in ON THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE 147 



the number of grains of protoplasm and other 

 bodily substance wasted in maintaining my vital 

 processes during its delivery. My peau de chagrin 

 will be distinctly smaller at the end of the dis- 

 course than it was at the beginning. By and by, 

 I shall probably have recourse to the substance 

 commonly called mutton, for the purpose of 

 stretching it back to its original size. Now this 

 mutton was once the living protoplasm, more or 

 less modified, of another animal a sheep. As I 

 shall eat it, it is the same matter altered, not only 

 by death, but by exposure to sundry artificial 

 operations in the process of cooking. 



But these changes, whatever be their extent, 

 have not rendered it incompetent to resume its 

 old functions as matter of life. A singular inward 

 laboratory, which I possess, will dissolve a certain 

 portion of the modified protoplasm ; the solution 

 so formed will pass into my veins ; and the subtle 

 influences to which it will then be subjected will 

 convert the dead protoplasm into living protoplasm, 

 and transubstantiate sheep into man. 



Nor is this all. If digestion were a thing to be 

 trifled with, I might sup upon lobster, and the 

 matter of life of the crustacean would undergo the 

 same wonderful metamorphosis into humanity. 

 And were I to return to my own place by sea, 

 and undergo shipwreck, the crustacean might, and 

 probably would, return the compliment, and de- 

 monstrate our common nature by turning my 



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