198 DR. PHILIP ON THE NATURE OF DEATH. 



quently that those parts of the brain and spinal marrow, by which it is supplied, being 

 thus deranged, their powers must cease also*. These are the last of the powers of life 

 which fail, and thus the body of the more perfect animal is left subject to the laws of 

 inanimate matter. The first functions which cease are those of the sensitive parts of 

 the brain and spinal marrow ; the last, those of the vital parts of these organs. 



* In the first of any of the more perfect animals, the nervous influence must have been supplied from without, 

 or the rudiments of the organs which supply it and those of the sanguiferous system must have been simultaneous 

 creations, because neither is capable of producing the other, the functions of each being inseparable from those 

 of the other. "We have seen that it is a necessary inference from direct experiment, that while the vital prin- 

 ciple is unimpaired, the powers of circulation, provided the blood be duly exposed to the influence of the air, 

 are capable, with the aid of voltaic electricity, of all the assimilating functions. No other powers are required 

 for the maintenance and growth of the animal body. 



We have reason to believe that the vital parts of the brain and spinal marrow may, like the lungs, be inactive 

 in the foetal state, some other means in this state being employed to supply the agent which, after birth, can only 

 be supplied by them. Well grown foetuses, perfect in all their other parts, have been bom without either brain 

 or spinal marrow. The growth of such foetuses must depend on the same causes as the growth of other mon- 

 strous productions in the uterus, namely, as far as relates to the brain and spinal marrow, on the powers of the 

 mother alone, how applied it is impossible to say. 



