672 THE HUMAN BODY. 



Body generally, of the mass as a whole, may be taken to be the 

 moment when the heart makes its last beat ; arterial pressure 

 then falls irretrievably, the capillary circulation ceases, and 

 the tissues, no longer nourished from the blood, gradually die, 

 not all at one instant, but one after another, according as their 

 individual respiratory or other needs are great or little. 



While death is the natural end of life, it is not its aim we 

 should not live to die, but live prepared to die. Life r 'has its 

 duties and its legitimate pleasures, and we better play our part 

 by attending to the fulfilment of the one and the enjoyment 

 of the other, than by concentrating a morbid and paralyzing 

 attention on the inevitable, with the too frequent result of 

 producing indifference to the work which lies at hand for each. 

 Our organs and faculties are not talents which we may justifi- 

 ably leave unemployed; each is bound to do his best with 

 them, and so to live that he may most utilize them. An active, 

 vigorous, dutiful, unselfish life is a good preparation for death ; 

 when that time, at which we must pass from the realm con- 

 trolled by physiological laws, approaches, when the hands 

 tremble and the eyes grow dim, when " the grasshopper shall 

 be a burden and desire shall fail," then, surely, the conscious- 

 ness of having quitted us like men in the employment of our 

 faculties while they were ours to use, will be no mean consola- 

 tion. 



