Scientists of the day disputed over this,
some arguing from it a proof that consciousness does not at once
depart the brain upon decapitation.
That night, while Paris slept, its walls were secretly placarded
with copies of a eulogy of Charlotte Corday, the martyr of
Republicanism, the deliverer of France, in which occurs the
comparison with Joan of Arc, that other great heroine of France.
This was the work of Adam Lux. He made no secret of it. The
vision of her had so wrought upon the imagination of this
susceptible dreamer, had fired his spirit with such enthusiasm,
that he was utterly reckless in yielding to his emotions, in
expressing the phrenetic, immaterial love with which in her last
moments of life she had inspired him.
Two days after her execution he issued a long manifesto, in which he
urged the purity of her motive as the fullest justification of her
act, placed her on the level of Brutus and Cato, and passionately
demanded for her the honour and veneration of posterity. It is in
this manifesto that he applies euphemistically to her deed the term
"tyrannicide." That document he boldly signed with his own name,
realizing that he would pay for that temerity with his life.
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