Spirit of the age. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1849-1865, 1854-03-08
CHAPTER XXXIII.

"a shattered preck-the ResurTcctioniSt {
A bold leap, reader, and VIC are back in
R--x. Three years have flown since we
left it in company with Don Martin Vegal
and the twins. 1t has grown up rapidly,
adding new buildings to its crowded streets,
schools and colleges arc thrown open for the
cultivation Of enquiring minds and wealth
has made it the resort Of traders and the de-
voices Of Fashion.
Where is Agnes the oRce fair and lovely
Where the drunken mother of the exile
twins2 Come and see. There she sits in a
wretchcd howell, on whose altar and hearth
stone are seen the footprints Of unutterable
woe. Desoation waves its raven pail over
that lonely spot. The debris of blasted
hopes clothes that dingy hut in its solemn
weeds. The mistress Of that spot was once
a bright nucleus around which love and
affections brightest flowers clustered, but
the breath Of the destroyer has poisoned
and witkcred them all. Her life has been
an eyentful QUO. Mark her now there
she sits moaning over her own shattered
wreck and her blasted hopes. She writhes
in the talons Of her murderer-she feels
the curse of her frailties and indiscretion
pressing upon her with a worlds weight
down to the tomb. Her mind is overthrow,
and at times the dingy walls of her home
ring with her gibbering curses IN the midst
of the rayless gloom of intellectual chaos
And then her body is a mass Of disease ;
her cheeks, that once doomed with the
blush of the morning rose, arc now bloated
and r~ipeuing for the revel Of the grave
reptile. A fatal disease Of the heart and a
dropsy holds her over the yawning mouth
of ~drunkard's grave. She looks into its
gloomy depths and chatters the unmeaning
dialect Of the idiot, and at times raves mid
tho wreck Of her shattered senses and bias
ted humanity. At this moment pray Hea-
ven, reader, that net only Agnes, but all
such may have a hope that drops in the
vale of the skies!
And Jacques? All yes. That's hin
among the graves in the Potter's Field bus,
in removing the fresh clods from the las
rtc-L-1 ..Sl -GsaAA On.
see him with me, if so be it you can by tn
dim starlight hat falls around him at tn
others sleep, to get bread for his ruined wifi
and an occasional glass of gin for himsel1
How intent in his avocation among tn
dead! Like the dull thump of a sluggis
wave on the sea, clod after clod falls upo
the red pile. Down he goes into the silen
home of yesterdays dead Down with
monotonous echo upon the sounding cofi
and rafting boards! Up he brings tn
grim trophy of his toil-a sheeted corps
bound hand and foot! And, reader, fror
these repulsive morsels of decaying mortal
ity he reaps his living. He is a Resurrec
ZIONIST and he supplies the R-x Med
ical College with the material for scientif
investigation.
As we do not wish to clothe this pursuit
or his vocation, with unnecessary horror, W
must beg the reader to follow us through
short depression upon this very subject:
Down from the old feudal eyes came tn
superstitious horror Of the uninitiated wit
regard to the dissection of the human body
In thiscountry perhaps there il no State bu
can boast Of q penal enactment on the Sta.
ute book fof the suppression of this scier
tific pursuit. Fines, Imprisonment and tn
thunders Of public cxecration arc the pei
alties attached to this vocation. Let a 10,
er Of science and truth be caught { Robin
the dead as it is popularity termed, and n
matter what his professional eminence ma
have been, down he comes like a shattere
rocket; loss Of business ensucs and the fur
of an excited mob is set upon him.
1t is not remarkable that the ignorar
and unrefecting portion Of the communit
those who engage in the popular rabbi
should raise the hue and cry against sue
mysterious pursuits but it is truly surpr
sing that the rejecting, educated and int
ligent masses should justify and even su
tain by their execrations the sentiments
the ignorantand superstitious How often
we see the Press in the midst of occasion;
outbreaks Of this kind huzzaing to the me
and muttering its curses against the III
lucky wight whose misfortune or indiscr
tion has led to his detection dealing wit
the dead If those whose position in soci
ty, their intelligence and education elevat,
them to the station of teachers in mora
and ethics would Internationally condem
the prejudices of the unenlightened, the di
fcultieS in the path of the enquirer aftt
trHth would soon be removed and the pei
al laws Of prohibition would only be r
membered as a monument of the superst
ton of by gone Legislators.
1t is passing strange that the public sci
timent is averse to the prosecution of an,
tomical pursuits, and yet the same publ
and the laws Of the same code, persist i
holding the surgeon or physician accounts
BILE if he is not in possession of the yer
knowledge Of the human organism the
have said he should not legally obtain j
the practitioner, through his ignorance
mal'treat his patient, he is arraigned at tn
bar Of the awand heavy fines imposed upo
him, while the popular anathema warns hil
TO be wise and the popular law declares b
shall not. Absurdity can find no create
extreme.
In this matter our boosted enlightenmer
is far behind the ancient. Herophilus an
Erisistratis were legally authorized by IL
Ptolomies to prosecute dissections in Il
Alexandrian school, and this privilege WI