REGARDED AS A MASS. 119 



of aspect, entirely out of the question, there is another 

 purpose answered by this integument, and by the colloca- 

 tion of the parts of the body beneath it, which is of still 

 greater importance ; and that purpose is concealment. 

 Were it possible to view through the skin the mechanism 

 of our bodies, the sight would frighten us out of our wits. 

 " Durst we make a single movement," asks a lively French 

 writer, " or stir a step from the place we were in, if we saw 

 our blood circulating, the tendons pulling, the lungs blow- 

 ing, the humours filtrating, and all the incomprehensible 

 assemblage of fibres, tubes, pumps, valves, currents, piv- 

 ots, which sustain an existence, at once so frail and so pre- 

 sumptuous ?" 



V. Of animal bodies, considered as masses, there is 

 another property, more curious than it is generally thought 

 to be ; which is the faculty of ^^a/icZZ/zo-; and it is more 

 remarkable in two-legged animals than in quadrupeds, and 

 most of all, as being the tallest, and resting upon the small- 

 est base, in man.* There is more, I think, in the matter, 

 than we are aware of. The statue of a man, placed loose 

 upon its pedestal, would not be secure of standing half an 

 hour. You are obliged to fix its feet to the block by bolts 

 and solder, or the first shake, the first gust of wind, is sure 

 to throw it down. Yet this statue shall express all the 

 mechanical proportions of a living model. It is not there- 

 fore the mere figure, or merely placing the centre of grav- 

 ity Vv^ithin the base, that is sufficient. Either the law of 

 gravitation is suspended in favour of living substances, or 

 something more is done for them, in order to enable them 

 to uphold their posture. There is no reason whatever to 

 doubt, but that their parts descend by gravitation in the 

 same manner as those of dead matter. The gift there- 

 fore appears to me to consist, in a faculty of perpetually 

 shifting the centre of gravity, by a set of obscure indeed, 

 but of quick, balancing actions, so as to keep the line 

 of direction, which is a line drawn from that centre to the 



* Anatomy explains the mode in which the weight of the body is 

 transmitted to the feet ; the muscles which prevent the head from fall- 

 ing forward in standing, have their fixed point in the neck ; those 

 which perform the same office with regard to the vertebral column, 

 have theirs in the pelvis ; those which preserve the pelvis in equi- 

 librium are attached to the thighs, or to the bones of the legs; those 

 which prevent the thighs from falling backward are inserted into 

 the tibia; and lastly, those that preserve the tibia in their verti* 

 cal position have their fixed point in the feet ; these preserve us firm ia 

 a standing position. Fawton, 



