If
failure of the power to be influenced vitiates life, presence of the
power to influence vitiates death. And no one will deny that a man can
influence for many a long year after he is vulgarly reputed as dead.
"It seems, then, that there is no such thing as either absolute life
without any alloy of death, nor absolute death without any alloy of life,
until, that is to say, all posthumous power to influence has faded away.
And this, perhaps, is what the Sunchild meant by saying that in the midst
of life we are in death, and so also that in the midst of death we are in
life.
"And there is this, too. No man can influence fully until he can no more
be influenced--that is to say, till after his so-called death. Till
then, his 'he' is still unsettled. We know not what other influences may
not be brought to bear upon him that may change the character of the
influence he will exert on ourselves. Therefore, he is not fully living
till he is no longer living. He is an incomplete work, which cannot have
full effect till finished. And as for his vicarious life--which we have
seen to be very real--this can be, and is, influenced by just
appreciation, undue praise or calumny, and is subject, it may be, to
secular vicissitudes of good and evil fortune.
"If this is not true, let us have no more talk about the immortality of
great men and women.
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