But it is a terrible ordeal for a man to stand upright on his two legs unswaying, and decide that in all the universe he finds for himself but one freedom--namely, the anticipating of the day of his death.

With this man this is the hour of the white logic (of which more anon), when he knows that he may know only the laws of things--the meaning of things never.
This is his danger hour.

His feet are taking hold of the pathway that leads down into the grave.
All is clear to him.

All these baffling head-reaches after immortality are but the panics of souls frightened by the fear of death, and cursed with the thrice-cursed gift of imagination.

They have not the instinct for death; they lack the will to die when the time to die is at hand.
They trick themselves into believing they will outwit the game and win to a future, leaving the other animals to the darkness of the grave or the annihilating heats of the crematory.