82 DIGESTION. 



the stomach is often inordinately increased, and every article 

 dissolved as soon as swallowed." 



Dr. Prout points out that hydrogen and oxygen essentially 

 exist in many animal and vegetable proximate principles in the 

 proportions which form water ; in fact, that water essentially con- 

 stitutes a part of them. This essential water is distinct from 

 that which is accidental and makes the substance moist or fluid. 

 If a large portion of water enters into their composition, the 

 compound is weaker and more easily decomposed. Thus cane 

 sugar consists of fifty-four parts of carbon with seventy -two of 

 water: the weak sugar of honey consists of fifty-four parts of 

 carbon with one hundred and eight of water. We cannot at 

 pleasure lessen or augment the quantity of this essential water, 

 and so alter the strength of the compound. The same holds 

 in regard to the influence of water in all organised bodies. Thus 

 strong, fixed, and solid oils have a very small constituent portion 

 of water, and a large proportion of olefiant gas; while alcohol, 

 the weakest form of the oily principle, perfectly soluble in water, 

 contains more weight of water than half the weight of the olefiant 

 gas. 



Dr. Prout contends that the first stage of digestion is the solu- 

 tion and reduction of the proximate principles of various sub- 

 stances, by means of water and the muriatic acid of the stomach, 

 to their weakest condition, to that condition in which they 

 are the most easily decomposed and brought into new combin- 

 ations. The effect of good cookery is to facilitate this reduc- 

 tion of the proximate principles in the stomach to the weaker 

 form ; x for although we cannot by art make a weak compound 

 strong (except, indeed, by lessening the water, incidentally moist- 

 ening or dissolving it,) we are able in some measure to make a 



u Bridgewater Treatise, by Dr. Prout, 



* Continental cookery is superior to ours for weak stomachs, as far as it 

 reduces substances to a pulp ; but in the use of so much pure oil and pure 

 sugar it is injurious, Dr. Prout remarks, to weak stomachs. For nature does 

 not furnish sugar, starch, c. or oil pure, but in combination. The purer we 

 employ them, and especially those which are crystallizable, the more refractory 

 is our food. Pure sugar, pure alcohol, and pure oil, are much less easy to be 

 digested by the healthy stomach than substances purely amylaceous, or than that 

 peculiar condition or mixture of alcohol existing in natural wines; or than 

 butter. In these forms, the assimilation of the saccharine and the oleaginous 

 principles is comparatively easy. Prout, 1. c. p. 507. sq. 



