INTROD.] ORGANIZED BODIES. 7 



the living body) will produce the organic compound, fibrine ; from 

 which, again, the organized structure, muscle, is formed. And so 

 in other cases. 



In the organized body the constituent particles are, as it were, 

 artfully arranged, so as to form peculiar textures, destined to serve 

 special purposes in the living mechanism of the animal or plant to 

 which they belong. The organic compounds which may be obtained 

 from these are devoid of this mechanical arrangement of particles, 

 and it is a beautiful feature of the organized body, that every 

 part has its special office, that there is nothing superfluous, nothing 

 wanting. As each organized body has a certain end to serve in the 

 oeconomy of the living world, so each organ has its proper use in 

 the animal or plant. In this adaptation of parts to the performance 

 of certain functions, we see the strongest evidence of Design ; and, 

 amidst much apparent difference of form and obvious diversity of 

 purpose, the anatomist recognizes a remarkable unity of plan 

 affording incontestable proof that the whole was devised by One 

 Mind, infinite in wisdom, unlimited in resource. 



The true proximate principles are those substances which are the 

 first obtained by the analysis of the organized textures; such are 

 gluten, starch, lignine, from the vegetable textures, or albumen, 

 fibrine, caseine, from the animal ones. From these again a great 

 variety of compounds has been obtained by various processes, 

 owing to the tendency which their elements have to form new 

 combinations. By boiling starch in dilute acids, it becomes con- 

 verted into a kind of gum, and starch-sugar. By placing yeast 

 in contact with sugar, the latter is converted into alcohol and car- 

 bonic acid, without the yeast affording it any of its chemical con- 

 stituents ; and, in the germination of barley, or of the potato, a 

 peculiar substance is formed, the contact of which with the starch 

 of the barley or potato converts it into sugar. Innumerable ex- 

 amples might be quoted from various vegetable compounds, shewing 

 that the affinity, which holds together the elements of organic sub- 

 stances, is so feeble, that it affords but slight resistance to their 

 entrance into new combinations. In this way a large class of 

 organic matters is formed, which it seems proper to distinguish 

 from the true proximate principles, under the name of secondary 

 organic compounds. 



In analysing the true proximate principles of organic substances, 

 it is found that they consist for the most part of three or four of 

 the essential simple elements, and that, as many of them contain 

 a large number of atoms, their combining proportion is represented 



