his writings, and
Ecclesiastes gives a most morbid and gloomy view of death.

However, no modern Biblical scholar accepts these passages in this
literal light, for it is known that they were written symbolically, or
as parables, and were not intended to be literally interpreted. They
have a spiritual significance. We are, however, not interested here so
much with this spiritual sense as we are with the literal implication of
the translation. Therefore, according to this literal meaning of the two
texts, if we accept them to prove that animals have no future life, we
are forced to believe by at least fourteen passages, of equal if not
greater power, that man shares their same fate after death. No man has a
right to select certain passages from the same book of the Bible and say
that they shall be accepted literally, and that other passages of equal
merit shall be interpreted otherwise. They must all be treated the same.

All scholars are familiar with that remarkable eleventh book of Homer's
Odyssey, known as the Necromanteia, or Invocation of the Dead, and in it
Ulysses descends into the regions of the departed spirits to invoke them
and obtain advice as to his future adventures. One commentator says: "He
sails to the boundaries of the ocean, and lands in the country of the
Cimmerians, who dwell in perpetual cloud and darkness, and in whose
country are the gates leading to the regions of the dead." All is
darkness, discontent, hunger; nothing is said of virtue, wisdom, beauty,
happiness. Only bitter gloom! No wonder this heathen poet considered,
with such views of a future life, sensual pleasures as the chief object
of this life.

The following dialogue between the inhabitants of the earth and the
dweller in the regions of the dead--between Ulysses and Achilles--is
remarkable for its horrible depiction of the future life:

"Through the thick gloom his friend Achilles knew,
As he speaks the tears dissolve in dew.
'Comest thou alive to view the Stygian bounds,
Where the wan spectres walk eternal rounds;
Nor fear'st the dark and dismal waste to tread,
Thronged with pale ghosts familiar with the dead?'
To whom with sighs, 'I pass these dreadful gates
To seek the Theban, and consult the Fates;
For still distressed I roam from coast to coast,
Lost to my friends and to my country lost.
But sure the eye of Time beholds no name
So blessed as thine in all the rolls of fame;
Alive we hailed thee wi