endorphins¹

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I'm always left breathless when I delve into the intricacies of the human mind, especially into the world of chemical wonders that tirelessly work behind the scenes. 

These past few days, I've been researching the brain's uptake of endorphins for a class and ran into this article where a medical missionary vividly shares his experience being subject to his own endorphins powerfully at work. 

Starting, and looking half round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing upon me. I was upon a little height; he caught my shoulder as he sprang, and we both came to the ground below together. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as a terrier dog does a rat. The shock produced a stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse after the first shake of the cat. It caused a sort of dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain nor feeling of terror, though quite conscious of all that was happening. It was like what patients partially under the influence of chloroform describe, who see all the operation, but feel not the knife. This singular condition was not the result of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast. This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed by the carnivora; and if so, is a merciful provision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death.

Livingston, David. Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa. 1857.

There it is, yet another biological act of mercy, courtesy of Above. 

¹ One of the body's own painkillers, an opioid (morphine-like) chemical produced by the body that serves to suppress pain.