Читать книгу Popular Books on Natural Science - Bernstein Aaron David - Страница 6

Man, according to what has preceded, is nothing but transformed food.

This idea may frighten us; it may be terrible to our hearts; but let us frankly confess, it is a true one! Man consists only of such substances as he has consumed; he is, in fact, nothing but the food he has eaten; he is food in the shape of a living being.

A child is said to live on his mother's milk; but what else does this mean than: "It is mother's milk, that has become alive by having been changed into head, body, hands, feet, etc., etc."

Indeed, it may sound strange, yet it is quite correct: This mother's milk in the shape of a human being consumes again new mother's milk, and, by respiration, by evaporation and secretion of matter, casts out the used-up milk.

This being so, it will now appear evident to every one, that by a profound chemical knowledge of our daily food, we may readily learn to know the chemical components of man, and vice versâ; knowing the substances of which man is made, it is easy for us to determine, what kind of food he must take, in order to continually renew his body.

Since the mother's milk is the simplest and most natural food for the child, let us consider it according to its importance. We shall then have a stepping-stone towards the knowledge of the food of adults and its effects. The mother's milk contains all the elements, with which the human body can renew itself; should there be but one of those elements wanting in it, the child would inevitably perish.

If, for example, milk did not contain calcareous earth, the consequence would be, that the bones of the child would, soon after its birth, neither grow nor increase in number, but they would fast diminish, and the child would die in consequence of this. The attempt was once made to feed animals on articles without calcareous parts, when, strange to behold, they all grew fat, but very weak in their bones, and finally broke down.

If milk contained no phosphorus, not only would the bones and teeth suffer from the want of it, but even the completion of the child's brain could not properly take place, and the child could not replace the quantity of brain which it emits and loses every moment by breathing.

If there were no iron in the mother's milk, the child would die from the green-sickness, a malady which, by the way, is dangerous also for grown people, and which is cured by medicines containing plenty of iron.

If there were no sulphur in it, the child's bile could not develop; the bile, as every one knows, has an important function in the human body.

These are but accessory elements of the mother's milk, elements which usually are not looked upon as articles of food; for who is aware that he must eat, and actually does eat daily, phosphorus, iron, calcareous earth, and sulphur? And not only these; there are a great many other articles, such as magnesia, chlorine, and fluor, that we eat without being aware of it; moreover, our proper food consists also of three gases: nitrogen, oxygen, and hydrogen; and of a solid substance called "carbon," which is no less and no more than pure coal.

All these, my friendly readers, are contained in milk – all these are the elements which in truth constitute the human body. Perhaps some persons believe that there is nothing easier than to procure proper food. It would only be necessary to take a certain quantity of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen; a little bit of potassium, natron, calcium, and magnesia; to mix a small piece of iron, sulphur, phosphorus, chlorine, and fluor, and take this mixture by the spoon at regular intervals, in order to give the body the necessary aliments. This, however, would be a mistake, for which the perpetrator would pay with his life.

Although it is true that these substances form the proper and most important constituents of our daily food; yet, in order to enjoy the desired result, we must not partake of them in their primary forms; they can actually feed our body only when they are combined together in a peculiar, wondrous manner.

In the next chapter it may be seen how nature first must combine these substances before they are presented to us as proper food; and it will also be seen, that we receive them sometimes in altogether different forms and combinations; for example, in the mother's milk, when we eat the above-named elements in the forms of caseine (cheese), butyrine (butter), sugar of milk, salt, and water.

These latter names have a more savory sound, have they not?