<54 BEALE'S PROTOPLASMIC THEORY. 



It is also recognized, and frequently insisted upon, 

 that all the chemical elements which are contained in 

 <iny tissue must have previously passed through the 

 living state; hence the protoplasm of the different 

 parts must contain them all, at least for a time. The 

 analysis of all the tissues and products of vital action, 

 animal and vegetable, gives us the sum of all the 

 chemical elements which must enter into the composi- 

 tion of protoplasm as a whole. But the particular 

 form of compound provided by each kind of proto- 

 plasm in the slow action of nutrition^nd secretion is 

 not indicated at all in the composition of the living 

 matter changed rapidly into ordinary chemical com- 

 pounds, and very little difference can be detected as 

 yet by chemical analysis between the products formed 

 by the sudden death of the different kinds of living 

 matter. These products are thus described by Dr. 

 Beale : 



" When the life of a mass of bioplasm of any kind is sud- 

 denly cut short, lifeless substances, having very similar pro- 

 perties, result. These substances belong to four different 

 classes of bodies. One separates spontaneously soon after 

 death ; another is a transparent fluid, which is coagulated by 

 heat and nitric acid ; the third consists of fatty matter ; and 

 the fourth comprises certain saline substances. When a mass 

 of bioplasm dies, it is resolved into : 1. fibrin ; 2. albumen ; 3. 

 fatty matter ; and, 4. salts. These things do not exist in the 

 matter when it is bioplasm, but, as the latter dies it splits up 

 into these four classes of compounds" ("Bioplasm," p. 11). 



The cardinal points here shown are that no binary 

 or ternary compounds alone can form living matter, 

 but all protoplasm must contain the four so-called 

 organic elements, with sulphur, phosphorus, and some 



