316 PHYSIOLOGY CHAP. 



always painful, because generally involuntary and morbid; in 

 other words, he endeavours to find a basis upon which to build up 

 a reasonable doctrine of euthanasia, Leopardi's pleasantness of 

 dying, which afforded the physicians of old, Camerarius, Alberti, 

 Hufeland, Cirillo, and Brodie, so much food for thought. 



Let us try to obtain if possible a further insight into the 

 alleged instinct of death. Does it really exist ? Have we really 

 within ourselves a dim feeling of the approach of death ? Ballion 

 (1892) contends for its existence by arguments taken by analogy 

 from the animal world. In many cases he considers there can 

 be no doubt that death is foreseen, proof thereof being the desire 

 for isolation manifested when the natural term of life is approach- 

 ing. Of greater weight, however, are the arguments adduced by 

 Egger and Sollier (1897), Fere (1898), and Ferrari (1896), all of 

 which are based upon strict observation. Ferrari succeeded in 

 collecting various cases, some of young hysterical subjects, others 

 of insane persons, in whom there was undoubtedly a presentiment, 

 almost a prophecy of death under normal physical conditions. 



One case was that of a woman of forty, an inmate of the 

 lunatic asylum at Reggio Emilia suffering from secondary insanity 

 and without a ray of intelligence. This woman suddenly changed 

 her behaviour, began to eat voluntarily, which she had not done for 

 nearly seven years, and seven months later expressed the desire 

 to write to her parents another thing she had not done for years 

 made remarks relating to her funeral, although she was in good 

 health, and announced the following evening that she had but 

 four or five days to live, and that she would like to spend them in 

 bed, although she was still in good, indeed in perfect bodily health. 

 Early on the fourth day she died suddenly. A post-mortem 

 examination was not possible, but whatever the internal state of 

 the dead woman may have been, the prevision and accurate pro- 

 phecy of death were remarkable, occurring in a person in whom 

 every form of sensibility was obtuse. 



It is extremely difficult to explain this and other similar 

 cases. The hypotheses of auto-suggestion (Forel) or of a dis- 

 turbance of general sensibility (Ferrari) caused by some organic 

 injury perceived by the subject before the last agony began do not 

 apply, since death was sudden and not preceded by any morbid 

 symptom. 



In the cases collected by Ferrari it is interesting to note the 

 relative indifference with which certain individuals passed through 

 the supreme moment the near approach of which they had foretold. 

 This phenomenon leads us to suppose that death is terrible only 

 because of its associations, and does not in itself affect our sensi- 

 bility. As a matter of fact the fear of death is not always present. 

 It is found in the large majority of adults, but in children, who 

 have scarcely gazed on the mystery of life, it is but rarely seen. 



