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Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers, Vol. II.

T >> Thomas De Quincey >> Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers, Vol. II.




Thursday, the 9th, he had sunk into the weakness of a dying person, and
the corpse-like appearance had already taken possession of him. I
visited him frequently through the day; and, going at ten o'clock at
night, I found him in a state of insensibility. I could not draw any
sign from him that he knew me, and I left him to the care of his sister
and his servant.

Friday, the 10th, I went to see him at six o'clock in the morning. It
was very stormy, and a deep snow had fallen in the night-time. And, by
the way, I remember that a gang of house-breakers had forced their way
through the premises in order to reach Kant's next neighbor, who was a
goldsmith. As I drew near to his bed-side, I said, 'Good morning.' He
returned my salutation by saying, 'Good morning,' but in so feeble and
faltering a voice that it was hardly articulate. I was rejoiced to find
him sensible, and I asked him if he knew me:--'Yes,' he replied; and,
stretching out his hand, touched me gently upon the cheek. Through the
rest of the day, whenever I visited him, he seemed to have relapsed
into a state of insensibility.

Saturday, the 11th, he lay with fixed and rayless eyes; but to all
appearance in perfect peace. I asked him again, on this day, if he knew
me. He was speechless, but he turned his face towards me and made signs
that I should kiss him. Deep emotion thrilled me, as I stooped down to
kiss his pallid lips; for I knew that in this solemn act of tenderness
he meant to express his thankfulness for our long friendship, and to
signify his affection and his last farewell. I had never seen him
confer this mark of his love upon anybody, except once, and that was a
few weeks before his death, when he drew his sister to him and kissed
her. The kiss which he now gave to me was the last memorial that he
knew me.

Whatever fluid was now offered to him passed the oesophagus with a
rattling sound, as often happens with dying people; and there were all
the signs of death being close at hand.

I wished to stay with him till all was over; and as I had been witness
of his life, to be witness also of his departure; and therefore I never
quitted him except when I was called off for a few minutes to attend
some private business. The whole of this night I spent at his bed-side.
Though he had passed the day in a state of insensibility, yet in the
evening he made intelligible signs that he wished to have his bed put
in order; he was therefore lifted out in our arms, and the bed-clothes
and pillows being hastily arranged, he was carried back again. He did
not sleep; and a spoonful of liquid, which was sometimes put to his
lips, he usually pushed aside; but about one o'clock in the night he
himself made a motion towards the spoon, from which I collected that he
was thirsty; and I gave him a small quantity of wine and water
sweetened; but the muscles of his mouth had not strength enough to
retain it, so that to prevent its flowing back he raised his hand to
his lips, until with a rattling sound it was swallowed. He seemed to
wish for more; and I continued to give him more, until he said, in a
way that I was just able to understand,--'It is enough.' And these were
his last words. At intervals he pushed away the bed-clothes, and
exposed his person; I constantly restored the clothes to their
situation, and on one of these occasions I found that the whole body
and extremities were already growing cold, and the pulse intermitting.

At a quarter after three o'clock on Sunday morning, February 12, Kant
stretched himself out as if taking a position for his final act, and
settled into the precise posture which he preserved to the moment of
death. The pulse was now no longer perceptible to the touch in his
hands, feet or neck. I tried every part where a pulse beats, and found
none anywhere but in the left hip, where it beat with violence, but
often intermitted.

About ten o'clock in the forenoon he suffered a remarkable change; his
eye was rigid and his face and lips became discolored by a cadaverous
pallor. Still, such was the effect of his previous habits, that no
trace appeared of the cold sweat which naturally accompanies the last
mortal agony.

It was near eleven o'clock when the moment of dissolution approached.
His sister was standing at the foot of the bed, his sister's son at the
head. I, for the purpose of still observing the fluctuations of the
pulse in his hip, was kneeling at the bed-side; and I called his
servant to come and witness the death of his good master. Now began the
last agony, if to him it could be called an agony, where there seemed
to be no struggle. And precisely at this moment, his distinguished
friend, Mr. R. R. V., whom I had summoned by a messenger, entered the
room. First of all, the breath grew feebler; then it missed its
regularity of return; then it wholly intermitted, and the upper lip was
slightly convulsed; after this there followed one slight respiration or
sigh; and after that no more; but the pulse still beat for a few
seconds--slower and fainter, till it ceased altogether; the mechanism
stopped; the last motion was at an end; and exactly at that moment the
clock struck eleven.

Soon after his death the head of Kant was shaved; and, under the
direction of Professor Knorr, a plaster cast was taken, not a masque
merely, but a cast of the whole bead, designed (I believe) to enrich
the craniological collection of Dr. Gall.

The corpse being laid out and properly attired, immense numbers of
people of every rank, from the highest to the lowest, flocked to see
it. Everybody was anxious to make use of the last opportunity he would
have for entitling himself to say--'I too have seen Kant.' This went on
for many days--during which, from morning to night, the house was
thronged with the public. Great was the astonishment of all people at
the meagreness of Kant's appearance; and it was universally agreed that
a corpse so wasted and fleshless had never been beheld. His head rested
upon the same cushion on which once the gentlemen of the university had
presented an address to him; and I thought that I could not apply it to
a more honorable purpose than by placing it in the coffin, as the final
pillow of that immortal head.

Upon the style and mode of his funeral, Kant had expressed his wishes
in earlier years in a separate memorandum. He there desired that it
should take place early in the morning, with as little noise and
disturbance as possible, and attended only by a few of his most
intimate friends. Happening to meet with this memorandum, whilst I was
engaged at his request in arranging his papers, I very frankly gave him
my opinion, that such an injunction would lay me, as the executor of
his will, under great embarrassments; for that circumstances might very
probably arise under which it would be next to impossible to carry it
into effect. Upon this Kant tore the paper, and left the whole to my
own discretion. The fact was, I foresaw that the students of the
University would never allow themselves to be robbed of this occasion
for expressing their veneration by a public funeral. The event showed
that I was right; for a funeral such as Kant's, one so solemn and so
magnificent, the city of Königsberg has never witnessed before or
since. The public journals, and separate accounts in pamphlets, etc.,
have given so minute an account of its details, that I shall here
notice only the heads of the ceremony.

On the 28th of February, at two o'clock in the afternoon, all the
dignitaries of church and state, not only those resident in Königsberg,
but from the remotest parts of Prussia, assembled in the church of the
Castle. Hence they were escorted by the whole body of the University,
splendidly dressed for the occasion, and by many military officers of
rank, with whom Kant had always been a great favorite, to the house of
the deceased Professor; from which the corpse was carried by torch-
light, the bells of every church in Königsberg tolling, to the
Cathedral which was lit up by innumerable wax-lights. A never-ending
train of many thousand persons followed it on foot. In the Cathedral,
after the usual burial rites, accompanied with every possible
expression of national veneration to the deceased, there was a grand
musical service, most admirably performed, at the close of which Kant's
mortal remains were lowered into the academic vault, where he now rests
among the ancient patriarchs of the University. PEACE BE TO HIS DUST,
AND EVERLASTING HONOR!

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