1 62 On the Combustion of the Human Body, 
able. Bianchini, Maffei, Rolli, Le Cat, Vicq-d’Azyr, 
and several men distinguished by their learning, have 
given certain testimony of the facts. Besides, is it more 
surprising to experience such incineration than to void 
saccharine urine, or to see the bones softened to such a 
degree as to be reduced to the state of a jelly ? The ef- 
fects of this combustion are certainly not more wonder- 
ful than those of the bones softened, or of the diabetes 
mellitus. This morbific disposition, therefore, would be 
one more scourge to afflict humanity; but in physics, 
facts being always preferable to reasoning, I shall here 
collect those which appear to me to bear the impression 
of truth ; and, lest I should alter the sense, I shall quote 
them such as they are given in the w orks from which I 
have extracted them. 
We read in the Transactions of Copenhagen, that in 
1662 a woman of the lower class, who for three years 
had used spirituous liquors to such excess that she would 
take no other nourishment, having sat down one evening 
on a straw chair to sleep, was consumed in the night- 
time, so that next morning no part of her w as found but 
the skull and the extreme joints of the fingers ; all the 
rest of her body, says Jacobsens, was reduced to ashes. 
The following extract of the memoir of Bianchini is 
taken from the Annual Register for 1/63 — The Coun- 
tess Cornelia Bandi, of the tow n of Cesena, aged 62, 
enjoyed a good state of health. One evening, having 
experienced a sort of drowsiness, she retired to bed, and 
her maid remained with her till she fell asleep. Next 
morning, when the girl entered to awaken her mistress, 
she found nothing but the remains of her body in the 
most horrid condition. At the distance of four feet from 
the bed was a heap of ashes, in which could be distin- 
guished the legs and arms untouched. Between the legs 
lay the head, the brain of which, together with half the 
