266 NATURE STUDIES. 



singular power to the influence of the will forcibly 

 concentrating the attention upon one subject. 



Few however would be likely to believe that even 

 if the power of producing inanition at will for long 

 periods of time became commoner than it is, the 

 duration of life could in this way be prolonged. These 

 spells of insensibility would be far more apt, we should 

 imagine, to shorten life than to be simply abstracted 

 from the total duration of life, so as to increase the 

 actual interval separating the day of death from that 

 of birth. It is true we are told that Old Parr, in the 

 later years of his unduly prolonged life, passed nearly 

 the whole of the 24 hours in semi-torpid sleep, during 

 which, doubtless, his natural powers wasted far more 

 slowly than they would have done had he kept awake. 

 But sleep is one thing, artificially-produced insensibility 

 another. If however the wonderful discovery were 

 real instead of imaginary ; if men could at their own 

 will be reduced to a state of absolute lifelessness for 

 months and years together, the time thus passed being 

 " so many unvalued and profitless years added to a 

 lifetime," what strange results might follow ! A man 

 might extend the threescore years and ten over as 

 many centuries, being brought to life for a week or 

 two at a time after intervals of two or three years 

 passed in frozen lifelessness. One who found himself, 

 or supposed himself, in advance of his age, might be 

 congealed until the age had overtaken or passed beyond 

 him. A father who had been shelved for a while in 

 the family ice-vault might be restored to children 



