what is required for tissue-building; but in herbivora, probably, the albuminoids are not in excess of the requirements of the decomposing tissues. In this case, therefore, the whole of the albuminoids is used for tissue-making, and the whole of the amyloids for force-making. In this class, therefore, these two classes of food may be called tissue-food and force-food. The force of these animals, therefore, is derived partly from the decomposition of the tissues, but principally from the decomposition and combustion of the amyloids and fats.
Some physiologists speak of the amyloid and fat food as being burned to keep up the animal heat; but it is evident that the prime object in the body, as in the steam-engine, is not heat, but force. Heat is a mere condition and perhaps a necessary concomitant of the change, but evidently not the prime object. In tropical regions the heat is not wanted. In the steam-engine, chemical energy is first changed into heat, and heat into mechanical energy; in the body the change is, probably, much of it direct, and not through the intermediation of heat.
12. We see at once, from the above, why it is that plants cannot feed on elements, viz., because their food must be decomposed in order to create the organic matter out of which all organisms are built. This elevation of matter, which takes place in the green
