713 A. It is possible that we might learn much were we to question dying persons, on their awakening from some comatose condition, as to their memory of any dream or vision during that state. If there has in fact been any such experience it should be at once recorded, as it will probably fade rapidly from the patient's supraliminal memory, even if he does not die directly afterwards. A curious case was published in Phantasms of the Living (vol. ii. p. 305), where a dying man returns, as it were, from the gates of death expressly to announce that he has had a vision, or "paid a visit," of this kind - which "visit," however, it was not possible to verify.

A somewhat similar instance, but with ultimate recovery of the patient, Dr. Wiltse, was printed in the St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journal, November, 1889, and in the Mid-Continental Review, February, 1890. Dr. Wiltse has since obtained for us the sworn depositions of the witnesses of importance. The experience is long, and for the most part of a thoroughly dreamlike type; but in any view it is extremely unusual, nor can it be fairly understood from extracts alone. I quote, therefore, the essential part of the case in full (from Proceedings S.P.R., vol. viii. p. 180).

[After describing his gradual sinking in the summer of 1889 under an unusual disease - typhoid fever with subnormal temperature and pulse - Dr. Wiltse (of Skiddy, Kansas) continues as follows:] - I asked if I was perfectly in possession of my mind, so that what I might say should be worthy of being relied upon. Being answered in the decided affirmative. I bade adieu to family and friends, giving such advice and consolation to each and all as I deemed best, conversed upon the proofs pro and con of immortality, and called upon each and all to take testimony for themselves by watching the action of my mind, in the bodily state in which they saw me, and finally, as my pupils fell open, and vision began to fail, and my voice to weaken, feeling a sense of drowsiness come over me, with a strong effort, I straightened my stiffened legs, got my arms over the breast, and clasped the fast stiffening fingers, and soon sank into utter unconsciousness.

I passed about four hours in all without pulse or perceptible heart-beat, as I am informed by Dr. S. H. Raynes, who was the only physician present. During a portion of this time several of the bystanders thought I was dead, and such a report being carried outside, the village church bell was tolled.

Dr. Raynes informs me, however, that by bringing his eyes close to my face, he could perceive an occasional short gasp, so very light as to be barely perceptible, and that he was upon the point, several times, of saying, "He is dead," when a gasp would occur in time to check him.

He thrust a needle deep into the flesh at different points from the feet to the hips, but got no response. Although I was pulseless about four hours, this state of apparent death lasted only about half-an-hour.

I lost, I believe, all power of thought or knowledge of existence in absolute unconsciousness. Of course, I need not guess at the time so lost, as in such a state a minute or a thousand years would appear the same. I came again into a state of conscious existence and discovered that I was still in the body, but the body and I had no longer any interests in common. I looked in astonishment and joy for the first time upon myself - the me, the real Ego, while the not me closed it upon all sides like a sepulchre of clay.

With all the interest of a physician, I beheld the wonders of my bodily anatomy, intimately interwoven with which, even tissue for tissue, was I, the living soul of that dead body. I learned that the epidermis was the outside boundary of the ultimate tissues, so to speak, of the soul. I realised my condition and reasoned calmly thus. I have died, as men term death, and yet I am as much a man as ever. I am about to get out of the body. I watched the interesting process of the separation of soul and body. By some power, apparently not my own, the Ego was rocked to and fro, laterally, as a cradle is rocked, by which process its connection with the tissues of the body was broken up. After a little time the lateral motion ceased, and along the soles of the feet beginning at the toes, passing rapidly to the heels, I felt and heard, as it seemed, the snapping of innumerable small cords. When this was accomplished I began slowly to retreat from the feet, toward the head, as a rubber cord shortens. I remember reaching the hips and saying to myself, "Now, there is no life below the hips." I can recall no memory of passing through the abdomen and chest, but recollect distinctly when my whole self was collected into the head, when I reflected thus: I am all in the head now, and I shall soon be free.

I passed around the brain as if I were hollow, compressing it and its membranes, slightly, on all sides, toward the centre and peeped out between the sutures of the skull, emerging like the flattened edges of a bag of membranes. I recollect distinctly how I appeared to myself something like a jelly-fish as regards colour and form. As I emerged, I saw two ladies sitting at my head. I measured the distances between the head of my cot and the knees of the lady opposite the head and concluded there was room for me to stand, but felt considerable embarrassment as I reflected that I was about to emerge naked before her, but comforted myself with the thought that in all probability she could not see me with her bodily eyes, as I was a spirit. As I emerged from the head I floated up and down and laterally like a soap-bubble attached to the bowl of a pipe until I at last broke loose from the body and fell lightly to the floor, where I slowly rose and expanded into the full stature of a man. I seemed to be translucent, of a bluish cast and perfectly naked.

With a painful sense of embarrassment I fled toward the partially opened door to escape the eyes of the two ladies whom I was facing as well as others who I knew were about me, but upon reaching the door I found myself clothed, and satisfied upon that point I turned and faced the company. As I turned, my left elbow came in contact with the arm of one of two gentlemen, who were standing in the door. To my surprise, his arm passed through mine without apparent resistance, the severed parts closing again without pain, as air reunites. I looked quickly up at his face to see if he had noticed the contact, but he gave me no sign, - only stood and gazed toward the couch I had just left. I directed my gaze in the direction of his, and saw my own dead body. It was lying just as I had taken so much pains to place it, partially upon the right side, the feet close together and the hands clasped across the breast. I was surprised at the paleness of the face. I had not looked in a glass for some days and had imagined that I was not as pale as most very sick people are.