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Whether by disease, genocide, homicide, suicide, assassination, battle, accident, natural old age or natural disaster; when a human life ends, that individual’s positive potential or accumulated insight for society as expressed through their being is lost for eternity. As Lincoln expressed within his Gettyburg Address (1863):
…It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain…1
We offer comfort to fellow humans who lived closest to those who no longer have a life as we still have ours in whatever decade we may be. In part, this was Lincoln’s task for a new nation under his care. Implicit in his address is that our lives affect other lives, many of which can extend well beyond us the longer we live. We achieve a kind of immortality through our impact on others – younger, contemporary, older and lives not yet living. Even if we demonstrate hateful actions as a main consequence of our lives, we provide good examples for how not to live for those able to perceive with morality.
REFERENCES
1. “The Gettysburg Address (1863),” National Constitution Center (United States), webpage. https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/historic-document-library/detail/abraham-lincoln-the-gettysburg-address-1863. Retrieved October 28, 2026.
