HOW IT FEELS TO DIE.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 18, Issue 12, 8 February 1907, Page 2

HOW IT FEELS TO DIE.

NO TERROR FOR MANKIND AT THE LAST. THEORIES OF SCIENCE. The Bishop of London, who has just recovered from the effects of an operation, has been telling a congregation at St. Pancras Church how it feels to die. Referring to the Bishop of London's statement, a London surgeon says : "The sensations of patients under the influence of anaesthetics differ very, widely. Some when in the semiconscious state that the Bishop, has experienced keep up a flow of talk about quite indifferent subjects while being operated upon. But many undoubtedly have very similar experiences and it is no uncommon thing for them to feel as though 'they had been carried out of the body,' or as if their souls were 'swept swiftly under the stars.' "But I think it is very doubtful whether these sensations resemble those of dying. In many cases, of course, such as those in-which a man is killed by a sudd-en blow or a riflebullet, there is no time for thought or feeling at all. "In the majority of deaths from disease the patient gradually relapses into unconsciousness and dies, so fatas one can tell, without any consciousness of pain, or even the anxiety about his sins that the bishop suggests may trouble him. . "There are cases where the patient makes a desperate fight for life to the end, but these are very rare. Deathbed horrors exist far more often in the novelist's imagination than in real life." And this idea is supported by the deaths of many famous men. David Hume, the historian, dying without any consolations religion affords, said "there is no joy in life like dying." Goethe, Germany's great poet, died quietly, asking for "more light." Lord Chesterfield, polite to the last asked that a gentleman should be given a chair. King Charles 10. apologised for being "such an unconscionable long time a-dying." Dr. Livingstone, when in the jaws of a lion, and apparently within a few 1 minutes of death, felt no fearonly curiosity to know what the beast would do next ; but he attributed this to the strange effect being in the power of such an animal has upon the human race. A man who was blown several yards by a powder explosion, and only recovered consciousness after several hours, said he had no recollection of being hurt or hearing a noise—he only remembered seeing a blinding glare. A workman who fell from a great height and almost miraculously, escaped with his life, after a long period of insensibility] said he felt no fear as he was falling only a sort of curiosity as to what was going to happen. The experience of people who have nearly lost their lives through drowning has been told too often to bear repeating. But in no case as death approached near them, did they feel any horror.