Charles Fillmore--The Appearance of Life's Absence

Death is defined by Webster as “cessation of all vital functions without capability of resuscitation.” This, like all definitions derived from sense observations, is quite incomplete. It gives us no idea of the relation that death bears to its polar opposite, life; and no idea of the process through which life passes in order to appear absent in that which has “cessation of all vital functions.” Following this to a final analysis, we find that we must understand life before we can apprehend that appearance of its absence in a form called death.