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February 23, 1856.] T.HE LEADER. 183
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Itterntart.
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Critics are not the legislators, but the...
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" Man docs not live by bread alone;" nev...
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MGDEBN PAINTERS. Modern Painters. Vol. T...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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February 23, 1856.] T.He Leader. 183
February 23 , 1856 . ] T . HE LEADER . 183
Itterntart.
Itterntart .
Critics Are Not The Legislators, But The...
Critics are not the legislators , but the judges and police of literature ^ y do not rnaVe laws-they interpret and try to enforce tnem . ^ kdmburgh Itenew .
" Man Docs Not Live By Bread Alone;" Nev...
" Man docs not live by bread alone ; " nevertheless bread , or its equivalent , is no contemptible adjunct to the means of life : a remark which was once made to a friend of ours by a French lady sitting next to him at dinner , and who , desirous of entering upon conversation while awaiting the soup , said , with the air of one communicating an important truth : Monsieur , le pain et Veau sont fort essentiels . Had we been the happy mortal thus addressed , our answer would have been , JEt la viartde , done ! for although same flaccid theorists maintain that vegetables alone constitute the true regimen of man , the prejudice in favour of beef has its merit . M . Payen is publishing , in La Revue des Deux Mondes , a series of articles on Public Food , and in the number for February 1 , there is one of great interest on Butchers meat , which , although written with a view to the municipal regulations of Paris , contains many points of interest to other than Parisian readers . He undertakes , among other things , to disprove the vulgar notion that bones make good soup . The celebrated Gelatine Commission , some years ago , declared , as the results of many experiments , that gelatine was not nutritious ; and this result has been repeated in almost every test-book of physiology ag conclusive , and is adopted by M . Payein ., wlio tests it in another series of experiments . Accepting the fact , we demur to the reasoning . But first let us state the fact . M . Payen boiled in one pe > t a portion of beef completely divested of bone , and in another the bone taken from the beef , with only a little salt . After five hours slow boiliag , the liquid from the beef was perfectly limpid , and of a light amber colour ,
that housewives have from time immemorial boiled the bones with the meat , and found the soup better for it . Is this a prejudice merely ? According to Mr . Pa yen , it is ; but we think the practice eminently ratidntft-Although bone-soup'without meat will never be half so nutritious as beefsoup without bones , ' it nevertheless is not so valueless as theorists proclaim ; and bone-soup with vegetables is nutritious , boue-s oup with meat perfect . We want the gelatine ; if we do not get it in soup we must get it elsewhere . Of course the reader will understand that we are not arguing for « be nutritiveness of bone as in the least equal to that of meat ; we only argtte for its due recognition as a nutritive suWance . Bf . Payen seems disinclined to allow it any value . He , however , attacks another prejudice , and this time more successfully , in arguing in favour of cow-beef , as equal to ami often superior to ox-beef . He also examines the influence of forage on the quality of meat ; and lays it down , as a fact decided beyond dispute , that the superiority of French veal over the English ( a superiority no one who has tasted the two will deny ) , in arorna ., tenderness , and delicacy , is owing to the French calves being fed on . milk so much longer thaia the English . Ke confirms the opinion that the milk of the cow depends ft * Its qualities Oil fft ' e forage ; thus when fed on plants containing little fat , of impregnated with disagreeable odours , such as cabbages and tttiriips , the cow gives a milk scanty in cream and without aroma . It is ovvitjg td the itnthense cultivation of Swedish turnips in England that out milk and butter are inferior to those of Brittany and Normandy . We have said enough to make the reade * curious to see La Revue des Dem : Monies , and consult It . Pay en ' s article . If this week it has beeii our cue to speak less of the " food for the mind , " let the cause be appreciated- ^ we had rioxie sueh to speak of .
having that aroma and delicate taste known to belong to good beet tea . 1 he liquid from the bones was whitish-grey , troubled and opaque , having a very slight odour , and a not agreeable taste . Nothing could be mote opposed than the two soups thus produced . In another experiment , he repeated this process with the addition of some vegetables , and even some drops of caramel . The beef-soup here maintained i ts delicious aroma , agreeably combined with that of the vegetables ; its limpidity was tire same , but its colour of course stronger . The bone-sottp had a dominant odour of vegetables , but its troubled and opaque aspect made it very unappetizing . From these experiences M . Payen concludes that the prejudice in favour of tlie addition of bones to the soup is—a prejudice ; and that , in fact * bones are uot at all nutritions . Now here we have to note a fallacy of some importance in physiology , and , what perhaps the reader will think even more important , a fallacy in the practical deduction . Two weeks ago we had occasion to show how empirical practice , as regards the feeding of cattle in early morning , was legitimized by science . Tradition was right , though it could give no reasons . We believe that the tradition respecting bone-Soup is right , and that Science can show why it is right ; although here , as in t he case of cattle feeding , by pointing out the real cause it limits and defines the practice . Had physiologists considered more accurately what Nutrition really is , they would not so easily have made the mistake of supposing gelatine to be non-nutritious . Nutrition is , at bottom , nothing but assimilation ; the process by which an organism selects from the substances in immediate contact with it those principles which arc like its own : thus albumen is assimilated by albumen , and
