And I will give you an example so that we
may take warning by the example of other men. Paroetus mentions a
Spanish woman who was suddenly seized with suffocation of the womb, and
was thought to be dead. Her friends, for their own satisfaction, sent
for a surgeon in order to have her opened, and as soon as he began to
make an incision, she began to move, and come to herself again with
great cries, to the horror and surprise of all those present.
In order that the living may be distinguished from the dead, old writers
prescribe three experiments. The first is, to lay a feather on the
mouth, and by its movements you may judge whether the patient be alive
or dead; the second is, to place a glass of water on the breast, and if
it moves, it betokens life; the third is, to hold a bright, clean,
looking-glass to the mouth and nose, and if the glass be dimmed with a
little moisture on it, it betokens life. These three experiments are
good, but you must not depend upon them too much, for though the feather
and the glass do not move, and the looking-glass continues bright and
clear, yet it is not a necessary consequence that she is dead. For the
movement of the lungs, by which breathing is produced, may be checked,
so that she cannot breathe, and yet internal heat may remain, which is
not evident by the motion of the breast or lungs, but lies hidden in the
heart and arteries.
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