ut, on the other hand, we must not forget that insensibility and
invulnerability, though to a certain extent allied, are two distinct
things. Injury the most serious may occur without the premonitory
warning, even without immediate subsequent suffering. A person in a
perfect state of insensibility might doubtless receive, without
experiencing any pain whatever, a blow that would shatter the bones of a
limb, and render it powerless for life. Indeed, there is on record a
well-attested case of a poor pedestrian, who, having laid himself down
on the platform of a lime-kiln, and dropping asleep, and the fire having
increased and burnt off one foot to the ankle, rose in the morning to
depart, and knew nothing of his misfortune, until, putting his burnt
limb to the ground, to support his body in rising, the extremity of his
leg-bone, calcined into lime, crumbled to fragments beneath him.[61]

Contemporary medical authorities, even when they have the rare courage
to deny to the convulsions either a divine or a diabolical character,
furnish no explanation of them more satisfactory than the citing of
similar cases, more or less strongly attested, in the past.[62] This may
confirm our faith in the reality of the phenomena, but does not resolve
our difficulties as to the causes of them.

It does not fall within my purpose to hazard any opinion as to these
causes, nor, if it did, am I prepared to offer any. Some considerations
might be adduced, calculated to lessen our wonder as to an occasional
phenomenon on this marvellous record. Physiologists, for example, are
agreed that the common opinion as to the sensibility of the interior of
the eye is an incorrect one;[63] and that consideration might be put
forth, when we read that Sisters Madeleine and Felicite suffered with
impunity swords to be pressed against that delicate organ, until the
point sank an inch beneath its surface. But all such isolated
considerations are partial, inconclusive, and, as regards any general
satisfactory explanation, far short of the requirements of the case.

More weight may justly be given to another consideration: to the
exaggerations inseparable from enthusiasm, and the inaccuracies into
which inexperienced observers must ever fall. As to the necessity of
making large allowance for these, I entirely agree with Calmeil and De
Gasparin. But let the allowance made for such errors be more or less, it
cannot extend to an absolute denial of the chief phenom