When
they brought him to the judge, the latter refused to receive him,
saying, "It is not that man whom I commanded you to bring here, but
Stephen the blacksmith." In consequence of this order the soul of the
dead man was directly brought back to his body, and at the same
instant Stephen the blacksmith expired; which confirmed all that the
former had said of the other life.

The plague ravaging the city of Rome in the time that Narses was
governor of Italy, a young Livonian, a shepherd by profession, and of
a good and quiet disposition, was taken ill with the plague in the
house of the advocate Valerian, his master. Just when they thought him
all but dead, he suddenly came to himself, and related to them that he
had been transported to heaven, where he had learnt the names of those
who were to die of the plague in his master's house; having named them
to him, he predicted to Valerian that he should survive him; and to
convince him that he was saying the truth, he let him see that he had
acquired by infusion the knowledge of several different languages; in
effect he who had never known how to speak any but the Italian tongue,
spoke Greek to his master, and other languages to those who knew them.

After having lived in this state for two days, he had fits of madness,
and having laid hold of his hands with his teeth, he died a second
time, and was followed by those whom he had named. His master, who
survived, fully justified his prediction. Men and women who fall into
trances remain sometimes for several days without food, respiration,
or pulsation of the heart, as if they were dead. Thauler, a famous
contemplative (philosopher) maintains that a man may remain entranced
during a week, a month, or even a year. We have seen an abbess, who
when in a trance, into which she often fell, lost the use of her
natural functions, and passed thirty days in that state without taking
any nourishment, and without sensation. Instances of these trances are
not rare in the lives of the saints, though they are not all of the
same kind, or duration.

Women in hysterical fits remain likewise many days as if dead,
speechless, inert, pulseless. Galen mentions a woman who was six days
in this state.[602] Some of them pass ten whole days motionless,
senseless, without respiration and without food.

Some persons who have seemed dead and motionless, had however the
sense of hearing very strong, heard all that was said about
themselves, made eff