PHYSIOLOGY OF ORGANIC LIFE. 133 



far more reasonable to conclude, that it is in- 

 tended to harmonise with it; and that the bile 

 instead of acting by its resin, and its alkali, as 

 an active purgative, is intended, in the first in- 

 stance, to separate the chylous, from the fecu- 

 lent parts of the chyme ; producing a precipita- 

 tion of the one, and afterwards assists the 

 expulsion of the other, conformably to ex- 

 periments which have been made to ascertain 

 the point. 



With respect to the pancreas, or sweetbread, 

 although it secretes a fluid of a quality bland 

 and mild, somewhat similar in its prpperties to 

 saliva, and which, probably, co-operates in ac- 

 complishing the same purpose as the bile from 

 the liver ; the specific determinate use to which 

 this fluid subserves, continues, to the best ex- 

 perimentalist, a perfect mystery. 



The same uncertainty prevails respecting 

 the use of the spleen. The well-known fact, 

 that it has been altogether absent in animals 

 which, in general, have one; and that it has 

 been extirpated without producing any violent 

 shock to the Constitution, led to the supposition 

 that it was of little or no use. Dr. STUKELEY, 

 seventy years ago, in his Gulstonian Lec- 

 ture, traced the connexion which subsists be- 

 tween the spleen and the stomach, as well as 

 between the other abdominal viscera ; and, from 

 a very scientific mode of investigation, was led 