phosphate of lime assimilated by phosphate of lime ; thus an animal in whose structure bone is a constituent element , must have phosphate of lime given in its food , or its bones will perish ; , for it cannot make phosphates , it enn only assimilate them . As soon as this is clearly conceived the conclusion is inevitable , namely , that inorganic substances arc as necessanj to the nutrition of an animal as organic substances are ; and when the Gelatine Commission declared gelatine not to be nutritious because animals fed on gelatine died rapidly of inanition , a fallacy was propounded ; for even albumen itself , if made the sole food , would not prevent the animal from rapid starvation , and yet no one declares albumen not to be eminently nutritious . The truth is , no single element of food suffices for a complex structure . The organism can make nothing , it can only decompose and assimilate the products of such decomposition . To apply this reasoning to bone-soup will not be difficult . Observation . « 1 . 1 . •_ .. ___ -1 _ _ T « . _ .. « . _ . un . 1 4 i 1- * a !¦» r * ii <^ n n a Tirmll no ¦ + !¦» r % tune carnivorouuiuiums uuvuiuon uvjj ^ w > >^»
owly snowcu s mu » = > " «» *»•< - flesh , and digested them ; had they rejected them as they do hair and other indigestible materials , or as the actinia docs the shell of the muscle or crab winch it has swallowed ( after carefully assimilating the flesh—the actinia lias no bones or shell , therefore can livid no use for those substances and rejects thorn ) then , indeed , we might reasonably have supposed the animals did not find bones nutritious ; but as they digest and asaimilutc the bones , we assert the bones to be indispensable . Feed a dog on meat without bones , and give him no biscuit or other food , iu which axe the inorganic substances ho demands , and you will soon find him perish lot your meat be ever so nutritious . Chossat tried a similar experiment with pigeons : he deprived thorn of all chalk , except such aa they took in the grains on which they fed ; the consequence was that they all died of ( starvation . But do not let us quit the path of vulgar observation . On that , path we have met with the fact that animals cjit the bones ; we slmll further meet the fact
Mgdebn Painters. Modern Painters. Vol. T...
MGDEBN PAINTERS . Modern Painters . Vol . Til . Containing P * rt IV . Of Many Thing , By Joha Ruskin . M . A . Smith , Elder and C 3 o . We have a kmdness for Mr . Ruskiri , derived entirely from the reading of Ins books All men who think for themselves , or who have even wished to tbmk for themselves on matters of Art and Literature , owe him a great debt of gratitude for valuable teaching and hearty encouragement . A writer who has brought long and arduous study , literaly ability of the highest orderv earnestness , couragl , and extraordinary originality of view to the service of criticism on Art in tins country , has deserved well of his ^ readers , and has acquired very strong claims to their admiration andregard . Reeling this , we have no desure to dwell at length on , what we believe to be , the inherent defects of Ms . Ruskin ' s mental nature . We can find enough that is good , true , and beautiful in all his booksto atone for the blemishes which iflay deface themhere and thejfe -blemishes which we see with no unfriendly eyes—and which we sincerely deplore as obstacles that hinder Mr . Ruskin sadly In- his own earnest and noble purpose of following the truth himself , and of teaching it honestly to * The present volume , viewed as a literary achievement , is the highest . most striking evidence of the author ' s abilities that has yet been published . If it has all his former defects , it has more than his former merits . It shows the maturity of his powers of thought , and the perfection of his grace of style . Even where we differ with him most widely , even where we believe him to be most mischievously self-deluded , in his character of public teacher , we can still recognise the qualities of a great , if not always of a deliberate and impartial thinker . The minor defects of this volume we shall not attempt to particularise—for they are more than balanced by the minor beauties only : the main faults are , as it seems to us , first , a disposition on the author s P ^ t to _ see things too much in detail , to find out too many hidden meanings in the picture t
or poem which he is examining ; and secondly , a endency ™ »!; " < ; " = '" " ^ infallibility of theory , which leads him , unconsciously , to sub ? ut" * e m some places sophistry for reasoning , and occasionally to make his comparisons ( in the Irish phrase ) ' all on one side . " In founding a theory on general views which are quite correct , Mr . Rusldn does not appear ve iling to admit the influence of exceptional and particular cases , and seems no t to feel , and not to let his readers feel , the weakening effect on the universal truth o the ; theory which such cases must inevitably have In the chapters on the-Grand Style , " and elsewhere , at easily-recognisable intervals throughout the : boofc his desire to be infallibly right , and to prove his opponents to be » nfe lib y wrong , leads him into exaggerations , intricacies , straw-splittings . and Aimute perversions , which would look like unfairness , if we did not make full allowance for the peculiar tendencies of the writer ' s mind ; and did not always recognise his honesty of purpose . Has there ever been such a P henomenon in the world as a man with views indisputably right , or a man withiViews indisputably wrong ? If there has , where in the whole history of human controversy can any proof bo found of it ? « ... ! .: „»„ fi ,,, u « th « vo . laio » ?«• -- ¦ --
However , after all due stress Das been on ™; . . « . » .. --., must remain in his favour a large balance of rimira ^ - *^™ ™*^ has greatly increased in importance by hw ^^ X t ^^ vJ ! S > fSZ ^ this time on such various topic , that his second title Of Many H mga , w row * more expressive of what his book s really about , than the old t tie Mo era Painters" The onlv modern painter who gets much attention is Ai irnor . tsffit ;; - * & -v-. w . *« - - ***» ° viow '
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 23, 1856, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_23021856/page/15/
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