56 OF THE ASSIMILATION OF CARBON. 



powerful means of help in the acquirement of true 

 knowledge. They have not been used, because their 

 study has been neglected. 



All discoveries in physics and in chemistry, all 

 explanations of chemists, must remain without fruit 

 and useless, because, even to the great leaders in 

 physiology, carbonic acid, ammonia, acids, and bases, 

 are sounds without meaning, words without sense, 

 terms of an unknown language, which awaken no 

 thoughts and no associations. They treat these- 

 sciences like the vulgar, who despise a foreign lite- 

 rature in exact proportion to their ignorance of it ; 

 since even when they have had some acquaintance 

 with them, they have not understood their spirit and 

 application. 



Physiologists reject the aid of chemistry in their 

 inquiry into the secrets of vitality, although it alone 

 could guide them in the true path ; they reject chem- 

 istry, because in its pursuit of knowledge it destroys 

 the subjects of its investigation ; but they forget 

 that the knife of the anatomist must dismember the 

 body, and destroy its organs, if an account is to be 

 given of their form, structure, and functions. 



When pure potato starch is dissolved in nitric 

 acid, a ring of the finest wax remains. What can 

 be opposed to the conclusion of the chemist, that 

 each grain of starch consists of concentric layers of 

 wax and amylin, which thus mutually protect each 

 other against the action of water and ether ? Can 

 results of this kind, which illustrate so completely 

 both the nature and properties of bodies, be attained 

 by the microscope ? Is it possible to make the glu- 

 ten in a piece of bread visible in all its connexions 

 and ramifications? It is impossible by means of in- 

 struments ; but if the piece of bread is placed in a 

 lukewarm decoction of malt, the starch, and the sub- 

 stance called dextrine,* are seen to dissolve like 



* According to Raspail, starch consists of vesicles inclosing within 

 them a fluid resembling gum. Starch may be put in cold water with- 

 out being dissolved ; but, when placed in hot water, these spherules 



