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[101] the highest point of conviction yet attained on that subject by many highly trained minds, it also seems to me a wonderfully condensed and vigorous piece of writing, and it is to be read in connection with that remarkable passage in “Elsie Venner,” where the author speculates in respect to the attempted murder of his young schoolmaster.

Boston, December 28, 1867.
Dear sir,
I should prefer to say that I trust there will be a righting of this world's evils for each and all of us in a future state, than say that I share the unquestioning certainty of many of those about me.

The natural argument seems to me against the supposition. In the year 1800 I was not, to the best of my knowledge. Since that time my consciousness has been evoked and my experiences have been accumulated. I do not see that I have any natural ground for claiming the future any more than the past,--other than my conviction that it is or ought to be so,--a conviction which is sometimes strong and at other times weak, as in the experience of many others.

I have seen many human consciousnesses put together, like my own. They were at one time represented by the unconscious life of ova. By and by they got sense, intellect, will, conscience, experience.

But I have seen many consciousnesses taken to pieces also; they lost the senses to a great extent; the intellect and of course the conscience with the will were enfeebled,


Macmillan, 1900.

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