The Undying Fire [Paperback]

H. G. Wells (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1998

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1919. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... upon their honesty. That's his key blunder. Any doctor could tell him, as I could have told him after my first year's practice, that telling the truth is the very last triumph of the human mind. Hardly any of my patients tell the truth -- ever. It isn't only that they haven't a tithe of the critical ability and detachment necessary, they haven't any real desire to tell the truth. They want to produce effects. Human beings are artistic still; they aren't beginning to be scientific. Either they minimize or they exaggerate. We all do. If I saw a cat run over outside and I came in here to tell you about it, I should certainly touch up the story, make it more dramatic, hurt the cat more, make the dray bigger and so on. I should want to justify my telling the story. Put a woman in that chair there, tell her to close her eyes and feel odd, and she '11 feel odd right enough; tell her to produce words and sentences that she finds in her head and she'll produce them; give her half a hint that it comes from eastern Asia and the stuff will begin to correspond to her ideas of pigeon English. It isn't that she is cunningly and elaborately deceiving you. It is that she wants to come up to your expectation. You are focussing your interest on her, and all human beings like to have interest focussed on them, Bo long as it isn't too hostile. She'll cling to that interest all she knows how. She'll cling instinctively. Most of these mediums never held the attention of a roomful of people in their lives nntil they found out this way of doing it. . . . What can you expect?" Dr. Barrack cleared his throat. "But all that's beside the question," he said. "Don't think that because I reject all this spook stuff, I'm setting up any finality for the science we have to-day. It's just a little...

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Broadman & Holman Publishers (September 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805416730
• ISBN-13: 978-0805416732
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,563,890 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars updated Job, June 21, 2004

By 

Bobby Newman (Long Beach, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Undying Fire: 12.95 (Hardcover)

H.G. Wells struggled with the issue of "what man can make of man" in the course of his many novels and other writings. In The Undying Fire, Wells give us an updated Book of Job, focusing on the tribulations of an actual descendant of the biblical Job. The various characters from the Biblical narrative are all there, in updated (circa World War One) form. This allows Wells the freedom to move around and speak from different perspectives and to explore the issue of humanity and its relation to the deity. This is a generally optimistic treatment, but the hints of Wells' eventual frustration are evident as well. A very well-written book.

0 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars There's more to come...., March 5, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: The Undying Fire: 12.95 (Hardcover)

Alright, well, i started reading this book a few days ago. I was going to read it for a book talk/paper thingy....but since it dwells upon relgion, and i just got a new LA teacher in the middle/near end of the school year, i went with another H.G Wells book. (this book is so captivating though, there is no way im gonna stop reading it) This means that im not finished with it...but i want to encourage anyone who stumbles across this book to pick it up. (i'll do a much better review when im done with the book, never fear)
Alright, so like i said, this book is based upon religion. At first i was cautious at buying this...because it does deal with the christian god, and i myself follow no religion. And personally, i didnt want to get stuck reading a bunch of stuff that i have already deemed irrelevant and end up wasting my money. Nothing of the sorts has happened, and let me tell you why.
1) i had faith in Wells. I wouldnt call myself a huge science fiction fan and i certainly do not take to most book well. The style in which he writes is just....breath taking, i love it, if thats a strong enough word.
2) I decided to buy this book, because i do believe Wells wasnt a 100% christian. He believed in the christian god, but he had his own viewpoints, which i very much wanted to see.
3) the convos had in the story are....truly insightful. Many a times have the same thoughts run through my head, have i argued with myself, and only to return emptyhanded. No matter which side you take on the story, the arguements are supported to the fullest. Its like sitting down to a meal that feeds your eternal hunger. Not much in this world can satisfy that hunger.
4)When i started reading this, i tried to keep an open mind...just because i dont believe in a god does not mean there is nothing worthwhile in this book. If people never review their beliefs and try to understand the other viewpoint, they are just as ignorant as the next.
4) alright, i know i really didnt do well in this review, but please, if the thoughts of life have ever trickled through your mind, grab this book: i can assure you that regrets you'll have none, i know i didnt.

and i'll leave off with a quote (which was very hard to choose...theres so many of them....i write down page numbers as i read, just so i can go back and reread some of them...)
"It is a commonplace of pietistic works that natural things are perfect things, and that the whole world of life, if it were not for the sinfulness of man, would be perfect. Paley, you will remember, Sir Eliphaz, in his 'Evidences of Christianity,' for which we have both suffered, declares that this earth is manifestly made for the happiness of the sentient beings living thereon. But i ask you to consider for a little and dispassionately, whether life through all its stages, up to and including man, is not rather a scheme of uneasiness, imperfect satisfaction, and positive miseries...."

okay, heres what Job is saying right before he says that.....i like it so much, i have to add it, heh.
"...I have thought of many things that men in their days of prosperity are apt to dismiss from their minds; and i am no longer sure of the goodness of the world without us or in the plan of Fate. Perhaps it is only in us, within our hearts that the light of God flickers- and flickers insecurely. here we had thought a God, somehow akin to ourselves, ruled the universe, it may be there is nothing but black emptiness and a coldness worse than cruelty."

5 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Incredible, September 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Undying Fire (Paperback)

Did you read any H.G Wells books growing up ? IF you enjoyed the War of the Worlds, Time Machine or the Invisible Man, then get ready for another classic.

Job suffered pain and sickness, the death of his sons and daughters, everything he had was lost. Ever try to console anyone with troubles bigger then your own ? Ever try to find the answers for lifes problems ? Ever wondered what life is about or your purpose or destiny ?

God has a plan for all of us, only most don't care to hear that and choose not to believe. It is the result of our own choices and decisions that create the situations we are in. Some find out and others will resist and never find out.