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XXVII
SHALL WE BE UNHAPPY THERE? SHALL we be unhappy there? It is hardly reassuring when we consider the habits of our nature and remember that we form part of a universe that has not yet collected its wisdom. We have seen, it is true, that good and bad fortune exist only in so far as regards our body and that, when we have lost the agent of our sufferings, we shall not meet any of the earthly sorrows again. But our anxiety does not end here; and will not our mind, lingering upon our erstwhile sorrows, drifting derelict from world to world, unknown to itself in the unknowable that seeks itself hopelessly; will not our mind know here the frightful torture of which we have already spoken and which is doubtless the last which the imagination can touch with its wing? Lastly, if there were nothing left of our body and our mind, there would still remain the matter and the spirit (or, at least, the obviously single force to which we give that double name) which composed them and whose fate must be no more indifferent to us than our own fate; for, let us repeat, from our death onwards, the adventure of the universe becomes our own adventure. Let us not, therefore, say to ourselves: "What can it matter? We shall not be there." We shall be there always, because everything will be there. |