Returning to Dr.
Gurgoyle, he continued:--"It may be urged that on a man's death one of
the great factors of his life is so annihilated that no kind of true life
can be any further conceded to him. For to live is to be influenced, as
well as to influence; and when a man is dead how can he be influenced? He
can haunt, but he cannot any more be haunted. He can come to us, but we
cannot go to him. On ceasing, therefore, to be impressionable, so great
a part of that wherein his life consisted is removed, that no true life
can be conceded to him.
"I do not pretend that a man is as fully alive after his so-called death
as before it. He is not. All I contend for is, that a considerable
amount of efficient life still remains to some of us, and that a little
life remains to all of us, after what we commonly regard as the complete
cessation of life. In answer, then, to those who have just urged that
the destruction of one of the two great factors of life destroys life
altogether, I reply that the same must hold good as regards death.
"If to live is to be influenced and to influence, and if a man cannot be
held as living when he can no longer be influenced, surely to die is to
be no longer able either to influence or be influenced, and a man cannot
be held dead until both these two factors of death are present.
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