LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER THE SECOND

      AFTER death, the body, whether of a man, or of an animal, being no longer preserved from destruction by vital force, falls under the dominion of chemical forces. If the body of a dead animal, or a human corpse be kept in a place where the temperature is below 0°, or if it be shut up in a space entirely air-tight, or if it be impregnated with antiseptic substances, it will remain intact, as at the moment at which life has abandoned it. Such is the process of embalming. The effect of the various chemical substances with which a corpse is impregnated, is to coagulate the albumen of the tissues, and thus to preserve the animal substance from putrefaction. A similar result will be obtained if the corpse be placed between two layers of ice, or in a coffin entirely surrounded with ice constantly renewed. If kept at a temperature of 0°, the body will not be subject to decomposition, because putrid fermentation cannot take place at so low a temperature.

      This was the process by which the entire carcasses of the mammoths, or extinct elephants, which belonged to the quaternity period, were preserved. In 1802 a perfectly preserved carcass of this gigantic pachyderm was found on the bank of the Lena, a river which runs into the Arctic Sea, after traversing a portion of the Asiatic continent in the vicinity of the North Pole. The frozen earth and the ice which covers the banks of the river into which the mammoth had plunged, had so effectually preserved it from putrefaction, that the flesh of the huge creature, dead for more than a hundred thousand years, made a feast for the fishermen of that desert place. In northern countries, if one would preserve the body of a man, it could be effectually done by simply keeping it constantly wrapped in ice.

      When the body of a man, or of an animal, is exposed to the combined influences of air, of water, and of a moderately high temperature, it undergoes a series of chemical decompositions, whose final term is its transformation into carbonic acid gas, and some compounds, gaseous or solid, which represent the less advanced products of destruction. Gases of various kinds, carbonic acid, hydrosulphuric, and ammoniac, and the vapour of water, spread themselves through the atmosphere, or dissolve into the humidity of the soil. At a later stage these compounds, thus dissolved into the water which bathes the earth, are absorbed by the little roots of the plants which live on it, and aid in their nutrition and development. As for the gas, it begins by spreading through the air; and then falling to the earth again dissolved in the rainwater, it also equally supplies the needs of vegetable life. The ammoniac and carbonic acid in the water which penetrates the soil, is absorbed by the roots, introduced into the tubes of the plants, and supplies them with nourishment.

      Thus, the matter which forms the bodies of men and animals is not destroyed; it only changes its form, and under its new conditions it aids in the composition of fresh organic substances.

      In all this the human body does but obey the common laws of nature. That which it undergoes, every organized substance, vegetable or animal, exposed to the combined influences of air, water, and temperature, equally undergoes. A piece of cotton or woollen stuff, a grain of wheat, a fruit—they all ferment, and reduce themselves to new products, exactly as our bodies do. The cere cloth which enfolds a corpse is destroyed by precisely the same process which destroys the corpse.

      But, if the material substance which forms man's body does but transform itself, journeying through the globe, passing from animals to plants and from plants to animals; it is quite otherwise with life. Life is a force. Like the other forces, heat, light, and electricity, it is born, and it transmits itself; it has a beginning and an end. Like light, heat, and electricity—the physical agents which make us comprehend life, and which have certainly the same essence and the same origin—life has its producing causes, and its causes of destruction. It cannot rekindle itself when it has been extinguished; it cannot re-commence its course when its fatal term has arrived. Life cannot perpetuate itself; it is a simple condition of bodies, a fugitive and precarious condition, subject to countless influences, accidents, and chances.

      The life is therefore greatly inferior in importance to the soul, which is indestructible and immortal. The soul is the essential element in all nature. It has active and positive qualities in all respects where the two other elements, the body and the life, have only negative qualities. Whilst the body dissociates itself and disappears, while the life becomes annihilated, the soul can neither disappear nor become annihilated.

      We have seen what becomes of a man's body after his death, and also of his life; let us now examine into the condition of his soul.

      No philosopher, no learned man, none of those who know the immensity of the universe and the eternity of the ages, can admit that our existence on the earth is a definite thing,—that human life has no link with anything above or beyond itself. Man dies at thirty, or twenty years old; he may live only a few months, or a few minutes. The average length of life, according to Duvilard's tables, is twenty-eight years. At present it is thirty-three. One fourth of mankind die before their seventh year, and one half do not outlive their seventeenth. Those who survive this time enjoy a privilege which is denied to the rest of the human race.2

      What is so short an interval, compared to the general duration of time, to the age of the earth and of the worlds? It is one minute in eternity. Our brief life is not, cannot be anything but an accident, a rapid and passing phenomenon, which hardly counts for anything in the history of nature.

      On the other hand, the physical conditions of terrestrial life are detestable. Man is a martyr, exposed to every sort of suffering: owing partly to the defective organization of his body, incessantly menaced with danger from external causes, dreading the extremes of heat and cold; weak and ailing, coming into the world naked, and without any natural defence against the influence of climate. If, in one portion of Europe, and in America, the progress of civilization has secured comfort for the rich, what are the sufferings of the poor in those very same countries? Life is perpetual suffering to the greater number of the men who inhabit the insalubrious regions of Asia, Africa, and Oceania. And then, before there was any civilization at all, during the period of Primitive Man,

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