211
April 1927
T h e
K i n g ’ s
B u s i n e s s
Does Man’s Sou l Eternally Exist? I T is a most striking coincidence that within recent months three noted men of science—an inventor, a surgeon and an astronomer—have declared their growing belief in the existence of the soul after death. These men are Thomas A. Edison, Dr. William J. Mayo and Dr. Heber D. Curtis. Sixteen years ago, in an interview with Edward Mar shall, printed in the New York Times, Mr. Edison said: “Soul ? Soul ? What do you mean by soul ? The brain ? . . . . There is no more reason to believe that any human brain will be immortal than there is to think one of my phono graphic cylinders will be immortal.” In that interview Mr. Edison described the brain as a “meat mechanism.” Now, in another interview with Mr. Marshall, printed in The Forum, Mr. Edison says: “Belief in the immortality of the soul to some extent depends upon our definition of soul. If, when we speak about the human soul, we mean the intel ligence, we must admit that, if there is any evidence on one side or the other, worthy of consideration by the scientific mind, it is in favor of the theory of immortality.” The interview has attracted editorial attention, in which there is little surprise that the great inventor in his declining years should turn from his skepticism to faith, even though that faith is not as clearly pronounced and defined as that of most believers. “At seventy-nine,” observes the Mil waukee Journal, “Mr. Edison has the faith, or is very close to the faith, that man is a child of immortality.” “Perhaps the very fact that his experience is com mon to that of most men—an increasing faith in the God of life as winter comes on—is further evidence that man lives again.” ; “Mr. Edison is coming into the light,” observes the Raleigh News and Observer. “He is growing old and his new conception is proof of the words, ‘At evening time there shall be light’.” From a daily paper comes the following quotation from Dr. Mayo: “Is there a soul? ‘Yes,’ says Dr. William J. Mayo, who knows more about man’s material makeup than perhaps any other living person. Dr. Mayo is a world-famous surgeon, senior of the two equally distinguished Mayo brothers. The keen blade of his scalpel may never have disclosed the soul as a tangible part of the mystery called man, but he knows it is there. He is as confident of its presence as he is’ of the most elemental truth to which his own medical science adheres. Humanity, too, sadly needs fuller acceptance of the spiritual teachings from which the concept of a soul arises, Dr. Mayo believes.” • “With energy, matter, space and time contin uous, with nothing lost or wasted, are we ourselves the only manifestation that comes to an end, ceases, is annihilated at three score years and ten? “What we crudely call the spirit of man makes new. compounds, ,plays with the laws of chemical action, guides the forces of the atom, changes the face of the earth, gives life to new forms and takes it away from millions of animals and plants. Here is a flame that controls its own flaming, a creative spirit which cannot reasonably be less than the con tinuity it controls. ' “This thing, soul, mind or spirit, cannot well be an exception. In spine way, as yet impossible to define, it, too, must possess continuity.” Daily papers a few days later recorded the statements of Dr. Heber D. Curtis, director of the Allegheny Obser vatory, made at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Said Dr. Curtis:
The Forgotten Prom ise H E goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see Him as He said unto you” (Mk. 16:7). This was the angel’s message to the women who went to the tomb and found the Saviour had risen. There was the promise (14- :28), “After I am risen I will go before you into Galilee,” and it had slipped their minds com pletely. True faith would have gone to the tomb without spices. If instead of mourning at Jerusalem they had set out for Galilee on His. promise, the days lost in grief might have been bright with hope and action. How often we too, in our hours of darkness, forget His words which are intended to give us greatest hope. The Buried Body P AUL states in 1 Cor. 15:4 that one of the Gospel essen tials is “that he was buried.” We place great empha sis upon our Lord’s resurrection. . It. might be well to place a little more emphasis upon the: fact that He was buried. It shows the reality of His death. It was the burial of Lazarus for four days (John 11) which demon strated that it was no mere trance from which he was awakened, but actually ’from death that he afose. The resurrection of Christ was no subsequent invention to try to explain or mitigate the shock His death had given His followers. He was bound in grave clothes, buried for three days and nights. When the tomb was opened, the grave clothes lay in perfect order, but the body had van ished out of them.
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