1825.] EleetrO'chemical Tkeofp to Chemical Pkisnomena, 267 



fact the negative electricity of the iholecules attracited, bfeing^ 

 partly concealed by the positive electricity of the alkaUes, at the 

 moment the new compounds are formed, they are forced so to 

 arrange themselves with the others as that they may retain an 

 excess of itinj iisy\wjLHj u^iuoiiti> ^iioiluLifjUno-j .ih»u^, o- 



it is evideftl itt'^his c«ie liwit theprnporlioaaii of tJie elements 

 ^tbese compounds must depend on the electrical state that they 

 as^^ume. It is important to notice this pecuharity, for the dif- 

 ference of the properties of organic substances depending solely 

 on the different proportions of their elements, the prodigious 

 variety of the former must lead us to infer that the cause which 

 determines the latter cannot be the same as in inorganic sub- 

 stances, which combine in very limited proportions, 

 ii' All the substances of the first class seem to owe their forma- 

 tk)n to a mode of combination analogous to that we have 

 examined ; for instance, let us first take the substances that are 

 produced by the act of digestion, by which the food is partially 

 converted into chyme, and the latter into chyle, which is effected 

 by the liquors poured out by the excretory organs into the intes- 

 tinal canal. It has been observed that the substances which are 

 there injected are in a short time acidified. This confirms our 

 theory, since all the liquors po-mred into the intestinal canal are 

 alkaline. The cliyme and the chyle, therefore, are merely salts 

 composed of those alkaline liquors and of the acids developed by 

 their influence in the food for the chyme, and ia the latter for 

 the chyle. 



The act by which the organs give rise to the liquors they 

 secrete, differs from the preceding merely inasmuch as the acid 

 or alkaline products resulting from the influence of the particu- 

 lar matter which composes each of them on the blood, do not 

 combine with it. Hence all the secreted liquors are alkaline or 

 acid. This is not the only example of the kind. Fermentation, 

 whether vinous or acetous, is an analogous phenomenon, for, as 

 in secretion, the products formed do not combine with the mat- 

 ter which determined their formation, at least if we may judge 

 by the smLallGj^uantity of ferment that disappears during the 

 operfttionjii'-JXii'jia luiu lo^auuiuq/s ;);)');ot o//.J /mo 1o 



Let us say one' word oh the <5auses of the spoiitan^bus dedofn- 

 position of organic substances, which are derived from the mode 

 in which their elementary molecules are disposed with respect 

 to their electrical state. It is not the same with all molecules of 

 the same nature. In vegetable substances, for instance, the 

 oxygen never being in sufficient proportion to form water with 

 the hydro2!:en and oxide of carbon, or carbonic acid with the 

 carbon, some of the molecules of the latter must be endowed 

 with positive electricity, and tend to combine with the oxygetl} 

 and the others with negative electricity, and act more especisllljf 

 on the hydrogen. The azote of auimal substances , must be 



