8. The Professor of Logic begins Deduction at College; "Man is mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is mortal." But why bring in Socrates; why not cite his own example? The Professor too is mortal. But he never says, "All men are mortal. Therefore, I, the Professor, am mortal, and you the students too are mortal." He passes on to Socrates the liability to die, for Socrates, luckily, is already dead. He is not likely now to stand up and protest. So the teacher and the pupils establish the mortality of Socrates, and as for themselves, enter into a conspiracy of silence. They fancy that they have warded off danger thus.

9. In this way, people are all the time making heroic efforts to forget death. But can one ever get rid of death by such means? Only the other day, when my mother died, death stood before me. But there is a way of conquering death by thinking fearlessly about it; but this way we dare not seek and find. A lion pursues a deer. The nimble deer flees in fright, but soon it gets tired, and its strength fails. But Death in the form of the lion pursues it. The state of the poor creature at the moment is indeed pitiable - it cannot even look at the lion. It buries its antlers and face in the earth, and stands helpless, as if inviting the lion to come and devour it. We too dare not face death. But although we try all tricks to run away from it, it is powerful enough to catch us at last by our neck.

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