1912] Chemical Interpretation of Vital Phenomena. 279 



induced in any normal man by excluding carbohydrates from his diet. 

 The diabetic patient, partly because he can make but imperfect use of 

 carbohydrates and partly because the common treatment of his disease 

 is to reduce his carbohydrate intake as much as possible, is liable as a 

 result to lose his power of oxidizing completely and normally even the 

 fats and proteins of his food, and in such cases it is the physician's duty 

 to treat the condition by supplying more carbohydrate in his patient's 

 diet than his first instinct would allow. It is difficult to account for 

 this remarkable phenomienon otherwise than by regarding it as an 

 instance of an induced reaction. The oxidation of fats and proteins 

 leads to the formation of certain organic substances the complete oxi- 

 dation of which normally occurs as a reaction induced by the simultan- 

 eous oxidation of carbohydrates or of some substance found in the course 

 of the breakdown of carbohydrates in the body. When the normal 

 course of the breakdown of carbohydrates is interfered with as in diabetes, 

 or when no carbohydrates are supplied with the food, then the reaction 

 by which certain products of the breakdown of fats and proteins are 

 finally and completely disposed of is not induced, and these products 

 leave the body unburnt or accumulate in it causing certain definite and, 

 it may be, serious symptoms. 



It would not be difhcult to multiply instances in which the facts 

 of the chemistry of the body in health and disease, which till recently 

 seemed to involve the assumption of vital activities inaccessible to the 

 methods of physical science, can now be regarded as intelligible mani- 

 festations of catalysis such as we know it and can study in the chemistry 

 of inanimate nature. 



The laws of chemical change are not yet so clearly understood that 

 it should be imperative that those who would study the chemistry of 

 life must fold their hands in despair and say these things are not for men 

 to understand. 



