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BOOK THREE
PART 7
[p. 255]masticated. Indeed, there is no comparison between these two processes; we have only to consider what the stomach contains- phlegm, bile, pneuma, [innate] heat,
Note especially pneuma and innate heat, which practically stand for oxygen and the heat generated in oxidation. cf. p. 41, note 3.
and, indeed the whole substance of the stomach. And if one considers along with this the adjacent viscera like a lot of burning hearths around a great cauldron- to the right the liver, to the left the spleen, the heart above, and along with it the diaphragm (suspended and in a state of constant movement), and the omentum sheltering them all- you may believe what an extraordinary alteration it is which occurs in the food taken into the stomach.
How could it easily become blood if it were not previously prepared by means of a change of this kind? It
has already been shown
Book I., chap. x.
that nothing is altered all at once from one quality to its opposite. How then could bread, beef, beans, or any other food turn into blood if they had not previously undergone some other alteration? And how could the faeces be generated right away in the small intestine?
That is to say, faeces ar obviously altered food. This alteration cannot have taken place entirely in the small intestine : therefore alteration of food must take place in the stomach.
For what is there in this organ more potent in producing alteration than the factors in the stomach? Is it the number of the coats, or the way it is surrounded by neighbouring viscera, or the time that the food remains in it, or some kind of innate heat which it contains? Most assuredly the
intestines have the advantage of the stomach in none of these respects. For what possible reason, then, will objectors have it that bread may often remain a whole night in the stomach and still preserve its original qualities, whereas when once it is projected into the
