DECLINE OP THE SYSTEM. 435 



and a diminution of energy becomes apparent in every func- 

 tion. 



Such are the insensible gradations by which, while gliding 

 down the stream of time, we lapse into old age, which in- 

 sidiously steals on us before we are aware of its approach. 

 But the same provident power which presided at our birth, 

 which superintended the growth of all the organs, which 

 infused animation into each as they arose, and which has 

 conducted the system unimpaired to its maturity, is still ex- 

 erted in adjusting the conditions under which it is placed 

 in its season of decline. New arrangements are made, new 

 energies are called forth, and new resources are employed, 

 to accommodate it to its altered circumstances, to prop the 

 shattered fabric, and retard the progress of its decay. In 

 proportion as the supply of nutritive materials has become 

 less abundant, a more strict economy is practised with re- 

 gard to their disposal; the substance of the body is husband- 

 ed with greater care; the absorbent vessels are employed to 

 remove such parts as are no longer useful; and when all 

 these adjustments have been made, the functions still go on 

 for a considerable length of time without material altera- 

 tion. 



The period prescribed for its duration being at length 

 completed, and the ends of its existence accomplished, the 

 fabric can no longer be sustained, and preparation must be 

 made for its inevitable fall. In order to form a correct 

 judgment of the real intentions of nature, with regard to 

 this last stage of life, its phenomena must be observed in cases 

 where the system has been wholly intrusted to the operation 

 of her laws. When death is the simple consequence of age, 

 we find that the extinction of the powers of life observes an 

 order the reverse of that which was followed in their evolu- 

 tion. The sensorial functions, which were the last peflfect- 

 ed, are the first which decay; and their decline is found to 

 commence with those mental faculties more immediately 

 dependent on the physical conditions of the sensorium, and 

 more especially with the memory, which is often much im- 



