ORGANIC PROPERTIES OF THE SALIVA. 147 



ponding series of solvent fluids. These are the wheels of the diges- 

 tive chariot, carrying its passengers either inwards as food, or out- 

 wards as drainage, for food and drainage are the same problem 

 applied to two different worlds, the animal and the vegetable, and 

 constipation whether in a town or an individual, whether in gut or 

 in sewer, is a limit to the circle of nutrition. Now of all the 

 solvent and locomotive fluids, the saliva, so called from its salty pro- 

 perties, is the head and the type. It is the vehicle and the flux of 

 the particles which it liberates from the food. These it dilutes, 

 softens, and dissolves ', draws forth their essences ; alters them into 

 suitable forms; sheathes the latter, and enables them to glide 

 through the pores which carry them to their destination in the 

 chyle or the blood. These are organic properties of the saliva, as 

 declared by its acts. But each joint of the tube has its specific 

 saliva, in addition to the previous fluid that descends from above. 

 The saliva of the stomach is the gastric juice. This saliva the 

 stomach can digest, and leave it mild, or grind it sharp, according 

 to the materials upon which it is to act. It can vary the fluid, and 

 suit the condiment, to its own want and palate. Moreover it can 

 modify the heat which is disengaged, and alter the shape and inten- 

 sity of its own culinary fire, fueling it well, and stirring it up, as 

 the viands require. This the stomach chiefly effects by the opening 

 of the saliva itself, when the vital fire comes cheerily forth, and 

 eats up the chemical heat which is also disengaged. The saliva of 

 the next compartment is the threefold contribution of the liver, the 

 gall-bladder and the pancreas. This triple-headed saliva is more 

 raging and terribly chemical than what went before it, and wastes 

 and melts the food with gross heat and uncompromising persecution. 

 Nor are there wanting other fluids suited in a series to all the 

 offices of these elongated tables. The point to be kept in memory 

 is, that there exists a commonwealth of salivas, and that the saliva 

 of each part is derived into the next when its proper uses have been 

 accomplished. These uses have been already enumerated in part. 

 In the first place they consist in the business of absorption, of which 

 they are the primary medium ; in the last, in the work of rejec- 

 tion, of which they are at once the measure and the stimulant. 

 "We now come to the series of matters realized or absorbed. The 



