anted is direct scientific examination, and verification by
competent persons, of all the phenomena the body presents in these
strange circumstances. In the absence, however, of recorded observation,
let us imagine how the thing might come about.

The series of effects surmised would not begin in the heart; analogy
leads us to suppose that primary interruption of the heart's action for
a very brief period is fatal. Somewhere in the Indian seas, death is
inflicted by a backward blow with the elbow on the region of the heart;
a sudden angina is produced, which is promptly fatal. Neither, upon
similar showing, can it commence in obstructed breathing. Then the
commencement of the changes must be sought in the brain. Now it is
analogically by no means very improbable, that the functions of the
nervous system admit of being brought to a complete stand-still, the
wheels of the machinery locking, as it were, of a sudden, through some
influence directly exerted upon _it_, and that this state of interrupted
function should continue for a very considerable period, without loss of
power of recovery. Nor would it be contrary to analogy that such an
arrest of activity in the nervous system should stop, more or less
completely, the act of breathing and the action of the heart, without at
the same time the consequences following which result from either of
these changes, _when they are primary_. The heart, when _not acting by
order_, need not be supposed to lose its contractile force and tendency.
The blood, though not moving, being in contact with living vessels, need
not coagulate. There is no physiological absurdity in supposing such a
general arrest of function, originating in the nervous system, and
continuing an indefinite period without life being extinguished. If a
swimmer be taken with cramp and sink, he is irretrievably dead in five
minutes. But if he sink from a fit of epilepsy, he may remain a longer
time under water, yet recover. But epilepsy is a form of loss of
consciousness beginning in the nervous system--a kind of fit which may,
under certain circumstances, be thus preservative of life. So may we
presume, that in the singular cases we are considering, the body is but
in another and deeper fit, which suspends the vital phenomena, and
reduces its vitality to that of the unincubated egg, to simple life,
without change, without waste or renewal. The body does not putrefy,
because it is alive; it does not waste or require n