DR. PROUT ON ANIMAL CHEMISTRY. 
' 575 
eases—the staminal or constitutional diseases—if I may be al¬ 
lowed the expression, connected with the imperfect development 
of the principles composing animal bodies, or the derangements 
to which they are liable. 
First, Of the Diseases connected with the Saccharine Principle, 
—Of all the staminal diseases, those more immediately connected 
with the saccharine principle may be considered in general as the 
most formidable ; and if fairly established, they seldom terminate 
but with the life of the patient. 
Of Diabetes ,—In this disease, the essential and merorganizing 
changes seem to be more or less suspended, while the reducing 
power of the stomach goes on even more rapidly than in health. 
The food, therefore, is quickly dissolved and absorbed; but as 
the meroganizing processes do not take place at all, or only very 
imperfectly, the products formed are untit for the purposes of the 
animal economy, and consequently are ejected from it in self- 
defence. This view of the nature of diabetes places the principal 
errors in the digestive and assimilating functions; and no one 
who has studied the affection can, I think, for a moment hesitate 
to assent to this view : but the kidneys, also, are undoubtedly in¬ 
volved in it; and as the natural action of these organs, as will be 
more particularly noticed presently, is of a dismerorganizing cha¬ 
racter, these undo what little had been done by the assimilatory 
organs, and the result is, that the alimentary matter is thrown 
out in the crystallizable form. 
A saccharine condition of the urine, in a minor degree, is by 
no means an unusual occurrence in various forms of dyspepsia, 
more especially in old gouty subjects ; and in this state it can 
hardly be considered as dangerous, at least not more so than many 
other urinary derangements: but when completely established in 
the form of diabetes, I need not say that it may be considered 
as one of the most formidable diseases to which humanity is 
liable. The quantity of urine may, indeed, be easily reduced in 
most cases within proper limits, by judicious treatment; but in 
every instance in which I have hitherto had an opportunity of ex¬ 
amining it., the saccharine tendency has remained in a greater or 
less degree, or has only given way to something still more formida¬ 
ble, as irremediable phthisis, or, in one or two cases, diseases 
of a malignant tendency. Diabetes is not often attended by any 
visible organic disease, probably on account of the very soluble 
nature of sugar: but if, in the ordinary state, this principle was a 
solid instead of a liquid, there is little doubt that morbid growths, 
or organic diseases, would be the consequence. 
Another disease, or set of diseases (for there are many), origi¬ 
nating in the saccharine radical, is connected with its acidification, 
