THE IMMORTAL DEAD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19792, 12 November 1927, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE IMMORTAL DEAD.

BY MATANGA.

AN IMPRESSIVE MARCH PAST.

Armistice Day had a brief space of sacred silence, wherein the patriot dead marched past. There was no ringing rhythm of their martial tread save that which the soul heard, no drum-beat save the throbbing of hoarts stirred by memory; but they marched nevertheless. Oft as such a day of recollection is observed they come swinging down the road of thought, and with them, on that most real of all roads, there march musings that no word of command can halt. Its frequent quoting in their honour makes Rupert Brooke's resounding sonnet echo inevitably on such a day; but at one note of this clarion " last post " the mind is moved to question.

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 Berene That men call age; and those who would have been Their sons, they gave, their immortality. " Their immortality " —did they give that ? Live they not still, through years of fond remembrance here, and for aye upon some other shore ? Even poetic license, and the daring that gives wing to so* vivid a phrase, cannot condone the final extravagance of this paean of adulation. Rebellious protest must rise. The mind balks at this last leap asked of it in pursuit of the flying fancy. They gave all the rest, without a doubt. But this ? Though they had never a thought of it, it is theirs irrevocably. The Unknown Soldiers.

True, there will come a time—not soon, if those who have known or even heard of them do as they should, but some day —when these will pass into the great company of the forgotten. Yet even that forgetfulness will not be utter. Their names may fade from rolls of honour, or if still noted be meaningless of aught that makes the images of the dead individually distinct. Yet will they share the general glory of the Unknown Soldier. Listen to Margaret L. Woods about " the forgotten dead."

To the forgotten dead, Come, let ua drink in silence ere we part. To every fervent yej resolved heart That brought its tiSneless passion and its tears, _ . Renunciation and laborious years. To lay the deep foundations of our race. To rear its mighty ramparts overhead And light its pinnacles with golden grace. To the' unhonoured dead. To the forgotten dead. Whose dauntless bands were stretched to grasp the rein Of Fate and hurl into the void again. Her thunder-hoofed horses, rushing blind Earthward along the courses , of the wind. Among the stars, along the wind in vain Their souls were scattered and their blood was shed, , , , And nothing, nothing of.them doth remain To tho thrice-perished aead.

Forgotten as individuals, yet remembered thus in a general thanksgiving, these whom our hearts cherish will stand, rank -on rank, among Uie host of all who helped to make the world their far-off successors i afterward enjoy honoured then all the, more {-beoause of the vast serving fellowship ih which they have found a nameless place. Perpetual remembrance, in some fashion, Will be theirs. Confessions of Faith. Yet is such perpetuation of memorial not the immortality with which they will be surely clothed. We cling to the belief that a life of their own, not merely one given them in the remembering thought of others, i 3 theirs for aye. We piay not be able to satisfy fully every querulous sceptic, nor even our own " freezing reason's colder part," but the belief comes back after every rebuff, ,unweakened and alert. It is harder not to believe than to believe.

The theologians rightly busy themselves about the pros %nd cons of the question as to whether there is a life after death, and about its fashion it it be assured. However, it is not their question only. Every man has an urge and a right to think about it in his own way. "Where shall we bury you?" asked Socrates' weeping friends as the fatal cup was doing its work. " You may bury me—if you can catch me," was his firm answer in the very face of death. It is the thought of every hopeful, contemplative man. So meu of every race have refused to shut tliA door on the idea of survival. A Working Creed.

Here, for instance, is Robert Blatchford's most recent confession of faith, expressed in the Clarion's columns in the course of his article on " Where did we get our Souls?"

When a politician goes over from one party to another he is contemned as a turncoat. Is that fair? May not a politician change his mind as blamelessly as his even Christian? When new evidence convicts a man of error it is sheeT mulishnees to hug the error closer. A few yea s ago I changed my mind: not as to affaiis nolitical but a3 to matters of wider scope and deeper moment. I had held for many years that the bram is the man. and that when the brain stops working the mrm in dead. But study and thought convinced rn<» ihat tho mind, or soul, is greater than SK brain is the brain's master and outlives it.

Out of that reasoning confidence Blatchford has got, as a myriad others have got, a working creed. Let him put it in his own way:

The hope of this world s sanity depends upon the proof of human survival. If there is another life, a longer and better.life, the Krip of this world relaxes, we take a wider view The prizes of Vanity Fair shrink in value. We cease to bo epJemeraU we have tune and room to develop, we are no longer in a frantic hurry We no longer need to snatch. e can afford to And we must think not individually, but racially; for this is not a mere question of the future happiness of any wayward marl, it 13 a question of choice between a further step in evolution on the one hand and the downfall of humanity into bloodguiltineas and savagery M an « cf ' u '^ p ® ) with the beneficent or deadly powers of human science, is in a position as critical as poor Queen Guenevere when she was bidden to choose between the painted cloths: ons meant heaven the other hell. Science will deliver us or destroy us as we use it. aanely or in madness. That is my point. If ,we have faith in another life we can afford to be selfless and patient. We need not quarrel and fight over the pitiful prizes of this world. .We have an enlarged hope, a more g.onous horizon. We can answer Omar s scornful question "Why. if the soul can fling the dust aside and naked on the air of heaven ride, wero't not a shame —were t not a B hame for him in this clay carcase crippled to abide?" Yes, Omar; but we are content.to work within our muddy vesture of decay and await the brighter dawn.

Believing thus, men will gladly toil and light, content to die without winning all for which they strovo, so long a,s they have " done their bit." They will survive to share in the eventual triumph, however long delayed. The patriot dead who marched past on Armistice Day in the silence are part of the army moving to that brighter dawn.