288 
EDITORIAL. 
of the proximate and mineral constituents of the animal body under the 
following classes, viz : 
" Non-nitrogenous acids. ■ 
I, Butyric acid group. 2, Succinic acid group. 3, Benzoic group 
4, Lactic acid group. 5, Solid fatty acids. 6, Oily fatty acids. 7, 
Resinous acids. 
Nitrogenous basic bodies. 
1, Non-oxygenous alkaloids, aniline, &c. 2, Alkaloids containing 
oxygen, creatine," &c. 
Conjugated acids. Hippuric acid, &c. 
Haloid Bases and Haloid salts. Oxide of lipyl, glycerin, &c. 
Lipoids. Cholesterin, &c. 
Non-nitrogenous neutral bodies. Glucose, lactine, &c. 
Coloring matters. Heematin, &c. 
Extractive matters. 
Nitrogenous Histogenetic substances. Protein compounds and their de- 
rivatives. 
Mineral constituents of the animal body. 
Professor Lehmann is a close adherent to the actual and demonstrable 
and discards all the theories of the marvellous influence of vital force, in- 
dependent of chemical reaction. He observes : 
" How long were the minds of natural philosophers haunted with an 
illusion that animal bodies possessed the power of generating mineral ele- 
ments, as lime, iron, sulphur, &c, from other elements, or even from nothing ! 
It was this method [alluding to the statistical method of comparing the gross 
constituents of the food wi:h the gross secretions and excretions] alone 
which exposed the perfect nullity of the obstinately defended dogma of the 
1 vital force.' " 
Our author places physiological chemistry first in importance among the 
scientific auxiliaries to medicine. He also disapproves of drawing the line 
between pathological and physiological chemistry, and believes it is not 
only unnecessary, but attended with disadvantage, to sever them, as the 
same laws and forces are exerted in diseased as in healthy matter, the 
chemical points of application being different. He is strongly opposed to 
what is termed meta-physiology, the physiology of life action and force, 
as contradistinguished from the chemical forces of organic matter. 
"We have not hesitated to avow that we have assumed a thoroughly 
radical point of view in reference to specific vital phenomena and vital 
forces; for we cannot rest satisfied with the mysterious obscurity in which 
they have been artificially enveloped. With the physicist, we w T ould uphold 
the reality of phenomena, and while we admit that the consciousness of the 
reality of matter is only the result of an abstraction, we regard this ab- 
straction, by which we regard the Immaterial, the Spiritual and the Force, 
as originating in reality. We therefore believe with the diffidence beseem- 
ing the genuine student of nature, that it would be wiser and more con- 
ducive to the spread of true knowledge to adhere, in the study of vital 
processes, to matter, and to the laws by which it is determined, than, fol- 
lowing the fictitious abstractions of dynamical processes, to assume that there 
exists in life a higher power of the spiritual forces pervading matter." 
