As in the passage I recently read in a book, entitled "The Soldier of
the Great War," the human element is and always will be; that is, the
existence is not dependent upon time; for it is difficult, indeed, not
to imagine where or what one was prior to one's own existence or one's
own realm of cognition. The passage is interesting, as it portrays the
thought of a painting (of a person), as he projects his image into the
future, i.e., those who look at the painting a hundred years later:
"These are the things in which I was so helplessly caught up, the
waves that took me, what I loved. When light filled my eyes and I was
restless and could move, I knew not what all the color was about, but
only what I had a passion to see. And now that I am still, I pass on
to you my liveliness and my life, for you will be taken, as once I
was, and although you must fight beyond your capacity to feel,
remember that it ends in perfect peace, and you will be still and
content as am I, for whom centuries are not even seconds."

It stands to reason, therefore, that we have been elsewhere prior to
our existence, and will be elsewhere following our existence here.
Again, it is difficult to think that our own "cognition" (above that
which we think is of the essence here) will completely be erased, for
it is impossible to think that, after death, one completely ceases to
exist. For, if such a matter is true, once you cease to exist, so does
the entire world.

Mark