LETTERS TO BROTHER JOHN". 153 



and his logarithms and his equations that the very 

 brain itself of a Newton and a Shakspeare should 

 own no better or nobler source than that of a 

 despised potato ! And, then, to think that that brain 

 must die must rot, and be resolved into its parent 

 earth ! Yet this is but the simple truth ; and thus, 

 like Ixion's, revolves for ever the wheel of all 

 existence round, and round, and round in an 

 eternal circle of successive changes. 



I shall now take leave to call your attention to 

 certain facts which necessarily result from what I 

 have said ; and of which I wish you to take espe- 

 cial note. 



First, then, you will observe, in following the 

 food from the mouth, through all its intermediate 

 changes until it has become blood, that almost all 

 those intermediate changes are wrought upon it by 

 the agency of the several fluids, juices, or secretions 

 which it meets with in the mouth, stomach, and 

 bowels; and that, consequently, its due conversion 

 into healthy blood depends upon the healthy quality 

 and abundant quantity of these secretions. But 

 these secretions, like every thing else in the body, 

 are formed out of the blood ; and their quality and 

 quantity will, consequently, depend upon the quan- 

 tity of vermilion blood wherewith the organs in 

 H 3 



