TASTING. 121 



Though the sense of taste varies in some individuals, yet, 

 like figurative taste, the standard of agreeable and disagree- 

 able, of pleasant and painful, is almost universally diffused 

 over mankind and the brute creation. Every horse, and 

 every ox, when in a natural state, eats or rejects the same 

 species of food. But men in society, as well as domestic ani- 

 mals, are induced by habit, by necessity, or by imitation, to 

 acquire a taste for many dishes, and combinations of sub- 

 stances, which, before the natural, discriminating sense is per- 

 verted, would be rejected with disgust. 



Some individuals of the human species have an aversion to 

 particular kinds of food, which are generally agreeable. This 

 aversion may be either original or acquired. I knew a child, 

 who, from the moment he was weaned, could never be in- 

 duced to take milk of any kind. These original aversions 

 must be ascribed to some peculiar modification in the struc- 

 ture of the organ, or in the disposition of its nerves. But, in 

 general, disgust at particular foods is produced by surfeits, 

 which injure the stomach, and create in that exquisitely irri- 

 table viscus an insuperable antipathy to receive nourishment 

 which formerly gave it so much uneasiness to digest. 



Brute animals, especially those which feed upon herbage, 

 and are not liable to be corrupted by example or necessity, 

 distinguish tastes with wonderful accuracy. By the applica- 

 tion of the tongue, they instantly perceive whether any plant 

 is salutary or noxious. To enable them, amidst a thousand 

 plants, to make this discrimination, their nervous papillae, 

 and their tongues, are proportionally much larger than those 

 of man, ' This sense indeed seems particularly intended as 

 a guard to the digestive organs, and to be subservient to 

 them; and this more especially in other animals than in 

 man, who is accustomed to depend upon his judgment and 

 experience, rather than his taste, in the selection of articles 

 of food. Still that which is salutary for the stomach, is 

 generally pleasant to the taste. It is probable that all ani- 

 mals possess the sense of taste, to enable them to make choice 

 of and enjoy their food, and that, in all of them, the sense 

 resides in those organs which are employed in receiving and 

 swallowing it.' 

 11 



