Download or read book Letter to Monsiuer Dubourg : on the Death of Persons Struck by Lightning. From: Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin ... written by Benjamin Franklin and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Benjamin Franklin uses a reference to persons killed by lightning as a springboard to speculate about "the doctrines of life and death, in general." He writes about toads remaining buried alive in sand "till the sand becomes petrified," and relates having seen apparently lifeless flies revived after having been transported across the Atlantic in a bottle of wine. Franklin then concludes "I wish it were possible, from this instance, to invent a method of enbalming drowned persons, in such a manner that they might be recalled to life at any period, however distant; for, having a very ardent desire to see and observe the state of America an hundred years hence, I should prefer to an ordinary death, the being immersed in a cask of Madeira wine, with a few friends, till that time, to be recalled to life by the solar warmth of my dear country!"