THE SANITARY LEGISLATION OF THE PENTATEUCH. 755 



a double office : on the one hand it serves to convey fresh matter to supply the wear 

 and tear of the system, whilst on the other hand it serves to carry off what may 

 be popularly called the waste or refuse of the body. Such refuse is in due course 

 eliminated by means of the kidneys, the sudiparous glands, etc., and appears 

 then in its avowed character of excrementitious matter. It is, therefore, evident 

 that the blood if drawn off promiscuously, arterial and venous together, contains 

 a certain proportion of effete substances, which are only fit to be expelled, and 

 which are ill-suited for human food. If by any derangement the action of the 

 kidneys is arrested, this refuse accumulates in the blood, and the consequences 

 at once make themselves felt. Now, as to separate the arterial from the venous 

 blood of a slaughtered animal is impracticable, we contend that to use the blood 

 as food approximates very closely to drinking urine, and is not merely loathsome 

 \)vXpro ianto unsafe. That, like liquid and solid excrements, it is valuable for 

 plant-food, and that it serves as a pabulum for certain classes of animals is no 

 proof that it is fit for human consumption. 



Even the mechanical state of blood when coagulated is a strong argument 

 against its dietetic use. Unlike flesh, it is not composed of fibres between which 

 the gastric juice can easily penetrate. It is a solid structureless mass like caout- 

 chouc, which can only be acted upon from the outside of each fragment, thus 

 rendering the process of digestion more difficult. 



Turning from theory to practical experience, we refer to the higher value — 

 in an actuary's sense of the word — of Jewish lives than of those of their Gentile 

 neighbors inhabiting the same locality and engaged in avocations little different. 

 Is not this recognized superiority on the part of the Jew due, in part at least, to 

 their hereditary avoidance of blood during the course of three thousand years ? 



It is generally admitted that the internal organs of animals — such as the kid- 

 neys, the liver, etc. — are of questionable value as articles of food. They are, as 

 we learn from carcase-butchers, very frequently in a diseased state, and are apt 

 to be the seat of entozoa. We have not succeeded in ascertaining whether these 

 parts are avoided by the Jews at the present day. But the law seems perfectly 

 clear (Leviticus, iii., 15, et passim) that in all cases of beasts sacrificed the "in- 

 wards " must be destroyed by fire. 



The disposal of blood did not escape the attention of the Israelitish law-giver. 

 Directions are given that it is not to be let stagnate on the surface of the ground 

 and there putrefy, but to be "covered with dust" (Leviticus, xvii., 13), or, in 

 other words, absorbed in dry earth. Hence it seems fair to conclude that more 

 than three thousand years ago the peculiarly offensive character of putrescent 

 blood and the deodorizing and disinfecting property of earth were known. Cov- 

 ering with earth is also the treatment specified for excrementitious matter. To 

 the present day nothing is more offensively striking, wherever large numbers of 

 human beings are collected away from their settled habitations, than the accumu- 

 lation of filth which defiles the neighborhood. Not merely sieges and other mili- 

 tary operations, but engineering undertakings, fairs, camp-meetings, pilgrimages, are 

 characterized by nuisances of this nature, which doubtless assist in the propaga- 



