I have here also to remark that the maintenance of the life process, although it has a metaphysical basis, does not go on without resistance, and consequently not without effort. It is this to which the organism yields every night, on account of which it then suspends the brain function and diminishes certain secretions, the respiration, the pulse, and the development of heat. From this we may conclude that the entire ceasing of the life process must be a wonderful relief to its motive force; perhaps this has some share in the expression of sweet contentment on the faces of most dead persons. In general the moment of death may be like the moment of awaking from a heavy dream that has oppressed us like a nightmare. Up to this point the result we have arrived at is that death, however much it may be feared, can yet really be no evil. But often it even appears as a good thing, as something wished for, as a friend. All that have met with insuperable obstacles to their existence or their efforts, that suffer from incurable diseases or inconsolable griefs, have as a last refuge, which generally opens to them of its own accord, the return into the womb of nature, from which they arose for a short time, enticed by the hope of more favourable conditions of existence than have fallen to their lot, and the same path out of which constantly remains open. That return is the _cessio bonorum_ of life. Yet even here it is only entered upon after a physical and moral conflict: so hard does one struggle against returning to the place from which one came out so lightly and readily, to an existence which has so much suffering and so little pleasure to offer. The Hindus give the god of death, Yama, two faces; one very fearful and terrible, and one very cheerful and benevolent. This partly explains itself from the reflections we have just made.