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I say that there is. I say that I do not know. It seems to me that
every sane and honest man must say the same. But if there is an
infinitely good God and another world, then the infinitely good God
will be just as good to us in that world as he is in this. If this
infinitely good God loves His children in this world, He will love them
in another. If He loves a man when he is alive, He will not hate him
the instant he is dead. If we are the children of an infinitely wise
and powerful God, He knew exactly what we would do--the temptations
that we could and could not withstand--knew exactly the effect that
everything would have upon us, knew under what circumstances we would
take our lives--and produced such circumstances himself. It is
perfectly apparent that there are many people incapable by nature of
bearing the burdens of life, incapable or preserving their mental poise
in stress and strain of disaster, disease and loss, and who by failure,
by misfortune and want, are driven to despair and insanity, in whose
darkened minds there comes like a flash of lightning in the night, the
thought of death, a thought so strong, so vivid, that all fear is lost,
all ties broken, all duties, all obligations, all hopes forgotten, and
naught remains except a fierce and wild desire to die. Thousands and
thousands become moody, melancholy, brood upon loss of money, of
position, of friends, until reason abdicates, and frenzy takes
possession of the soul. If there be an infinitely wise and powerful
God, all this was known to Him from the beginning, and He so created
things, established relations, put in operation causes and effects that
all that has happened was the necessary result of his own acts.

Ninth, nearly all who have tried to answer what I said have been
exceeding careful to misquote me, and then answer something that I
never uttered. They have declared that I have advised people who were
in trouble, somewhat annoyed, to kill themselves; that I have told men
who have lost their money, who had failed in business, who were not
good in health, to kill themselves at once, without taking into
consideration any duty that they owed to wives, children, friends, or
society.

No man has a right to leave his wife to fight the battle alone if he is
able to help. No man has a right to desert his children if he can
possibly be of use. As long as he can add to the comfort of those he
loves, as long as he can stand between wife a