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SECT. XXXI. 



OF NUTRITION, 



454. BESIDES the function of the blood formerly 

 investigated, of distributing oxygen through the sys- 

 tem and removing carbon, its principal use is to afford 

 nourishment to the body in general, and to the se- 

 creting organs the peculiar fluids which they possess 

 the power of deriving from it. Nutrition shall be first 

 examined. 



455. Nutrition is the grandest gift of nature, and the 

 common and highest prerogative of the animal and ve- 

 getable kingdoms, by which these, beyond measure, 

 surpass, even at first sight, all human machines and 

 automatons. Upon these no artist can bestow the fa- 

 culty, not to say of increasing and of coming to perfec- 

 tion, but even of existing independently and repairing 

 the incessant losses incurred from friction.* 



456. By the nutritive faculty of the body, its greatest 

 and most admirable functions are performed ; by it we 

 grow from the first of our formation and arrive at man- 

 hood ; and by it are remedied the destruction and con- 

 sumption which incessantly occur in our system during 

 life.f 



* " Nutrition, in fact, appears to be a continued generation," according to 

 the old observation of the very ingenious Ent. See his work, already (290. n.) 

 recommended. 



f- Th. Young, De carports humani viribus conservatricibus. Getting. 

 1796. 8vo. 



Fl. J. Van Maanen, De natura httmana mi ipsii/s conscrvatrice ac medica- 

 trice. Harderv. 1801. 8vo. 



