182 WHAT DOES MAN LIVE UPON? 



us see what Man is really composed of. According 

 to Quetelet, a full-grown man weighs on an average 

 1541bs., and if we subtract the great quantity of water 

 which runs through all parts of our body, keeping them 

 supple and pliant some 38 Ibs. 14 Ibs. of this comes 

 from the bones, and 24 Ibs. from all the remaining parts. 

 The former contain about 66 per cent., the latter 3 per 

 cent, of earthy constituents, which are left behind after 

 combustion. Man consists, therefore, in more than a 

 third part, of inorganic substances, which are necessary to 

 his existence ; and which he must, therefore, receive with 

 his food. He must, in fact, as the Evil Spirit says, feed 

 upon dust. 



Exactly as the softer organs of the human body, in their 

 every motion partly worn out and consumed, become 

 replaced through nutrition, so does man continually lose a 

 portion of those inorganic substances, and must make good 

 this loss by food. But during life, a peculiar relation is 

 maintained between the two kinds of matter which are 

 received. In the child, still growing, whose organs are 

 still in the process of development, far more of both classes 

 of substances, of the organic equally with the inorganic, 

 is taken up than is worn out ; in the adult, the receipt and 

 the expenditure are in equilibrium ; in old age, on the 

 other hand, a peculiar disproportion occurs. The old man 

 consumes continually more organic matter than he can 

 replace by food. The strength of his muscles disappears, 

 the quantity of blood becomes smaller, he grows thinner. 

 But the inorganic matters are not wasted in the same 

 quantity as they are received in the food. Man thus goes 

 back again to the stage of childhood, and we obtain a view 

 of life and death, almost directly in contrast to that for- 

 merly unfolded. Ever more and more earthy matter [is 



