, 201 
 Phillips, Stephen, 332 
 Phillips, Wendell, 294 
 Philo, 172 
 Pindar, 160 
 Plato, 90, 91, 154, 158 
 Pliny the Younger, 78 
 Plotinus, 173 
 Plutarch, 165, 166 
 Pope, Alexander, 231 
 Pythagoras, 157 
 
300 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, 106, 107, 
 
 108, 109 
 Rauschenbusch, "Walter, 140, 336 
 Renan, Ernest, 310 
 Richter, Jean Paul, 243, 246, 259 
 Robertson, Frederick, 282 
 Roland, Song of, 8 
 RoUand, Romain, 19, 387 
 Rossetti, Christina, 277, 278 
 Rossetti, Dante G., 279 
 Rousseau, J. J., 240 
 Royce, Josiah, 349 
 
 Saemund, 60 
 
 Savage, Minot J., 335 
 
 Savonarola, 101 
 
 Schlegel, Frederick von, 254 
 
 Scott, Capt. Robert F., 75, 77 
 
 Scott, Frederick George, 37 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 241 
 
 Seegar, Alan, 29 
 
 Seneca, 55, 164 
 
 Shakespeare, William, 45, 53, 70 
 
 Shaler, Nathaniel, 40, 320 
 
 Shaw, G. Bernard, 83 
 
 Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 86, 133, 
 
 255, 257, 258 
 Sill, Edward Rowland, 50 
 Simonides of Ceos, 7 
 Snowden, James H., 350 
 Socrates (see Plato) 
 Sophocles, 42, 44, 151 
 Sorley, Charles Hamilton, 400 
 Southey, Robert, 261 
 Spenser, Edmund, 209 
 Spies, August, 117 
 Spinoza, 57, 222 
 Stedman, E. C, 131, 375 
 Stephen, St., 94 
 Stevenson, Robert Louis, 68, 368 
 
 Stoddard, Richard Henry, 366 
 Stowe, Harriett Beecher, 291 
 Streeter, Burnett Hillman, 347 
 Streets, J. N., 21, 31, 392 
 Swedenborg, Emanuel, 226, 227 
 
 Tabb, John B., 321 
 
 Tacitus, 135 
 
 Tagore, Rabindranath, 126, 127, 
 
 361 
 Tamil, South Indian Book of 
 
 Poems, 3 
 Taylor, Bayard, 283 
 Taylor, Jeremy, 217 
 -J Tennyson, Alfred, 74, 301, 306 
 Thomson, James, 234 
 Thucydides, 9 
 Tolstoi, Leo, 327, 362 
 Traubel, Horace, 119, 123 
 Trotter, Bernard Freeman, 402 
 Twain, Mark, 124, 339 
 
 Vane, Sir Henry, 41 
 Vaughan, H., 232 
 Vedas, 145 
 Voltaire, 239 
 
 Wagner, Charles, 386 
 Wallace, Alfred Russel, 317 
 Watson, William, 364, 376 
 White, Blanco, 266 
 Whittier, John Greenleaf, 287, 
 
 288 
 Whitman, Walt, 122, 139, 323, 
 
 372, 373 
 Wisdom of Solomon, The, 169 
 Wordsworth, William, 1, 263, 264 
 
 Young, Edward, 236 
 
 Zoroaster, 149 
 

 
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